The Thunder had two 1st round picks, #21 where they took Mitch McGary (F/C Michigan) and #29 where they took Josh Huestis (SF/PF Stanford), and acquired #55 Semaj Christon (SG Xavier) from the Hornets. The controversial portion of this news is that Huestis was apparently picked solely for their D-League team, a strategy that no NBA team has yet employed; we'll see if it bears fruit. I would suggest that not drafting Cleanthony Early (SG/SF Wichita State) is the real head-scratcher: they could've had a local-ish guy who fits their offensive scheme that I am convinced is going to be a good player and instead they draft a guy for another team's bench. I don't get it. This is how you support KD and Westbrook?
Indeed, I don't get much of anything OKC has done over the years. Last year this team had 7 guys that played 78 or more games: Durant, Ibaka, Derek Fisher, Collison, Adams, Jackson, Lamb. That's a lot of wear and tear for not much (outside of KD and Ibaka) production. Throw in that down the stretch they gave big minutes to Caron Butler and still rely heavily on Kendrick Perkins and you see why Durant won his MVP: he carried this team by himself to the 2nd best record in the league, I can understand that Durant and Westbrook are the focus, they are handling the ball the majority of the time, they are the vast majority of the production (and the salary cap) and you don't want to have too many guys getting in the way of that. But why not give them some support? Why not bulk up the bench depth? Why not look to the future? As much praise as the OKC front office deserves for drafting well for three straight years, they deserve blame for not doing much of anything else since. Their big free agent signings this summer were Anthony Morrow (yawn) and Sebastain Telfair (spit take!). This is how you plan on luring Durant back to OKC when his contract is up?
That said, I still expect OKC to finish 2nd or maybe 3rd in the West and probably get at least to the conference finals. KD is that good, man. And Westbrook is too. They've got 2 of the best players in the league even if they've got the sorriest depth around behind them. We'll see if Perry Jones, Andre Roberson and Lamb can develop. We'll see what they can get out of McGary and Telfair. Going forward extending KD and re-signing Reggie Jackson will keep them busy next summer. Until then just ride KD and Westbrook as far they can carry you.
If I were KD my bags would already be packed, I'd have apartments in 5 or 6 different cities just in case and I'd have my agent ready to get the Melo/Love-style trade complaint machine ready to go. If I were Westbrook I'd be taking notes on how KD orchestrates his removal from this kooky franchise.
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