Lauri Markkanen - Utahin Marsalkka: All-NBA Snub

[Cassity14]

He can't stay in front of good 3's or when he gets switched onto a guard. It worked with Allen and Mobley behind him and I think it can still work with those guys at the 4 & 5 during the regular season. I suspect he would get abused in a playoff series (who could he guard against Miami, Boston, Milwaukee, or a full strength Brooklyn?), but we have to get there first before we worry about that. The playoffs this year have once again demonstrated that mobile size is invaluable.

To answer your question, I think he would be fine against Lopez, and could even be the primary guy on Giannis for brief stretches. He could certainly bother Tatum with his length or defend lesser role players like Horford or Williams just fine in my opinion. Against Brooklyn the answer is pretty obvious: Simmons.

When you have an incredible defender like Mobley next to Lauri and a rim protector like Allen to anchor the defense, you can get away with a lot. Mark is in the ideal situation to cover up his deficiencies on both ends of the court.

 

[Dr No]

To answer your question, I think he would be fine against Lopez, and could even be the primary guy on Giannis for brief stretches. He could certainly bother Tatum with his length or defend lesser role players like Horford or Williams just fine in my opinion. Against Brooklyn the answer is pretty obvious: Simmons.

When you have an incredible defender like Mobley next to Lauri and a rim protector like Allen to anchor the defense, you can get away with a lot. Mark is in the ideal situation to cover up his deficiencies on both ends of the court.

Mobley certainly helps a bunch. But if Laurie guards Lopez, who does Allen guard? The whole team shoots 3's so you'd end up pulling your protection away from the rim and watching Giannis go for 40. We played well vs Miami in the regular season, but I think they are a rough matchup for us in a series. Against Brooklyn, Laurie on Simmons probably means they go small and you'd then have Allen and Mobley chasing Durant and Harris all over creation. I agree with you on Boston. I think we match up pretty well with them. Williams, Horford & Smart are such that we could give a lot of help on Tatum and Brown. That said - I think Laurie is our best option at the moment and I think we can become a playoff team with him at the 3 - I don't think he's a bad player. I just think he's going to have problems matching up in a series against teams with shooting and mobility.

 

[Lee]

I like Lauri, he has a use on a championship team, he did much better at SF than I expected, but championship teams, heck playoff teams, since to have a facilitator at SF. Lauri is not that. GS has Draymond playing that role at pf/c, but they also have other playmakes besides him and Steph.

I really think longterm Lauri is our first big off the bench. His shooting will be valuable. I dont know who our future SF is, not sure he is in the draft or on the team. We will see. Maybe Mobley becomes a better passer? But really all the things Mobley does well, being a 2nd or 3rd playmaking option is not one of them. I could be wrong though.

 

[Swuul]

Lauri Markkanen is probably going to play for Team Finland (nicknamed "Susijengi" aka "Wolfpack"***) in the World Cup qualifiers against Sweden and Kroatia (the game against Kroatia is an away match, so Markkanen would have to get permission from the Army for that). The national team coach also hopes Markkanen will take part in the European Championship tournament, but that again depends on the Army and NBA/Cleveland to give permission for that.
The Google translated article from the national broadcasting company YLE site:

Lassi Tuovi astuu heti tällä viikolla Henrik Dettmannin saappaisiin â Lauri Markkanen mukana MM-karsintaryhmässä

Suomi viimeistelee sopimuksia vakuutusyhtiöiden ja NBA:n kanssa, jotta Lauri Markkanen voi pelata MM-karsinnoissa. Henrik Dettmannin mukaan kyse on muodollisuuksista.

yle-fi.translate.goog

***Finnish national teams in different sports are called with different animal names. National hockey team is called "Lions", national football (soccer) team is called "Owls", national floor-ball team is called "Hornets", and national basketball team is called "Wolfpack". Each of those nick-names has a story attached to them, as is the case for all nicknames

 

[Mr. Magic]

Lauri opened his summer training a lil bit in his latest interviews for finnish media. It's notable that he is training with same physical coach (his friend from his hometown) that he used also last summer. After his first Cavs season Lauri said that his early shooting slump was cause of... he didn't have his legs (same story every year). He said that he had to play against faster opponents at SF and it did affect to his shooting. So question is why he did choose same physical coach then? No idea. Maybe 'cause they are wiser now. FINnisher said that they have been training smaller players stuff rather than bigs. Ball handling and passing for example. Lauri also revealed some weight por* for fans. He said that he does front squat with "just" 100 kg now. And he also mentioned that his bench press is trending down. He prob can't do big sets with 100kg anymore. Prob with 90 kg. So seems that strategy is to get leaner and quicker for next season.

 

[stick]

Good info @Swuul and @Mr. Magic , appreciate it!

Lauri doing more small player training is interesting. No doubt the recommendation came from the Cavs FO/his role last year. The days of him being the 5 on the court seem over. 3/4 position emphasis makes a lot of sense for the Cavs and I think it suits Lauri well. His advantages come from shooting at his size and athleticism attacking the basket with some runway. He was solid at swinging the ball and surprised me a little with his drives to the basket from the three point line. Slimming down should will help with attacking closeouts from defenders.

If his legs aren't supporting as much weight and that positivity impacts/helps mitigate shooting slumps and helps with movement around the court on defense...? Yes, please!

 

[Dunkqvist]

Lauri Markkanen is probably going to play for Team Finland (nicknamed "Susijengi" aka "Wolfpack"***) in the World Cup qualifiers against Sweden and Kroatia (the game against Kroatia is an away match, so Markkanen would have to get permission from the Army for that). The national team coach also hopes Markkanen will take part in the European Championship tournament, but that again depends on the Army and NBA/Cleveland to give permission for that.
The Google translated article from the national broadcasting company YLE site:

Lassi Tuovi astuu heti tällä viikolla Henrik Dettmannin saappaisiin â Lauri Markkanen mukana MM-karsintaryhmässä

Suomi viimeistelee sopimuksia vakuutusyhtiöiden ja NBA:n kanssa, jotta Lauri Markkanen voi pelata MM-karsinnoissa. Henrik Dettmannin mukaan kyse on muodollisuuksista.

yle-fi.translate.goog

***Finnish national teams in different sports are called with different animal names. National hockey team is called "Lions", national football (soccer) team is called "Owls", national floor-ball team is called "Hornets", and national basketball team is called "Wolfpack". Each of those nick-names has a story attached to them, as is the case for all nicknames

To my knowledge Lauri did never appear to his military service location this year. At least he not by deadline. So maybe later.... There have been some instagram posts by Bemorebasketball, so obviously he is sticking with his previous summer coach. I would have liked that change but lets hope they figure out some new moves.

 

[Adam]

Good info @Swuul and @Mr. Magic , appreciate it!

Lauri doing more small player training is interesting. No doubt the recommendation came from the Cavs FO/his role last year. The days of him being the 5 on the court seem over. 3/4 position emphasis makes a lot of sense for the Cavs and I think it suits Lauri well. His advantages come from shooting at his size and athleticism attacking the basket with some runway. He was solid at swinging the ball and surprised me a little with his drives to the basket from the three point line. Slimming down should will help with attacking closeouts from defenders.

If his legs aren't supporting as much weight and that positivity impacts/helps mitigate shooting slumps and helps with movement around the court on defense...? Yes, please!

I also would not be surprised if Kevin Love didn't some what influence it. He has demonstrated the value of getting your weight down.

 

[Sebastian]

To my knowledge Lauri did never appear to his military service location this year. At least he not by deadline. So maybe later.... There have been some instagram posts by Bemorebasketball, so obviously he is sticking with his previous summer coach. I would have liked that change but lets hope they figure out some new moves.

That's interesting about his service, given everything that is happening.

That said, in my experience there is very little advantage to being 7-feet tall in the Army!

Do you think he was given a waiver to not to train with his unit?

 

[sailfish]

Markannens shooting and spacing is important for this team. We will absolutely be playing plenty of minutes with him at the 3 next time Mobley and Allen.

I just know that in the most important game of the year to make the playoffs, Markannen was shooting the hell out of the ball. He had 26 pts 8 reb 2 stow 1 block. He was +8. Garland and Mobley were +2 and +3 respectively. LeVert was even. One handed Allen was -3.

Rondo was -18. Okoro -14. Love -8

Mark is not even 25 years old. He’s a big piece of this core. I think we’re going to see an absolutely excellent season out of him as probably our starting 3 this year.

Even if we draft a guy like Daniels, Eason or Dieng, to just throw them into the starting lineup that desperately needs a spacer like Markannen.

The rookie wing we hopefully get should absolutely play big minutes. But to just slot them at the starting 3 could really hurt our chances to win right away.

A rookie like Mobley who comes in and instantly contributes to winning at the level he did is just…a rare and extremely valuable thing.

Most of the time it’s a Jalen Green or Cade situation where even if these guys had decent rookie years they basically didn’t do shit to add any wins to their teams record throughout the year.

Even a rookie as well polished and good as Kyrie didn’t really have an effect on winning(then again Kyries never really had lan effect on winning besides the 2016 finals lol..just looking at on-off and advanced stats )

The best way to develop Eason, Daniels, Dieng, Sochan or whoever we end up drafting will be to bring them off the bench, but also to give them time throughout the game with various Garland/Mobley lineups. But most importantly to give them the time and space and opportunity to work on their game without it also being a prsssure cooker type of situation.

We were good with Lauri starting alongside our towers. He’s a good fit. If it isn’t broke, no need to fix it. We need to go into the season with LeVert at the 2, Lauri at the 3. And we need to get hopefully a good 20-30 straight healthy games after hopefully a healthy training camp to truly evaluate that lineup and LeVert specifically.

If the Cavs are committed to Lauri as a SF, I’d like to see him drop a little weight and work on his quickness, particularly his lateral quickness, as he needs to get better defensively at that spot. He also will need to be able to put the ball on the court and take his man off the dribble, when teams crowd him, as is likely with the kind of shooter he is.

 

[sailfish]

I think the Cavs should experiment with Mobley defending the 3 in those situations and playing Lauri at the 4. Mobley defends really well in space, and as he matures and grows more comfortable, he can be more of a Swiss army knife defensively.

Mobley is trying to get stronger & gain weight this offseason. When that happens, a guy usually loses some quickness. Hopefully not too much, but, when Mobley comes back, I think he’s going to be more of a stretch 4 and small ball 5.

 

[dark2332]

Mobley is trying to get stronger & gain weight this offseason. When that happens, a guy usually loses some quickness. Hopefully not too much, but, when Mobley comes back, I think he’s going to be more of a stretch 4 and small ball 5.

Mobley’s frame can easily support 15-20 more pounds of muscle without losing quickness.

If anything, some added muscle might make him more explosive.

At some point, yes, muscle mass is going to impact you negatively from a speed standpoint, but Mobley is so rail thin that he’s actually getting in better shape with good weight here.

Think Giannis, and Giannis put on something like 40-50 lbs in his career. We’re talking 15-20 lbs here for Mobley, shouldn’t be a hindrance.

 

[sailfish]

Mobley’s frame can easily support 15-20 more pounds of muscle without losing quickness.

If anything, some added muscle might make him more explosive.

At some point, yes, muscle mass is going to impact you negatively from a speed standpoint, but Mobley is so rail thin that he’s actually getting in better shape with good weight here.

Think Giannis, and Giannis put on something like 40-50 lbs in his career. We’re talking 15-20 lbs here for Mobley, shouldn’t be a hindrance.

It depends upon the guy, the type of weight they put on, and how their frame supports it. I can tell from Mobley's face that he's already put weight on. Mobley has great feet for a big guy and, hopefully, putting on weight doesn't affect that too much.

 

[CavsKermit]

Mobley is trying to get stronger & gain weight this offseason. When that happens, a guy usually loses some quickness. Hopefully not too much, but, when Mobley comes back, I think he’s going to be more of a stretch 4 and small ball 5.

I'd argue that if Mobley develops a jumper, then you can use both him and Lauri interchangeably on offense. So long as there's enough space for folks to operate, it doesn't really matter what position you play those two at offensively. But when we play teams with true superstar types at the 3, it would be nice if Mobley could slide out and guard those guys.

 

[cavsfever]

I’m very skeptical about Mobley gaining weight. His greatest asset defensively is his quickness and mobility. Banging in the middle should never be his game, sacrificing any ability to close out on the perimeter to do that would be a big mistake.

He should be working relentlessly on improving his three point shot over the summer