Nicolas Batum
i dont think he will ever exceed someone like melo...but his ceiling is prob higher than rudy gay's just because of his defensive potential to be the next pippen. his shot keeps getting better and he knows how to geet off his own shot now and its fun to see but as for him ever surpassing melo i just dont see it....i think melo is very underrated as a superstar....melo and KD are 1 and 2 when it comes to scoring at will. melo just needs the drive that got lebron his ring last year.
but batum is still young and i can see him staying as a top 5 sf for a long time
Melo and Lebron are both SFs even though there teams play small sometimes and they play out of position they are SFs. That being said the only SFs better than Batum right now are Lebron, Durant, and Melo. I am talking about right now so I am leaving some guys out who some may think are better.
Man it's ridiculous how low people rate Rudy Gay's standing as a player, if you were watching Memphis vs OKC the other day you would've seen Gay match Durant shot for shot, and play solid D while doing it. He was a big part of why they won that game and he's much improved this year, but people are putting Batum ahead of him?
I like Batum, I think he's a great defender, and an underrated scorer, but while he has a nice shot and a nice handle for his size, he still struggles to create his own looks and will never be a go-to guy offensively. To put him in the top-5 conversation ahead of guys who do similar things (score and defend) like Deng and Iguodala seems a tad bit premature.
i posted about this about a week or so ago, but batum is playing great.. his combinations of blocks steals and 3's is just nasty, not to mention hes almost averaging 7 boards... he will never be the scorer that melo or rudy gay were but he will have a way larger defensive presence.
I wouldn't put melo and rudy gay in the same sentence when you're talking about scoring or defense. Melo is one of the best scorers in the league and doesn't put much effort into defense. Rudy Gay is a solid scorer but no where near Melo's efficiency, especially in crunch time.
Batum looks like he might fit somewhere in the middle both scoring and defense wise, which is one well rounded package. Let's go Blazers.
I don't know if anyones posted anything about the dude since the seasons started, but he's playing like an all star. 20 pts, 6 rebs, 3 asts, 2 stls and a block with excellent percentages. He's always been looked at as a complete package in terms of skillset, but this year he's taking full advantage of his ability playing both ends of the floor extremely well. He's still only 23! The Blazers are finally reaping the rewards of their patience.
Whats the likelihood he maintains something close to this production for his career? And if he actually gets better, whats his ceiling? I think he's a top 5 SF right now, with the potential to exceed Rudy Gay and maybe Carmelo.