Nikki Teasley ready to FIGHT for her roster spot. Pic by "Big Smooth", on Twitter.
According to the WNBA Transactions page, the Dream have waived Marlies Gipson. There has been no announcement on the transaction page of the waiver of Chantelle Anderson. We'll assume that the reason that the WNBA hasn't reported it is because Chantelle reported it first; and that Chantelle is indeed gone.
We'll also assume that Leuchanka is going to be a no-show. This leaves the Dream with a roster of 12 players.
C Snow
F/C de Souza
F Lacy
F Lyttle
G/F Castro Marques
G Latta
G Young
G C. Miller
G Teasley
F Holdsclaw
G/F McCoughtry
G Lehning
With just one cut away from a final roster, one would think, "Oh, it's easy. Lehning will go." However, I've heard the names Coco Miller, Tamera Young, and even Ivory Latta mentioned as possible trade/waivers.
There could be some drama in that last week of the preseason. Stay tuned.
15 comments:
Wow. The "leuchanka is never coming" rumor just won't die. I think we have to make sure she comes to visit you personally at a game, if she does come. In some ways it might be esier for the mgt if she did not, becuase when you look at the new roster that means some really hard choices.
That being said, you are right that the final cut (plus one more when Leuchanka does show up if she does, which would not be til late June) will be really hard, and may involve not so obviouos cuts involving popular players which means your list is probably right too in terms of the bubble. Lehning has looked really good and picking up Coco out of the blue was a huge get, but of course that makes things very messy when figuring out who to cut this week. Ivory not being a pure point guard but also not being a great shooting guard due to her height has to put her on the bubble even though she is popular. Young is super fast and a strong defender but still can't seem to shoot that well in games and Angle is so obviously way better than her. Coco hustles all over the place and is a veteran who can shoot well and play all positions, but is not a pure scorer at all. Lehning is tall and showing good skills for a rookie at point in terms of leading on the court, but is definitely not a scorer at all.
Tough stuff.
Actually, it doesn't look to be a tough decision at all. Cut Lehning and stick with the remaining 11 until Leuchanka shows up. Lehning is a true PG, but she has yet to show she can put the ball in the hole. In this WNBA, you have to show an ability to score. She needs to go overseas to refine her skills if she's ever going to play in the WNBA.
For continuity purposes, keep Young and Latta and hope they'll develop (even though you know they won't). They can be replaced next season if need be.
I don't know who is actually on the bubble, but personally I would take Coco and Lehning over Latta any day. Latta is popular, but that hides that the kid has never really learned how to play point. She dribbles with her head down a lot which is amazing at this level. She can shoot okay, but is too short to get it off unless she is wide open. This team has plenty of offense, why keep a 3 pt shooter who can't run the offense over a much taller point guard who can truly lead and run the offense?
Roster flexibility is why you keep Latta over Lehning. Latta isn't much of a point guard, but she does have a scoring mentality that is valuable in a 10-12 mpg role. You can even play her alongside Teasley if a SG is injured or in foul trouble. That can't be done with Lehning, who can't shoot and needs the ball to be effective. We don't have the time or the resources to develop a PG, so we need as many "what you see is what you get" players at that position. We already know what Latta brings at the WNBA level. She can't run a team, but she can score. We don't know what Lehning brings. She could be great or she could be a dud. In my opinion, she would not have been the 25th player selected in a weak draft if she was truly a great point guard-to-be.
If this were a 12 or 13-player roster with better options at PG and SG, I would go with Lehning to see if she develops into something halfway decent. With the reduced roster and high premium being placed on scoring, we have to stick with Latta. Lehning can try to run a team all day until her feet are sore, but this team won't win unless she's a threat to score. Right now, she isn't. Given we only have 11 roster spots, we can't afford to keep her around long enough for her to develop a shot or make her fast enough to get to the rim at this level.
I have not seen enough of Lehning to join the debate, but I can tell you this - latta is only a scorer when she shoots a lot. Her percentage is not great and she takes a lot of bad shots along with her open 3s. Last year it was okay becuase the team was so bad, but this year there is way too much talent to have her hopping around throwing up bad shots or getting posted up by the other team's much taller SG. Sadly, I think her days in the WNBA are numbered...partly because she has not improved her skills as a point or shooting guard either one since college.
I will say that taller solid PGs are a premium in this league. Don't know if Lehning is amazing or not, but with everything else on this team offensively you might not need her to do much if she can simply run the offesne right when Teasley is resting.
Again, with the reduced roster spots, it is more valuable to have a back-up guard on the roster who is capable of scoring than it is to have a player who can only run an offense. I am no fan of Latta, but we need her proven scoring more than we need a rookie true PG who can't score and would require too many minutes just to show she cannot cut it in this league without a reliable jump shot and lack of foot speed.
As said before, I am no fan of Latta, but I do know one thing. Teams can't sag off Latta like they'd be able to do with Lehning. Lehning can attempt to run a team all day, but it's hard to run offense when you're playing four-on-five in this league. Latta won't be a WNBA player for much longer (a goner once her rookie deal is up), but at least she does have WNBA experience and has shown that she can score the ball. That keeps teams from doubling our talented bigs. Lehning, on the other hand, is nothing but hype at this point. She needs development and this is not the team for that.
I think I would side with the anon commenter on Lehning if she is good enough, because Ivory showed last year she is a disaster at running the point. Sure she can score a litle, but if Teasley starts to ache midseason the Dream will lose games if Latta has to run point....Tesaley cant play 40 min every night....I think Coco can probaly run point a little bit but I am guessing Lehning is a whole lot better at that than coco....I also think Lehning probably can shoot better than she shows but just does not focus on it first (unlike Latta)....I am guessing Dream will wimp out and not cut Latta just because she is so popular, but maybe not...
All of this debate about lehning and latta hides the real issue no one will talk about. Dream first round pick from last year better start taking better shots - and making them - or she is going to be someone else's project. If you watched the preseason game you saw Angel make Tamera look like the rookie.
Tamera wasn't really hitting shots overseas, so what makes anyone think she'll do so over here? She will make the opening day roster because we don't need the "what if?" drama that will come up. You guys know what I'm talking about, too. The "what if the Dream took Tasha Humphrey instead?" drama of 2008. If she's not hitting by midseason, then I can see her being cut.
Anonymous who posted after me, Lehning shot 27% from three and hit less than 50 of them in her entire career. Shooter she is not. I've never seen her hit anything other than a lay-up, and she won't be getting those in the WNBA against this level of athleticism and size.
As for the Latta/Lehning debate, I have one question. Why didn't Meadors just send Latta to LA rather than send the other 1st round pick if she's that bad at running a team? It's because she has experience. If Teasley's knees give out mid-season, it's better to have a back-up player who's already been in the system at least a year as opposed to having one who hasn't proven herself to be WNBA caliber.
Aint no bad feelings about not taking Tasha Humphrey, everyone knoews her real issues and I bet Marynell knew, and notice that DC has kept her in hiding off the roster all during camp with a vague injury. One of my friends who works at Detroit told me rumor was Laimbeer apparently offered Tasha for Tamera straight up last year before the DC trade happened. Laimbeer knew and Detroit staff knew her issues.
From waht I hear, Latta has not
Just catching up on this blog, and found this set of comments very interesting. Wish this was over on Rebkell where we could see who was commenting and get wider input. No one seems to be too focused on the Ivory/Coco/Shalee/Tamera debate anywhere else. It is obvious that no matter what the Dream does that it is going to upset someone - that is the hard reality of cutting to 11, especially for this team that added so much new talent.
Looks like someone did put it on Rebkell after all, and predictably the MM bashers come out saying that Ivory's issues are due to MM instead of the fact Ivory simply is not WNBA material. Coco plays better D and sadly would be a better PG than Ivory, which is not saying much for Ivory, not an endorsement of Coco at PG. Shalee is the PG Ivory could have been if she had actually gotten good coaching somewhere in her career before the pros, but instead she was encouraged to shoot like crazy which worked until everyone got tall. Cold hard reality is that if the Dream cut Ivory then I don't think she would ever play in the W again...but whether MM will have the guts to make the right call will remain to be seen.
If the Dream cut Ivory, there would be no less than three teams ready to pick her up right away. Let's not get ridiculous here. She's still a talent despite her shortcomings (no pun intended) and I still feel that she, along with the versatile Coco and Tamera "Lil Smooth" Young, will make the opening day roster. Whether they, especially Ivory, remain on the roster until the end of the season is up to Marynell and them.
So much for my prediction! Congratulations to Shalee and good luck to Ivory in the future.
FYI I heard from a Dream staffer that Shalee was draining open 3s in practice game situations and scrimmages. I think she is probably a better shooter than people realize if all she has to do is knock down open ones created by people sagging. Pleasant Dreams you pegged this one early - this did turn out to be quite a bit dramatic!
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