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Roster - Oklahoma City Thunder

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Trades. Book it.


Rolling Thunder: 30/09/2017

 

As the summer rolls on in Oklahoma, it’s become clear what the Thunder need to do in the immediate future for the roster: clear roster spots.

As is a now recurring problem for OKC every year, they currently have 17 guys all jostling for a spot on a stacked Thunder line-up that can only hold 15 guys. Key bench players, Dennis Schroder, Nikola Mirotic and JaVale McGee have all expressed interest in returning, which means only the departure of Larry Sanders brings change to the Thunder line up next season. So here’s the equation:

1 Roster spot. 3 rookies.

Zhou Qi: He’s a 7’2 big man out of China who needs to get a body, but he knows the game, can run the floor and has a 3 point shot. His size is an obvious benefit, but he also has good timing to block shots. He’s coming over and the Thunder so far have kept him far away from the trade table as their project big.

Luke Kennard: Kennard slipped in the draft a little to the Thunder at pick 17…the rich get richer. He had a strong summer league showing poise, good vision, good decision making and good shot selection, all key indicators for a guard at summer league where it’s usually an inefficient chuck fest. Remember Josh Selby? Me either. Kennard showed he’s definitely not a Redick clone and if he works on his D he could be in a rotation from the get go. There's reports he could be hard to keep off the floor already. In the Thunder’s roster predicament however, he’s a prime trade target in a squad that has few spots for development.

Tyler Lydon: Lydon too showed some game at summer league and he too slid to the Thunder at pick 31. He wasn’t their 1st choice here, but can you deny an athletic stretch big who just needs the guidance to play hard on all plays to become a rotation player? At the least he should carve a NLL career as a sweet shooting big man. But, again, the space for developing players is limited on the Thunder’s roster.

 

Unless there’s some outside noise for a current Thunder player, the likelihood is that we will only see 1 of these rookies on the Thunder next season. At this time it would seem that Zhou has the inside track given the Thunder’s wing player depth. With multiple draft pick offers for Tyler Lydon already, it is expected he’s out the door. But, will Kennard follow or will there be a 2 of 1 deal elsewhere that sees him sign and play behind a combination of JRich, Sauce Castilo and Patrick McCaw?

 

GM Nenjabin is hot on the trade phones discussing with multiple teams. There will be movement in the coming weeks before Free Agency. Stay tuned.

- OKC News

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