Early Comps For Cooper Flagg After Lighting Up Summer League | Fan After Dark

Early Comps For Cooper Flagg After Lighting Up Summer League | Fan After Dark

Well, how about that? And another DFW team, Dallas Mavericks have an impact player in Cooper Flag. Impact players, two summer league games, 63 total minutes out of 80 uh minutes that could have been played in the two summer league games. If you wanted to watch Cooper Flag in person or on TV, you got exactly what you paid for. He was not sitting on the bench. He was in there playing point guard, bringing the ball up the court, uh dribbling, shooting, showing the whole setting up the offense, catching great defense. played great defense, blocks. I mean, even the one where he had the monster dunk in the fourth quarter, he ends up making the block on the other end um right before I think it was the third quarter, right before the the quarter ends. Like, you are just I’m not going to overreact this summer be like, “This guy’s going to be an MVP or this guy’s going to be terrible.” But you saw little increments of what it can be. And I just think this Dallas Mavericks team, if it’s not already obvious, is going to look a lot different. They’re going to be up and down the court. They’re gonna be a team that’s defensive heavy that’s obviously got bigs. I mean, Cooper Flag’s gonna be like there’s gonna be two guys taller than him on the court most time with Cooper Flag on the court. And this guy’s like I already said in the first segment, pause. Guy’s long. He takes up a lot of space on the court. No, he’s a big dude. Fortune favors the bull. It absolutely does. Nico, I’ll say this. Who Who is your player comp after two games? I have mine. I don’t know if it’s 100% accurate, but the guy he reminded me the most of for Cooper Flag and and I feel pretty confident like I was like every almost every play I was like he seems like a more athletic version of this player and if not Kawhi Leonard. No, I don’t think he’s like Kawhi Leonard either. Um I think he’s got a midame like Kawhi, but that’s about it. I think to me he remind he’s a bigger Scotty Pippen is the way he reminds me right now. Anybody Anybody currently in the league? M mine’s a mine’s a debatable top 10 player that he reminds me a lot of. Who’s yours? Mine was Jason Tatum. No, I mean I’ve heard that I’ve heard that uh watching him in the mid-range even the way he attacks the basket where it’s like it doesn’t look like he’s about to score a dunk and next thing you know he just rises up from three four feet and puts it behind his back and dunks it like a young Jason Tatum obviously cuz he’s young. Uh the three ball shot where it’s very like I don’t know how you would say like a tall follow through if you will. All right. Um, he does need to kind of work on the wrist and the elbow kind of flares out. He’s got he’s got a funky looking shot. Um, I mean, but I’m not worried about it. I mean, it’s going to get better over time. I mean, here’s what I love about it. He’s not afraid to pull it. He’s not afraid of I mean, in that second game, the first three he made was about as confident as it gets. He’s about to drive. Pulls it back between his legs and just pulls up right like that’s a smooth looking I’ve made a hundred of these shots before. That was not the first time I shot that shot. So, I was uber impressed in that second game. less about the counting stats, but just about how comfortable he looked on the court. Like I said in the first segment, him attacking the basket, finishing with the left and right. Like when you have that’s a three I saw a three-level scorer right there. And there’s not that many highlevel three-level scorers in NBA. We know guys that can finish at the rim, guys that can shoot, guys can do mid-range. There’s not. That’s why they kind of get to Jason Tatamish. like I don’t know if he’s going to be phenomenal, the best in the league at one thing, but he’s it looks like he’s going to be a jack of all trades and a B+ to an A minus in pretty much everything on the court, which is and that’s why the Scott the Scotty Pippen comp is plays for me because I I think we forget and you know, not to get on a side tangent or anything like that, but that’s I mean that’s what Scotty was, right? I mean that’s I mean that dude did everything. He could probably better shooter than Scotty though. Oh, absolutely. Cuz Scotty had a funky shot. He really did. Uh but Scotty, but here the thing though, Scotty would yam on you. And and that’s the thing about Cooper Flag is Cooper Flag will yam on you, dude. He’s already had two in the summer league where he has tried to Oh, no. He’s tried to kill people. Oh, I’m here for it. And the this the one in the second game where he literally like puts it on his hip. I mean, he’s over here jumping from the middle of the the the lane for crying out loud. Okay, here’s uh Tim Ko, who was on earlier today. This is uh his Cooper flag takeaways. There are millions and millions of Mavericks fans and there are, you know, every single person has their own relationship to the team and certainly some looked at the Luca trade and said, you know, it’s just they they they can’t keep uh, you know, they they can’t keep it up. But I would say that a majority of Mavericks fans, even the spurned ones, even the ones, you know, who hated the trade, and that is the majority of them. But I I would say even then, the majority of Mavericks fans want to root for the Mavericks. And Cooper Flag is an avenue to feel joy again to to feel like it’s not just negative news cycle after negative news cycle. Certainly, you know, even for my place in the media, I am very very very grateful uh that that there is something exciting to talk about. It’s not fun. It’s not enjoyable to go, you know, on our DLS show every single day, uh, weeks and weeks and weeks in a row and, uh, you know, be scrging for, you know, like was is Brandon Williams a most improved player candidate for next season? Uh, you know, like just being able to talk about Cooper Flag and and who he was at summer league is uh, I I I feel a sense of relief and I can only imagine how much Mavericks fans feel that even more. And he was he was good. He was really good. I thought, you know, and his first game, obviously, you struggled. The second one uh may be the best performance uh in in Vegas or or you know, if not, it’s it’s going to be something close to that. And and that’s what everybody wanted to see, you know, like Drew Timmy is also balling out in summer league. So, you know, like the the the Nets player and you know, so balling out in summer league. Uh you know, it it’s it’s it’s good to do it. It’s certainly better to do it than not. You know, if if Cooper had had another quiet game, uh I would come on here and tell you how good he is and how good he’s going to be and why not to worry about that stuff. But it’s certainly easier and better and and feels, you know, better and feels more true to who Cooper is going to be next season that he did have this game and, you know, that second game where he balled out and showed us why he is, you know, probably the best collegiate freshman, the best collegiate prospect since Anthony Davis. My bad. Brandon Williams catching a stray in the middle of that talking about most improved player said we don’t want to come out here and talk about that. I do I want to hear Brandon Williams most improved player talks. Uh speaking of point guards, um the hype died down quick for our boy Nimhard. Well, Nimhard is ready to take Russell’s spot after game one. I I didn’t we didn’t get into that too much on uh on Sunday with CA, but yeah, one for 10. He was overwhelmed. You could see the ceiling. You could see the I’m a small guard that has a ceiling and and Harper and and and them boys for the Spurs were all over him. He could barely dribble. Well, and and look, did you hear what the coach said after the game? Who for the Mavs? No, we just got to we got to get him open. We did a bad job getting him open. I mean, cuz our boy Nick Ang said asked him like, “What was the the size difference? How do you, you know, help him develop?” It’s like, “We we need to do a good job getting him open. He’s your point guard.” What? Yeah. I Yeah, that’s that’s I mean just set more screens I guess. I don’t know who was it. I’m trying to think. Was it Was it Gilbert Arenus? Somebody on a podcast and I can’t remember which one it was. It just said like you know unless you can score in today’s NBA good luck being a small point guard. Yeah. Fred Van Fleet they can that’s stocking can and that’s about right. And and again he’s been in the league for what almost eight nine years now. So he’s and he’s he’s kind of been there done that. Think about it. Kyle Lowry say, “Oh, they got a little caboose there.” Look, let me tell you something. Kyle Lowry is a thick ass dude. Okay. Wow. Pause. Wow. This guy just You’ll get to say pause after that. You went all in. I mean, he didn’t even have to say it like that. We already knew what we were talking about. He said, “Let me say the full sentence.” He is. I mean, I don’t care. He’s a He’s a He’s got a caboose. I mean, Kyle Lowry and I’ll tell you what, Kyle Lowry has whether it’s been in Houston, whether it’s been in Toronto. Uh, but now but I want to say Kyle Lowry is about 6’2 63. Is he? Yeah. Under six foot. Yeah, he’s definitely No. No. I want to say Kyle Lowry’s about 6’2 63. Who’s under six foot in the NBA? Do we know, bro? I don’t even know if anybody’s even under six. Well, put it this way. Nobody that you know of. I’m sure there is. I mean, thinking hard enough. I think Fred is. Here’s the thing. If they’re listed at 6 feet tall, they’re probably 5’11. 510. So, if Ryan Nhard’s listed at 6 feet tall, he’s probably 5’10. But he looks small out on the court. Nobody that’s good. Jose Alvarezo Mike Connley. DaVon Mitchell. Yeah. Brad Van Vleet. So, you know, uh yeah, it’s rough. That’s rough. Look, does is is Ryan Nimhard I mean, let’s put it this way. Is Ryan Nimhard going to be better than Jaden Hardy? No. That that’s the question. Does he make the roster in any capacity or is he just your two-way guy? He’ll be a two-way GLeague guy. Okay. And and I’m okay with that. If somebody were to get hurt, you know, he’s there. This team’s And we saw that last year. Well, exactly. But I I mean I I Miles Kelly, him maybe a center. Let’s be real. The wheels fell off when you made the Luca trade. Mhm. Okay. The the the the wheels to this basketball team figuratively and literally fell off. There’s always positive to bring out of it, though. You found a lot of diamonds in a rough of Brandon Williams. you you had to sign a million two-way guys that are now like you you got a lot of potential out of them and you got a lot of help where like you said shout out to Jason Kid for still holding this team afloat and not quit bottoming out and being the worst team in the league after that. Like they had their two three games where they were terrible after Luca Trey when they got beat by 50 by the Cavs. Well, and that team was in shock after that. I mean you I mean they got beat by like 100 by the I mean that game was over after the first quarter. Okay. Like that was a It was like 76 to like 30. It was rough. It It was a rough It was a rough go, but [Music]

Though he only played two games in the Summer League, Cooper Flagg left quite the impression on Mavs fans and the NBA world. Fred and Blake look back at his performance in Vegas and give some comparisons to what he could develop into.

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