The Thunder have four ongoing positional battles
Heading into the 2015-16 season, the Oklahoma City Thunder have four positional battles that new head coach Billy Donovan has to figure out.
The battles: starting shooting guard (Andre Roberson vs. Anthony Morrow vs. Dion Waiters), starting center (Steven Adams vs. Enes Kanter), fourth big man (Mitch McGary vs. Nick Collison) and backup point guard (D.J. Augustin vs. Cameron Payne).
Donovan isn't stressing about determing who starts or plays just yet, as he's trying to get a grasp on the roster's strengths and weaknesses, and which players fit into different roles.
“This is going to sound like a coaching cliché,” Donovan told The Daily Oklahoman. “But I'm not really right now wrapped up in who's starting and who's not. What I'm really wrapped in is trying to get them to understand philosophically what we're trying to do.”
Among the competitions, it seems as if Roberson and Adams have the advantage to start, as Waiters, Morrow and Kanter are better served as bench scorers because of their defensive limitations. Besides that, though, the other two backup spots are up for brags between incumbents and their younger replacements.
