to be clear. You believe that what @wizenheimer described is cheating? Or do you mean the coach deliberately losing games?
Being bad at basketball isn’t tanking. Losing games on purpose is. All I’m saying is all teams should play hard (and yes the lotto as constructed disincentivizes this) toward their goals. If your goal isn’t to make your players better then why the hell are you in charge of the team?
But far more great players have been drafted before 8th than after 8th. It's a roll of the dice. And the dice are more weighted in your favor the higher you pick.
Were talking about the same thing. See above my response on that specific scenario. The young core would have improved sooner and more. Creating more wins in the second half to offset the early losses. Again. We are kind of seeing that now. It just would have been sooner in the season. The vets played like ass in the beginning of the season. I think the young core would have won the same amount of games regardless.
Why dice? Why cant it be like roulette where you can hedge your bets all over the table? That feels more like what we have done.
I don't think it is near as big of a deal as some are making it out to be. if we had done that, do you think the vets we want to move would increase or decrease in value? In my opinion the vets had to be played in the beginning of the season so Joe could try to make moves. But when they stunk it up the first half. It killed Joes abilities to get what he is asking for. The vets had to get minutes in the early part of the season in my opinion. Not a big deal. Sky isn't falling.
These vets were known commodities. Nobody was going to be tricked into overpaying for them. Whatever their value was before season was the best we were going to do. This season set us back substantially. We have almost no hope of catching San Antonio or OKC now. If you don't care about ever beating those teams in a series then it's not a big deal. Agreed.
Dice because the comment I replied to used dice as an example. We refused to pick a lane which parked us in purgatory. The worst place you can be in the NBA is just missing or just making the playoffs.
i don't buy that at all. worst place to be if you are a roster full of vets, for sure. A really young core? Not a big deal. I really think you are way overselling the doom and gloom.
I'm overselling it if there is a plan to get as much talent as OKC, San Antonio, Boston, etc. If not, then we're not going to beat those teams barring some insane miracle. And miracles are cool. Just not good practice to plan on them as a part of your plan. For example, I wouldn't recommend you plan on retiring on winnings from Vegas.
this has gone on long enough...we aren't going to agree on projections what I'm saying is that the minutes of guys like Avdija-Sharpe-Camara weren't going to increase much. Scoot yes; Clingan yes. But there would still be a learning curve for the youth that would not get significantly accelerated. And they would have had to learn about playing with each other. And frankly, Portland would have probably led the league in turnovers subtracting the winshares of the vets would have meant the youth started with a projected deficit of 10-12 fewer wins over the current 35. For chunks of the season, the bench was Scoot-Sharpe-Avdija-Clingan. Starting those guys would mean the bench would have been Banton, Murray, Walker, Reath plus Minaya in the beackcourt; that or some of the replacement players landed in the trades. Even if the starting lineup had meshed earlier than I'm projecting, the bench would have been worse
So, if the team went young and lost, people would bitch that Chauncey can't coach. If the team goes with "Vets" who "won't be here" (Simons, Grant and Ayton) and they win, they bitch. If they lose, they bitch. Since Simons played 70 games, I didn't include him in this. But Grant and Ayton played 47 and 40 games each. Without Ayton they went 18-22 (pace: 37 wins). With him they went 17-23 (pace: 35) Not sure how him playing made a difference. With Grant, the team went: 22-25 (pace: 38 wins) Without: 13-20 (pace: 32 wins) In games they BOTH missed, the team went 9-12, (pace: 35 wins). I,e., they started winning too much *after* they both were out. Point being, maybe this team is better than we thought they were. With Ayton, they're about a 35 win team. With Grant, they're about a 38 win team. Without Ayton, 37 wins. Without Grant, 32. Without them both they're 35 wins. Which is pretty much the same as saying they're about a 35 win team regardless. The biggest "win share" that the team has is Deni. Second is Toumani.
I don't think it that simple. The whole team played better in January than they did in Nov-Dec. And both Ayton and Grant were part of that. Although I would prefer to trade Grant and keep Ayton. (Only because of their contracts and age)
I see no reason at all to keep Ayton. Clingan is already a better C and he's good at things that a modern C needs to be good at (see no reason to keep Grant either)
I think having a center who can score to go along with Clingan is optimal. At his current contract, he is not worth it. But if he so hard to trade, then I don't see anyone paying him that much again. We should be able to get him on a reasonable contract. As we have discussed for years, one good center does not cut it. They get injured. You need at least 2 and a third who can fill in when needed.
I don't agree...mainly because I have no confidence at all that Cronin will re-sign Ayton for a reasonable deal. Which is less than 20M/year in my view I also don't agree, at all, with the notion that the Blazers can re-sign Ayton and Simons, and still re-sign Sharpe, Scoot, Camara, Avdija, & Clingan. That all would take place over a 2 year period and it's ludicrous to think a small market team could afford that. It's not a sustainable payroll I also ain't buying that a team "needs" two big lumbering drop-coverage C's on significant contracts. Gobert + Naz Reid works; Gobert + Gobert wouldn't. Holmgren + Hartenstein work; Hartenstein + Hartenstein not so much. Jarett Allen + Mobley works; Allen + Allen would be redundant. And of course, Holmgren and Mobley have the mobility to play PF; Ayton can't contrary to the occasional pipedream around here. And, Hartenstein and Allen are both more mobile than Ayton and Clingan but yeah sure...Blazers should just keep punting tough decisions down the road and pray for epiphanies; great plan
This right here. I notice it was skipped over by those claiming we would have been much worse starting the young core from the get go. We can all agree to disagree, but you doom and gloom folks are wrong.
