Brian, I'll just agree to disagree with you.
Fair enough.
You've 100% written off any chance of LMA sticking around here when he is a free agent, but also seems like you write off anybody improving individually on the team,
Not at all. I think many people on this team will improve with LMA gone.
so you take current roster, and add meh MLE, an meh draft.
If you can in any way offer a separate outcome, I'm all ears. But the FACT is that if all you do is use either the draft pick or cap space or both to get that "defensive big" that LMA so desperately has begged for repeatedly, then there is NO OTHER POSSIBLE WAY that you a) get a draft pick in 2014 without either trading one of the core or missing the playoffs, b) have more than the MLE in the summer of 2014, or c) have a lotto pick in 2015 unless you trade one of the core or miss the playoffs. That's not 100% negative, that's 100% FACT.
I'll say adding two injury prone bigs will set the team back as much as Oden did, and we'd have to well overpay with any cap space to get anybody here.
First, Thompson is not injury-prone. He's a young big who's averaging just about a double-double with a 16 PER. Second, I didn't say we HAD to draft Len or Noel, but let's be clear--neither one of them is as close to injury-prone as Roy was when we was drafted. Noel's had an ACL surgery that supposedly is
recovering "perfectly". Len's stress fracture in his ankle was supposedly fixed with surgery, but I get it if you don't like taking injured centers. What about Oladipo or McLemore?
But not anybody worthwhile, they'll be Hedo type of overpays.
So we can use cap space this year to get someone who will make LMA stay, but we won't be able to use it in 2015 when he goes unless it's a hedo-type overpay? How does that make sense?
Then, we'll hobble in mediocrity, likely be slightly off from getting Wiggins, settle for an ok prospect, and bounce around in our same level of mediocrity with no true #1 star until we have these conversation about Lillard.
If you think a lineup of, say, Lillard/Oladipo/Batum/Thompson/(mediocre C) + lotto pick "slightly off from Wiggins" with Wes, Leonard, a full 2014 MLE, #10, and #19 off the bench is mediocre 2 years from now, then I don't know what to tell you. OR, if you think Lillard/(FA signing this year)/Batum/Thompson/Noel + lotto pick "slightly off from Wiggins" with Wes/Leonard/Claver/full 2014 MLE/#10/#19 is mediocre, then you're welcome to your opinion.
But I beg you to show me where there's even the remotest possibility that you can keep the Core 4, make the playoffs, and have any more additions to this team between now and July 1, 2015 that aren't a) this years #10 pick (and, to be fair, #39/40/45), b) ~11M in cap space, c) 2014 full MLE, d) 2015 draft pick. And obtw, somehow you need to spin a) and/or b) into a "defensive big" that will keep LMA from going to wherever he wants to go for nothing.
