James Edwards III Offseason Trade Idea

[Snakebites]

We collectively need to stop being prideful about the assets of our 14 win team.

I understand that I'm changing the subject a bit here, but this roster could easily have doubled that win total had it a competent coach instead of being subject to the most outrageously destructive head coaching the NBA has seen in a long while.

I'm not saying that the roster wasn't plagued by holes or inadequate to the task of making a push for the play-in tournament -- it was both of those things -- but Monty took that poor roster and sabotaged it to depths literally never before seen in NBA history. 

My point is that while the roster has problems, it's not on its own merits the utter disaster it's being named. It needs to improve significantly in one way or another in order to do anything meaningful, yes. But it's not the trainwreck this season made it appear. Its dumbfounding catastrophe of a head coach saw to that.

Yeah it is changing the subject.

And it’s moot.

I don’t think Ivey and Duren have the value most on this board think they do. If we can turn them into a pair of useful well fitting pieces like Bridges and DFS for the cost of a pick downgrade I’d do it without hesitation. It’s time to start building a team.

[Neptune]

Terrible trade. Keep our players and trade our pick to absorb a max or near max contract type player.

Don't lose our assets for something we can literally get for our pick. We'll end up regretting it down the road

[JennetteMcCurdy]

We collectively need to stop being prideful about the assets of our 14 win team.

I put this trade in T&T thread too - I bet it gets slammed. I really have no idea what any of these players are worth, but I think we’re all going to be disappointed when we figure it out…….

[Uncle Mxy]

Can I throw our coach in with the trade?

[BDM22]

Can I throw our coach in with the trade?

Yeah, #1 reason to not trade for Bridges is that it would probably spell the return of Monty.

[SuperBad]

Lebron wants a coach to boss around, the Lakers are about to be swept, maybe we can flip Monty for Darvin ham, what a great day that would be.

[Kalamazoo317]

Unpopular take: I’d 100 percent do that trade without hesitation and I doubt the Nets would.

Not sure how unpopular this take is. I agree with it 100%.

Iffy on the ideas for free agency posted along with the trade, though. I would want to see us go after more shooting than that to complement Cade/Bridges/Ausar.

But Bridges would be an amazing player to put alongside Cade and I’d be all-in for that part.

[Billl]

I don't think bridges is available for that package. If he was, we would have to do it. You hate to give up on young players, but Ivey amd Duren still have major question marks.

[Cowology]

We collectively need to stop being prideful about the assets of our 14 win team.

I understand that I'm changing the subject a bit here, but this roster could easily have doubled that win total had it a competent coach instead of being subject to the most outrageously destructive head coaching the NBA has seen in a long while.

I'm not saying that the roster wasn't plagued by holes or inadequate to the task of making a push for the play-in tournament -- it was both of those things -- but Monty took that poor roster and sabotaged it to depths literally never before seen in NBA history. 

My point is that while the roster has problems, it's not on its own merits the utter disaster it's being named. It needs to improve significantly in one way or another in order to do anything meaningful, yes. But it's not the trainwreck this season made it appear. Its dumbfounding catastrophe of a head coach saw to that.

Yeah it is changing the subject.

And it’s moot.

I don’t think Ivey and Duren have the value most on this board think they do. If we can turn them into a pair of useful well fitting pieces like Bridges and DFS for the cost of a pick downgrade I’d do it without hesitation. It’s time to start building a team.

I wanted to come back to this post from Snakebites. What is the perceived value of Ivey/Duren from outsiders? Higher or lower than at the start of the season?

For me Ivey feels like an obvious regression. While he showed signs of life late last season, this season he struggled with... everything. There is still obvious potential there, but also reason for concern. Would you trade him for the 5th in this years draft? Would somebody else give up the 5th for him?

Duren I think still has value. He's not the defensive presence we want, but he's a solid double-double guy. The shooting is a limiting factor, but at least he's a C so it's somewhat acceptable. However, he get's bullied by bigger C's and I dunno what the hell he's gonna do with this new bread of Chet's & Wemby's. Against Embiid or Giannis? No chance.

For a while C was the least important position. Embiid & Jokic were having MVP battles, but up until this past season neither of them had a ring and the league was still being dominated by LBJ, KD, Stef, Kawhi etc. If you were building a roster, those were the guys you had to worry about getting past. With those guys aging out and with the rise of Sabonis & Sengun the entire paradigm is shifting in front of us. Zingis is 7'2" on the best team in the league. The C position is back in a BIG way.

How does Duren stack up?

My fear is that as the league shifts back towards size/height that Duren is going to have more and more matchup problems. At least most of them are currently out West, but he may be another example of Weaver simply being a decade behind in terms of his talent valuation. In 2014 Duren is great. Today? He might be power forward who can't shoot.

For a minute people questioned Cleveland going with twin towers and then Minny made their bold move and people definitely questioned that. But both those teams may actually be a little ahead of the curve in terms of preparing for what is coming.

[Kalamazoo317]

A smaller Center that doesn't stretch the floor and doesn't protect the rim is a backup in this league. We'd love to Duren to develop into more, but he didn't take a big leap in any important area this year and he has some durability questions at this point as well, imo.

[Cowology]

I might get some hate for this... but Stewart contributes more to winning then Duren.

[theBigLip]

A smaller Center that doesn't stretch the floor and doesn't protect the rim is a backup in this league. We'd love to Duren to develop into more, but he didn't take a big leap in any important area this year and he has some durability questions at this point as well, imo.

I just don’t think this is accurate. He developed a pretty good post game. He’s a better rebounder.

Of course we want him to be a rim protector. And if he could shoot 3s it would be awesome. Maybe he works hard on those areas this offseason. And we shouldn’t mix up his time frame with Weaver’s. He’s only 20, so he has time to develop.

[Billl]

The problem with Duren isn't offense. He can run a pick and roll and offensive rebound. Anything above that is gravy. He needs to stay in his lane and not try to do too much, but he's going to be fine there. His problem is 100% on the defensive end. He was a bad defender last year. He didn't block shots, defend the paint, get deflections, rotate well etc. He took a step back in all those areas and was just content to get the rebounds. Maybe it was the constant ankle injuries, but he just wasn't making plays defensively. You can be a non-shooting bigman in the NBA right now, but you can't be a non-shooting bigman that doesn't defend.

[Cowology]

The problem with Duren isn't offense. He can run a pick and roll and offensive rebound. Anything above that is gravy. He needs to stay in his lane and not try to do too much, but he's going to be fine there. His problem is 100% on the defensive end. He was a bad defender last year. He didn't block shots, defend the paint, get deflections, rotate well etc. He took a step back in all those areas and was just content to get the rebounds. Maybe it was the constant ankle injuries, but he just wasn't making plays defensively. You can be a non-shooting bigman in the NBA right now, but you can't be a non-shooting bigman that doesn't defend.

That makes sense. Is it more likely Duren develops a shot or that he becomes a good help-side shot blocker?

[Kalamazoo317]

A smaller Center that doesn't stretch the floor and doesn't protect the rim is a backup in this league. We'd love to Duren to develop into more, but he didn't take a big leap in any important area this year and he has some durability questions at this point as well, imo.

I just don’t think this is accurate. He developed a pretty good post game. He’s a better rebounder.

Of course we want him to be a rim protector. And if he could shoot 3s it would be awesome. Maybe he works hard on those areas this offseason. And we shouldn’t mix up his time frame with Weaver’s. He’s only 20, so he has time to develop.

Sure, that's fair. He has developed abilities that can allow him to be a roleplayer at this level, but not those that are needed out of a starter. You can't start at center in this league for a true contender unless you are a unicorn on offense or an anchor on defense, IMO.

[theBigLip]

A smaller Center that doesn't stretch the floor and doesn't protect the rim is a backup in this league. We'd love to Duren to develop into more, but he didn't take a big leap in any important area this year and he has some durability questions at this point as well, imo.

I just don’t think this is accurate. He developed a pretty good post game. He’s a better rebounder.

Of course we want him to be a rim protector. And if he could shoot 3s it would be awesome. Maybe he works hard on those areas this offseason. And we shouldn’t mix up his time frame with Weaver’s. He’s only 20, so he has time to develop.

Sure, that's fair. He has developed abilities that can allow him to be a roleplayer at this level, but not those that are needed out of a starter. You can't start at center in this league for a true contender unless you are a unicorn on offense or an anchor on defense, IMO.

Agreed. Let’s just hope he isn’t a finished product yet. And of course, if we had great shooters at the 2,3 and 4, this wouldn’t be much of a concern.

[Cowology]

I'm searching for a comparison here, but right now I wanna say... Shawn Kemp. Which to be fair, that dude was an All-Star on a Finals team during the Jordan era. Duren is a better rebounder, but offensively that's the best-case scenario.

The way the league is headed this guy cannot defend C's and he's not a help-side defender. He could be an explosive force at PF. Still a ways to get there, but I'm jumping on the "Duren is a PF" buss early. I could absolutely see us draft Sarr and start the two of them together with Stewart backing up both.

Weaver has wanted a 2-big lineup all along, we just haven't found the right pieces yet.

[Kalamazoo317]

I'm searching for a comparison here, but right now I wanna say... Shawn Kemp. Which to be fair, that dude was an All-Star on a Finals team during the Jordan era. Duren is a better rebounder, but offensively that's the best-case scenario.

The way the league is headed this guy cannot defend C's and he's not a help-side defender. He could be an explosive force at PF. Still a ways to get there, but I'm jumping on the "Duren is a PF" buss early. I could absolutely see us draft Sarr and start the two of them together with Stewart backing up both.

Weaver has wanted a 2-big lineup all along, we just haven't found the right pieces yet.

And if this were the late 90's Duren could be an all-star with his offensive skill set. But it's not.

The main problem with this roster right now is we have too many players with limited skill sets that need the right mix around them to work at this level. We can do that with one or *maybe* two players if they end up really elite at that limited skill set. But we can't do it with an entire roster outside of Cade.

Like Ausar could be an elite defender, but if he's a non-spacing wing, we have to fit everything else around that. Duren could be an elite rebounder. But if he's not a rim protector, we have to fit everything else around that. Ivey could have elite speed. But if he turns it over too much, is a streaky shooter at best, and is bad on defense, he's probably not even a rotation player longterm.

[JennetteMcCurdy]

The main problem with this roster right now is we have too many players with limited skill sets that need the right mix around them to work at this level.

I’ll make it simpler - the main problem with this roster is that no one can SHOOT. We have two players in our rotation (sorry, Sasser, not yet) who shoot league average - Stewart, who is wildly overmatched as a starter, and Fontecchio, who played a dozen games for us. And by the way, a starting lineup with the two of them and Duren would give up 150 points per game, so someone’s coming off the bench.

This draft seems to have two guys at the top who can shoot - Sheppard and the French guy. I’d focus on them. Free agents - look at the ones who can shoot, and stop there. Shorter, tradeable deals. Keep it simple.

[bstein14]

The main problem with this roster right now is we have too many players with limited skill sets that need the right mix around them to work at this level.

I’ll make it simpler - the main problem with this roster is that no one can SHOOT. We have two players in our rotation (sorry, Sasser, not yet) who shoot league average - Stewart, who is wildly overmatched as a starter, and Fontecchio, who played a dozen games for us. And by the way, a starting lineup with the two of them and Duren would give up 150 points per game, so someone’s coming off the bench.

This draft seems to have two guys at the top who can shoot - Sheppard and the French guy. I’d focus on them. Free agents - look at the ones who can shoot, and stop there. Shorter, tradeable deals. Keep it simple.

100% need shooters over just about everything else. I like Claxton as someone who could come in and help us out on D but overall we can't take any more non shooters. That's why Tyus Jones (plus his lack of TOs) is a big target for me. He wants to start and I'd be fine with him starting next to Cade. It's pretty clear if we want to win 30+ games next year Ivey likely needs to be a lower MPG backup if he's still here. If we can't land Tyus then we should take a quick look at Quickley who's great in pick and roll and shoots 40% from deep. If they can't be had we should consider De'Angelo Russell who's 41+% from deep. Malik Monk 37.5% from deep. KCP, Hayward, Hield, are also options albeit a bit older. Last resort you've got Beasley, Burks, Melton, Gary Trent Jr, Royce O'Neal, etc... There are simply tons of guys shooting 37+% from deep there is zero reason for us to have only two guys on our roster who can shoot decently.