Keeping Love thread

[southern wolf]

My main concern with keeping Love and risking him walking for nothing at the end of the season is that we're not going to be able to attract any decent free agents with the money we save if he leaves.

[phonzadellika]

My main concern with keeping Love and risking him walking for nothing at the end of the season is that we're not going to be able to attract any decent free agents with the money we save if he leaves.

We'll just have to horribly overpay someone. If we had maxed Batum during his RFA there is no way Portland would have matched. Then we would currently be trotting out Rubio/Martin/Batum/Love/Pek and arguing amongst ourselves whether or not Martin is a worse contract than Batum.

[phonzadellika]

Flip needs to bring out the nasty out of this guys.
No more pretty boy Ricky Unicorn Rubio.
No more Pek the teddy bear. You can put a bear to sleep with your bare hands
We have the talent. We dont have the mentality
Luckily Flip lived through the attitude era of the NBA. Flip needs to psych them up. Thats all they need

Completely agree with this.

It's also the reason I like Shabazz so much, that guy when he is playing looks like he'd stab someone to get the ball. I thought that was an element that the team had been missing for the past few years. I hope he can crack the starting lineup sooner than later.

[Nitroglycerin]

Flip needs to bring out the nasty out of this guys.
No more pretty boy Ricky Unicorn Rubio.
No more Pek the teddy bear. You can put a bear to sleep with your bare hands
We have the talent. We dont have the mentality
Luckily Flip lived through the attitude era of the NBA. Flip needs to psych them up. Thats all they need

Completely agree with this.

It's also the reason I like Shabazz so much, that guy when he is playing looks like he'd stab someone to get the ball. I thought that was an element that the team had been missing for the past few years. I hope he can crack the starting lineup sooner than later.

yes with Bazz. I think he'll be great for us this season.
and my post is really directed to Pek
He's a gentle giant. And I hate it.

[Sothron]

My main concern with keeping Love and risking him walking for nothing at the end of the season is that we're not going to be able to attract any decent free agents with the money we save if he leaves.

It is better if he left for nothing than take back guys that (Please Use More Appropriate Word) our roster and keep us in the twilight of 25-35 win seasons.

[phonzadellika]

I'd rather Kevin Love leave for nothing and then offer a max contract to pry one of Kawhi Leonard or Klay Thompson away from their teams. I'd also consider making a really strong near-max contract to Jimmy Butler or Kenneth Faried.

I definitely don't want the Wolves to take on pretty much anyone being discussed in trade (except for Klay and Wiggins of course). I'd like to think that all of Lavine Muhammed and Dieng will emerge as top 15 guys at their positions soon but probably one of the restricted guys would be a better option.

[Krapinsky]

I'd rather Kevin Love leave for nothing and then offer a max contract to pry one of Kawhi Leonard or Klay Thompson away from their teams. I'd also consider making a really strong near-max contract to Jimmy Butler or Kenneth Faried.

I definitely don't want the Wolves to take on pretty much anyone being discussed in trade (except for Klay and Wiggins of course). I'd like to think that all of Lavine Muhammed and Dieng will emerge as top 15 guys at their positions soon but probably one of the restricted guys would be a better option.

You'd rather Kevin Love leave for nothing and then sign Faried to a near max?? Leonard and Klay would be matched. I guarantee that. Butler at the near max is even more ridiculous.

It sounds to me like you're getting frustrated and now just becoming irrational.

[phonzadellika]

I'd rather Kevin Love leave for nothing and then offer a max contract to pry one of Kawhi Leonard or Klay Thompson away from their teams. I'd also consider making a really strong near-max contract to Jimmy Butler or Kenneth Faried.

I definitely don't want the Wolves to take on pretty much anyone being discussed in trade (except for Klay and Wiggins of course). I'd like to think that all of Lavine Muhammed and Dieng will emerge as top 15 guys at their positions soon but probably one of the restricted guys would be a better option.

You'd rather Kevin Love leave for nothing and then sign Faried to a near max?? Leonard and Klay would be matched. I guarantee that. Butler at the near max is even more ridiculous.

It sounds to me like you're getting frustrated and now just becoming irrational.

It's not frustration, it's economics.

I would have thought that Houston would match on Parsons. You never know how things turn out.

Butler's market value is probably around 10m per year on the open market as Avery Bradley got 8 and Butler is a better version of Bradley. You have to pay more to make Chicago not want to match. Maybe 13, who knows. Same thing for Faried. They are starters. The goal would be to build a team around Rubio's strengths and hope that his ability to get everyone involved creates a sum greater than the parts. You need the right parts for that. Butler and Faried both have aspects to their game that Rubio could use in order to make the offense function better as a whole.

[Krapinsky]

I'd rather Kevin Love leave for nothing and then offer a max contract to pry one of Kawhi Leonard or Klay Thompson away from their teams. I'd also consider making a really strong near-max contract to Jimmy Butler or Kenneth Faried.

I definitely don't want the Wolves to take on pretty much anyone being discussed in trade (except for Klay and Wiggins of course). I'd like to think that all of Lavine Muhammed and Dieng will emerge as top 15 guys at their positions soon but probably one of the restricted guys would be a better option.

You'd rather Kevin Love leave for nothing and then sign Faried to a near max?? Leonard and Klay would be matched. I guarantee that. Butler at the near max is even more ridiculous.

It sounds to me like you're getting frustrated and now just becoming irrational.

It's not frustration, it's economics.

I would have thought that Houston would match on Parsons. You never know how things turn out.

Butler's market value is probably around 10m per year on the open market as Avery Bradley got 8 and Butler is a better version of Bradley. You have to pay more to make Chicago not want to match. Maybe 13, who knows. Same thing for Faried. They are starters. The goal would be to build a team around Rubio's strengths and hope that his ability to get everyone involved creates a sum greater than the parts. You need the right parts for that. Butler and Faried both have aspects to their game that Rubio could use in order to make the offense function better as a whole.

Just take a step back for a second. What is your team's ceiling if you're paying Faried and Pekovic $25M/year combined? Or Butler and Rubio $25M/year combined? How are we ever supposed to build a winning team with those kind of salaries on non-all-star players?

[phonzadellika]

You'd rather Kevin Love leave for nothing and then sign Faried to a near max?? Leonard and Klay would be matched. I guarantee that. Butler at the near max is even more ridiculous.

It sounds to me like you're getting frustrated and now just becoming irrational.

It's not frustration, it's economics.

I would have thought that Houston would match on Parsons. You never know how things turn out.

Butler's market value is probably around 10m per year on the open market as Avery Bradley got 8 and Butler is a better version of Bradley. You have to pay more to make Chicago not want to match. Maybe 13, who knows. Same thing for Faried. They are starters. The goal would be to build a team around Rubio's strengths and hope that his ability to get everyone involved creates a sum greater than the parts. You need the right parts for that. Butler and Faried both have aspects to their game that Rubio could use in order to make the offense function better as a whole.

Just take a step back for a second. What is your team's ceiling if you're paying Faried and Pekovic $25M/year combined? Or Butler and Rubio $25M/year combined? How are we ever supposed to build a winning team with those kind of salaries on non-all-star players?

The way that I see it, the Wolves, sans Kevin Love, have two players right now with elite abilities. Rubio is an elite pick-and-roll point guard and passer, Pekovic is an ultra-efficient low-post scorer. So, you have 1 go-to-method to score and you have to add decent perimeter shooters to the lineup in order to have an offense that can space the floor correctly and score efficiently.

Defensively you need to pair an high-level perimeter defender with Rubio and a defensive big that can provide the help defense that Pekovic can't.

Free agents, as of now, aren't flocking to come here. It's obviously better to put a star next to Rubio and Pek, someone like Anthony Davis would be ideal, but something like that is improbable unless we win the lottery. So, we have to try to win the Piston way, the Denver way (I know they didn't make a deep playoff run but they were a winning team), and the 2014 Spurs way by assembling a team that works really, really well together.

We should try to do two things if we want to win with a Rubio/Pekovic core - put the absolute best defense we can on the floor and put decent perimeter shooters that can pass to the open guy and allow Rubio and Pekovic to pick-and-roll the other team to death.

Faried can provide the help defense that we need. He's a high-level rebounder. Not much of an offensive threat but he's an above the rim player. Butler can provide good perimeter defense. We can't afford to overpay both but we can afford to overpay 1 as long as the person we are overpaying can consistently perform the specific tasks that are necessary in order to make the team function as a whole.

Ideally, we wouldn't overpay anyone, draft correctly, develop these guys and go from there. I think one of Lavine/Muhammed/GRIII might turn out to be a very useful two-way player so we'd probably have to go for someone like Faried.


Ideally, Kevin Love would re-sign and we'd build around him and just play Dieng next to him.

[Klomp]

Well, that was a joke (think it was obvious). If Love wears a wolvesuniform next year, I'll support him 100%, like every other wolvesplayer (except Barea).

Unfortunately, I've seen/heard multiple fans suggest it elsewhere, so that's why it was hard to take it as a joke.

[Narf]

I sympathize with you wolves fans. I can't understand why people think anyone besides the wolves have any leverage in this situation. It especially irks me when people post about the impossibility of cavs trading the number one pick in Wiggins for love. Do they not understand that implicit with the trade would be his verbal assurance of resigning? In the end I think you will get Wiggins and probably Bennett or picks for him. I doubt that love goes for any less and if he does it won't be to the cabs.

People think the Wolves have no leverage because they don't.

Just like DEN, ORL, NOH, MEM had no leverage when they traded their disgruntled superstars for very little.

I understand Wolves fans don't like it. I'm not a fan and I don't like it, I wish Love stayed and kept playing with Ricky. But it shouldn't be that hard to accept reality, which is that he wants out and he's in the last year of his contract, and superstars who want out and are in the last year of their contract have all the leverage in the world and their teams very little.

Well that's just horrible logic.

Even if you think the Wolves have to trade Love, they don't have to trade Love to Cleveland. If Minnesota starts selling Love for less then he's worth, other teams start being interested. Ibaka/Love straight up or even slightly more to OKC is better than crap. Denver's deal has more legs. Washington with Nene/Beal. There are plenty of other teams that would like Love at a slight discount.

Cleveland has no leverage, because if they are offering poor value for Love then someone else will offer it too. And there is no one else selling a top 10 talent at age 25 right now.

[Antrim]

I sympathize with you wolves fans. I can't understand why people think anyone besides the wolves have any leverage in this situation. It especially irks me when people post about the impossibility of cavs trading the number one pick in Wiggins for love. Do they not understand that implicit with the trade would be his verbal assurance of resigning? In the end I think you will get Wiggins and probably Bennett or picks for him. I doubt that love goes for any less and if he does it won't be to the cabs.

People think the Wolves have no leverage because they don't.

Just like DEN, ORL, NOH, MEM had no leverage when they traded their disgruntled superstars for very little.

I understand Wolves fans don't like it. I'm not a fan and I don't like it, I wish Love stayed and kept playing with Ricky. But it shouldn't be that hard to accept reality, which is that he wants out and he's in the last year of his contract, and superstars who want out and are in the last year of their contract have all the leverage in the world and their teams very little.

Well that's just horrible logic.

Even if you think the Wolves have to trade Love, they don't have to trade Love to Cleveland. If Minnesota starts selling Love for less then he's worth, other teams start being interested. Ibaka/Love straight up or even slightly more to OKC is better than crap. Denver's deal has more legs. Washington with Nene/Beal. There are plenty of other teams that would like Love at a slight discount.

Cleveland has no leverage, because if they are offering poor value for Love then someone else will offer it too. And there is no one else selling a top 10 talent at age 25 right now.

I never said they had to trade him to Cleveland. Re-read.

Minnesota can't sell Love to any team because these teams won't go after him if he says he won't sign an extension. It seems like there are only 4-5 possibilities at most. This is why Love has more leverage than the Wolves.

You're delusional. OKC is not going to trade their star PF/C for a player that DOESN'T HAVE MUCH TRADE VALUE RIGHT NOW. As good as he is. It doesn't matter. His contract is about to expire. You're not getting Beal. You're not getting Wiggins. Stop dreaming and start looking at the past superstar trades that have been posted several times the past few days. See what those teams got for their disgruntled superstars about to opt out of their contracts and that'll give you a good idea of what the Wolves are about to get for Love.

[Narf]

You're delusional. OKC is not going to trade their star PF/C for a player that DOESN'T HAVE MUCH TRADE VALUE RIGHT NOW. As good as he is. It doesn't matter.

Again with the terrible reasoning.

OKC doesn't care what Love's trade value is. They care if Love gives them a better chance at a championship then Ibaka. That's all they care about. Trade value is your delusion, and terrible logic is your calling card.

[Antrim]

You're delusional. OKC is not going to trade their star PF/C for a player that DOESN'T HAVE MUCH TRADE VALUE RIGHT NOW. As good as he is. It doesn't matter.

Again with the terrible reasoning.

OKC doesn't care what Love's trade value is. They care if Love gives them a better chance at a championship then Ibaka. That's all they care about. Trade value is your delusion, and terrible logic is your calling card.

Right, right. Trade value doesn't exist, it's some sort of illusion. The fact that Love's contract is about to run out means nothing. Carmelo/Howard/Paul/Gasol, in exactly the same situation as Love were traded mostly for young roleplayers and low first round picks because their FO were just tremendously stupid, unlike the Wolves who are going to get a player of Wiggins or Ibaka's caliber. Anything other than that is simply not logical.

[Narf]

You're delusional. OKC is not going to trade their star PF/C for a player that DOESN'T HAVE MUCH TRADE VALUE RIGHT NOW. As good as he is. It doesn't matter.

Again with the terrible reasoning.

OKC doesn't care what Love's trade value is. They care if Love gives them a better chance at a championship then Ibaka. That's all they care about. Trade value is your delusion, and terrible logic is your calling card.

Right, right. Trade value doesn't exist, it's some sort of illusion. The fact that Love's contract is about to run out means nothing. Carmelo/Howard/Paul/Gasol, in exactly the same situation as Love were traded mostly for young roleplayers and low first round picks because their FO were just tremendously stupid, unlike the Wolves who are going to get a player of Wiggins or Ibaka's caliber. Anything other than that is simply not logical.

Your perceived trade value has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not OKC would trade Ibaka for Love straight up.

Nothing

Zero

Your delusional trade value is not what OKC cares about. What they care about is whether or not Ibaka for Love would bring them closer to a championship. That's all they are going to look at. Love will commit to OKC, he wants to win, and he's buds with Westbrook. No team gives Love a better chance at a ring then OKC, and in 2 years when the new TV Contract goes into effect Love will be able to resign for more money without pushing OKC into the lux.

It's not that hard to say Love would be willing to remove his opt out and stay for 2 years at OKC, then resign.

[Antrim]

Again with the terrible reasoning.

OKC doesn't care what Love's trade value is. They care if Love gives them a better chance at a championship then Ibaka. That's all they care about. Trade value is your delusion, and terrible logic is your calling card.

Right, right. Trade value doesn't exist, it's some sort of illusion. The fact that Love's contract is about to run out means nothing. Carmelo/Howard/Paul/Gasol, in exactly the same situation as Love were traded mostly for young roleplayers and low first round picks because their FO were just tremendously stupid, unlike the Wolves who are going to get a player of Wiggins or Ibaka's caliber. Anything other than that is simply not logical.

Your perceived trade value has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not OKC would trade Ibaka for Love straight up.

Nothing

Zero

Your delusional trade value is not what OKC cares about. What they care about is whether or not Ibaka for Love would bring them closer to a championship. That's all they are going to look at. Love will commit to OKC, he wants to win, and he's buds with Westbrook. No team gives Love a better chance at a ring then OKC, and in 2 years when the new TV Contract goes into effect Love will be able to resign for more money without pushing OKC into the lux.

It's not that hard to say Love would be willing to remove his opt out and stay for 2 years at OKC, then resign.

So basically:

-It doesn't matter that Ibaka's trade value is much, much higher than Love because of the latter contract situation. It only matters if they think that Love is the better player. Not like they could trade Ibaka for several very valuable pieces and then use some of them to get Love instead. What they should do is lose a trade by a landslide and give away one of the best assets in the league for an almost-free-agent Kevin Love.

-Love is NOT going to resign for the max ASAP and gain security and will instead wait a couple of years simply in order to help Clay Bennett, famous for being cheap not get into the luxury tax.

-He will go through all this risk only to give himself the opportunity to resign with OKC in the summer of 2016, which is exactly the time when Durant is hitting FA (and possibly leaving for a bigger market).

And I am the delusional one.

[Krapinsky]

I could see a scenario where we keep Love and Love agrees to not opt out for his last year and let Flip recreate the team around him. For example, after this season we could have cap space to offer Gasol the max (buddies with Rubio?) and/ or make strong offers to Jimmy Butler, Danny Green, Wes Matthews, Tobias Harris, or Afflalo.

[Narf]

-Love is NOT going to resign for the max ASAP and gain security and will instead wait a couple of years simply in order to help Clay Bennett, famous for being cheap not get into the luxury tax.

-He will go through all this risk only to give himself the opportunity to resign with OKC in the summer of 2016, which is exactly the time when Durant is hitting FA (and possibly leaving for a bigger market).

And I am the delusional one.

Yes, you really are. 2016 is the new TV deal. The reason to wait 1 more year is Love will get paid a lot more, whoever said he was being charitable? Oh right, you said that. You think Love getting more money on a better team is charity. Just my advice, but you probably don't want to call other people delusional for a while.

OKC is going to ask themselves one question. Does Love for Ibaka increase or decrease their chances of winning multiple championships. That's what they're going for right now.

[Saltine]

Maximum salaries are based on 42.14% of Basketball Related Income,as a 7 year player Love's max is 30% of cap. With the cash from the new TV deal a max contract will start out at $4 or $5 million more per year.
http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q16

A max deal signed next season would probably start around $18 million with %4.5 raises available for 4 years. A deal signed in 2016 should start around $22.5 million, perhaps $23m.

If Love opts into his $16.75m deal next season, then signs with the Wolves in 2016, he can get a 5 year deal with %7.5 raises each year, starting around $23 million, instead of $18m for 4 years with 4.5% raises.

He loses a lot of cash.
2015 --> 16.750m or 18.000m
2016 --> 23.000m or 18.810m
2017 --> 24.725m or 19.656m
2018 --> 26.578m or 20.541m
2019 --> 28.573m or $25.0m new deal at 30 years old?
2020 --> 30.716m or $27.0m???

he earns;
$150.342 million staying in Minnesota and signing a new deal.
$77 million opting out and signing as a free agent. maybe $129m if we assume someone pays him a ton to sign again in 2019...

Best case for Love he loses $21 million dollars by leaving Minnesota. If he's a MLE type guy at 30 years of age he's potentially out $60+ million.

Making him stick around this season and do the math next offseason might not be a bad idea at all, especially if we make the playoffs. He could leave and sign a 1 year deal somewhere, then try to sign a 4 year somewhere in 2016... but that is risky, and he still loses out on a 5 year deal with big raises.