Arenas for Vince or dump Arenas for cap space?

[fishercob]

I'd argue this was the case the moment we drafted Wall.

Wall is being considered a once in a generation PG prospect. In addition, he was a top pick in the draft. Well, let's see first, the impact elite PG prospects have on their teams as *rookies*, and second, the impact quality #1 picks have on their teams as rookies.

PGs:

2005 Hornets: +18 games from last year
2005 Jazz: +15 games from last year
2008 Bulls +8 from previous year
2009 Bucks +12 from previous years.

For goodness sake the Bobcats were +7 after they drafted Felton!

The only exceptions were Russel Westbrook (who was considered a major project at the time, and not even a pure PG), on a team that had Durant, Green, and literally nothing else, and Stephon Curry, whose team was devastated by injury like no team in recent memory. We have *far* more talent than those teams even without Arenas.

Meanwhile, let's look at #1 picks that panned out

Yao Ming + 15
LeBron James + 18 (Wade, Bosh, and Melo would be #1s in other years, so will include them just because - +17, +7, and +27 respectively)
Dwight Howard + 15
Bogut + 10
Bargnani (arguably a bust bust still +20)

Durant is an interesting case - he's minus -10, but SEA/OKC had blown it up, trading Allen and Lewis. Obviously Oden didn't play.

Rose + 8, as above.

Obviously Griffin didn't play, but Evans, as the only impact rookie from last year's class, was +8, and they had started strong, and might have better if Martin was healthy.

So based on the track record, if we are in the high lottery yet again, we either got racked by injuries, or we have much bigger problems than Arenas making us too good, because it means Wall isn't ready and/or Blatche and McGee have stagnated or regressed.

Impact rookies make immediate and significant improvements in team win totals and even if it doesn't vault them into the playoffs, it does take them well over the 30 win mark in most cases.

So basically, the scenario where dumping Arenas puts in the high lottery, assumes Wall, Blatche, McGee, Booker, Seraphin, and even Young are busts.

Chaos, this is well researched an thought-provoking. I think it's a little bit of creative accounting though. Rather than the win improvement, let's look at the actual rookie W-L records of the teams of everyone you name in the above post. The team's top-5 total minute getters are in parens.

Elite Point Guards:
Paul 38-44 (Paul, D. West, PJ Brown, D. Mason, S. Claxton)
Deron Williams: 41-41 (Okur, Kirilenko, Williams, Harpring, Collins)
Rose: 41-41 (Rose, B. Gordon, Ty. Thomas, Noah, Deng -- followed by Hinrich, Nocioni, Salmons, Gooden and Hughes)
Jennings: 46-36 (Jennings, Delfino, Bogut, Ilyasova, LRMAM)

Notes: Milwaukee had the #2 defense in the NBA last year. Utah lost Boozer to a major injury.

"Exceptions"
Westbrook: 23-59 (Durant, Green, Westbrook, Collison, Watson)
Curry: 26-56 (Curry, Ellis, Maggette, Morrow, Watson)
Even Ray Felton: 26-56 (Felton, B. Knight, Grezec, Jum. Jones, G. Wallace)

Notes: The W's were ravaged by injury, as you noted, as were The Bobs.

Top Picks that Panned Out
Lebron: 35-47 (Lebron, Boozer, Z, Kevin Ollie, Erik Williams)
Wade: 42-40 (Lamar Odom, Eddie Jones, R. Alston, Brian Grant, Wade) caron and haselm
Carmelo: 43-39 (Melo, Dre Miller, Nene, V. Lenard, Camby)
Bosh: 33-49 (V. Carter, D. Marshall, Bosh, Mo-Pete, Jalen Rose)
Howard: 36-46 (S. Francis, Howard, Grant Hill, Battie, Turkoglu)
Bogut: 40-42 (Redd, TJ Ford, B Simmons, Magloire, Bogut)
Bargnani: 47-35 (Bosh, A. Parker, TJ Ford, Garbajosa, Nesterovic) -- Bargs 6th
Durant 20-62 (Durant, E. Watson, J. Green, Collison, D. Wilkins)
Tyreke Evans 25-57 (Evans, Udrih, J. Thompson, Casspi, Hawes)

Notes:
Lebron played with a very good front court with Z and Boozer. Wade wasn't a big reason for Miami's relative success, and Caron and Haslem were right behind him in minutes. Melo played with some very good veterans, as did Howard. Bogut, like Wade, played only the 5th most minutes on his team, and Bargnani didn't even crack the top 5.

Analysis
Firstly, I'm not making the argument that my list is in some way "complete." It's just more complete. The players you mention are a little arbitrary, as there's no stated criteria etc.

It would indeed appear that young rookie PG's have more of an impact than young rookie bigs (not a surprise) .

The two teams with the highest records on your list were Bargnani's (47 wins) and Jennings' (46). Bargnani was low-impact guy on that team, so I'd toss him out. As noted above, the Bucks were the second best defensive team in the NBA last year. I'd be very surprised if the Wizards were top 10 in either ORtg or DRtg, so I'm choosing to toss Jennings.

Let's toss out Wade's 42-win Heat and Boguts 40-win Bucks for their low minutes. Let's also toss out Felton's Bobs beacuse he isn't very good and Curry's W's b/c I won't even allow myself to think about us having more bad injury luck. So then we're left with:

Paul (38), Rose (41), Williams (41), Westbrook (23), Lebron (35), Carmelo (43) Bosh (33), Howard (36), Durant (20) and Evans (25)

I'd remove Melo's team because they were laden with talented veterans, so after that we have nine data points between 25 and 41 wins. So I think it's a safe assumption that we'll pick no worse than 15th, and likely somewhat higher.

The question is does Wall make us more like Rose or Williams' team, or does our "top-heavy" roster make us more like Lebron's Cavs? You can draw parallel's to any of those teams including the Kings, Sonics and Thunder that won 25, 20 and 23. Those teams were young and talented, but unsettled in their play styles and had yet to turn a corner.

The next piece of analysis that I;d find interesting is to see where certain records were likely to land us in the draft as well as the historical quality of that draft position. But ultimately, I don't think it's a slam dunk that without Arenas we avoid the high lottery (again, see Kings and Thunder for decent comps). But with Gil in tow I think we're likley to be somewhere in the 7-14 range, which is a bit of an upward adjustment than what I had previously thought.

[nate33]

More good info. Thanks fishercob.

One thing worth noting is that we stand to benefit in the win column for a few reasons other than the addition of Wall.

1. This will be the second year under Flip's system. There's usually a one-year adjustment period with a new coach.
2. Blatche appears to have just broken out. It's reasonable to expect 82 games of "good Blatche" rather than just the 32 games we had last year.
3. McGee will probably show considerable improvement. The third year for a big man is usually a big year.

Of course, there's also Gilbert Arenas. But the premise of this analysis is to determine how good we'd be without Arenas in the lineup.

[Ruzious]

Had Jamison and Butler not been on the team at all, I'd argue we'd have played at a playoff pace.

I don't know what to say to that other than - I need to take a break from this place.

[Silvie Lysandra]

The question is does Wall make us more like Rose or Williams' team, or does our "top-heavy" roster make us more like Lebron's Cavs? You can draw parallel's to any of those teams including the Kings, Sonics and Thunder that won 25, 20 and 23. Those teams were young and talented, but unsettled in their play styles and had yet to turn a corner.

It's interesting, because Wall and Durant were -10 for their teams, were Westbrook was +5 in terms of on/off. I disagree with your description of "young and talented" for the Thunder in 2007, or even 2008 - it was basically Durant, Green playing out of position, and Saer Sene-type scrubs. The Kings are probably a better example - a lot of nice pieces, but no real consistency. Neither team had no young piece like Blatche, whose team was better with him on the court than off the court despite him being out of position (can't stress this enough), and as the #1 option posted a half-decent on/off rating despite playing with teammates that were *worse* than what Evans and Durant had to work with. Now we're adding Wall to the mix, an elite prospect at a position as you have confirmed, produces immediate dividends in terms of win total. If we get anything above the norm from the rookies, and at least some improvement from Javale, then it will be hard to win less than 30 games even without Arenas (also, another thing you have to consider is what we get back for him - if we trade Arenas to the Knicks for Curry + Chandler, that's not enough of a talent dump to get us to a lower-echelon team).

I think Gil puts us in the 36-48 range; if Blatche makes an enormous leap from his production as a starter, (basically boosting his TS% from 53% to 55+%, lowering his TOs, and going from a slightly-above average defender to an above-average to elite defender), if McGee gives us a consistent inside scoring threat, a decent amount of rebounds and is better than abysmal in help defense and rotations (think a 7'1 Amare with the longest standing reach in the NBA), Arenas returns at least to 85% of his peak, and we find a SF somewhere in the mix, then a huge season can happen.

Also, I was throwing out certain ones, like Bargs and Curry, I hadn't made that clear enough. And even though that Denver team had quality veterans, they had also won 17 wins the previous year.

Had Jamison and Butler not been on the team at all, I'd argue we'd have played at a playoff pace.

I don't know what to say to that other than - I need to take a break from this place.[/quote]

What part of "Jamison and Butler were terrible last year" don't you understand?

Butler probably made us 5-10 wins worse than we would have been alone, and Jamison was his usual high offense low defense self, and Blatche had already surpassed him.

An average SF + starting Blatche 82 games would have upgraded both positions.

[LyricalRico]

Had Jamison and Butler not been on the team at all, I'd argue we'd have played at a playoff pace.

I don't know what to say to that other than - I need to take a break from this place.

Yeah, I know how you feel dude.

[LyricalRico]

I'd remove Melo's team because they were laden with talented veterans, so after that we have nine data points between 25 and 41 wins.

One thing worth noting is that we stand to benefit in the win column for a few reasons other than the addition of Wall.

1. This will be the second year under Flip's system. There's usually a one-year adjustment period with a new coach.
2. Blatche appears to have just broken out. It's reasonable to expect 82 games of "good Blatche" rather than just the 32 games we had last year.
3. McGee will probably show considerable improvement. The third year for a big man is usually a big year.

Very interesting stuff. The analysis done by Chaos/fisher now has me thinking that I was underrating Wall's potential impact. And as much as I still think Blatche and McGee have room to grow, I can't disagree with nate that they will be better. So after re-thinking it, this could be a 30+ win team without Arenas, basically slightly worse than the recent Bulls teams with Rose and no other "star".

Put a healthy and reformed Arenas on those Bulls teams and you might have something. Then again, you might not (the Bulls had Gil-lite in Ben Gordon and still were a .500 team). But I can kind of see why others think we can keep Gil and win sooner rather than later. Still, for those who are concerned about Gil's locker room behavior, the thought that this team can already be competitive without Gil is actually an argument in favor of trading him because you don't want him to ruin what could be a pretty good thing.

I'm definitely still on the "trade Gil" side of the fence, but I'm closer to the fence than I was before. Keep up the analysis!

[montestewart]

Had Jamison and Butler not been on the team at all, I'd argue we'd have played at a playoff pace.

I don't know what to say to that other than - I need to take a break from this place.

Take sun screen and plenty of water.

[AceDegenerate]

Had Jamison and Butler not been on the team at all, I'd argue we'd have played at a playoff pace.

I don't know what to say to that other than - I need to take a break from this place.

People are not seriously still trying to overstate Jamison's impact on this team in the past 7 years are they? It is NO coincidence that this man was traded to the #1 team in the league for NOTHING, and that team played WORSE with him than without him.

Antawn Jamison's effect on any team (unless he is a 6th man) is a NET Negative. His effect in the locker room is COMPLETELY overstated as well.

[Hoopalotta]

I have our cap number at $50M in the summer of 2012 (you have to add 2 minimum salary vets to the roster shown on my spreadsheet). We could theoretically shave off about $2.5M more by dumping N'Diaye, Seraphin and Booker, and replacing them with minimum salary cap holds. I'm assuming If we assume a 3% increase per year in the salary cap (which is unlikely with the new CBA), the cap limit will be in the neighborhood of $61.5M.

viewtopic.php?f=35&t=1022747&start=795#p24490348

The only way to have max salary in 2012 is if Arenas is traded, or if he decides to pull a Richard Jefferson and opts out of the last two years of his contract in exchange for an extension. We could also work out some kind of sign and trade with Blatche or McGee if we're angling for an elite big man like Howard (or potentially Oden).

Hmmmm, the discrepancy is because I mistakenly didn't have Javale at 300% of his 2011 salary and was just plugging in his qualifying offer instead.

About $49 million without Hamady and assuming the 12th and then 18th picks. Not wildly exciting if the cap crimps down and it means we didn't do anything long term the year before either. It's basically "lockout year or bust" as far as leveraging that space if we're keeping Gil unless.......we start juggling expiring contracts, which is counter productive IMO. After the lockout, there's not time for any of this "gosh, we sure do fancy those Oklahomans and their patient resolve, but also we're considering that...." half measure business. The FO better know what it wants to do.

"Hmmmm", indeed.

[Induveca]

Hoopalotta,

I suspect the front office's mantra right now is something along the lines of:

1. Improve the quality of the organization with talent, both on the court and upstairs.
2. Put out a quality product.
3. Increase brand loyalty through transparency, interaction with the fans and operating with the utmost integrity, and most importantly success on the court.

I can say these things as I had the benefit of sitting in staff meetings with Leonsis back in my late teenage/early 20s as a dot com uber-geek. The guy is all about integrity and transparency, always has been.

You can rest assured if he hammers a point home in public in something related to his business, it was calculated (take a cue from Leonsis David Kahn....) and in the interest of building trust with the customer (aka wiz fanbase).

I honestly think most intelligent businessmen would take a look at the NBA free agent process, and see there are roughly 400 or so players out there, and 10 of them are true game changers for a franchise and only attainable in something related to free agency (outright signing or trade). Then you take into consideration there are 30 teams in the NBA, personal preferences of the player in terms of city/locale, the fact that a player's existing team has far more incentives to resign them. To even attempt to break that down into some sort of algorithm showing a team's chances of landing one of those top 10 guys in a year where he is a free agent with all of those subjective variables in place is pointless. What is boils down to is one word......

LUCK

You don't plan your business based on hoping LUCK defines your success. People who wish to be successful in anything need to realize you make your own luck. Working hard, and enjoying success inevitably leads to more success. Whenever you "wait" for some projected occurrence you are basically leaving yourself to the whims of luck and chance. Bad formula for success. He'll opt to win now and lean heavily on his mantra......

"SUCCESS BREEDS MORE SUCCESS". Honestly I can't remember if that was his or Steve Case's quote but they definitely bantered it around in meetings. Compete and have even marginal, sustained success and you attract players and become a destination for these said free agents. Losing more won't make that happen.

[jimij]

Re "Success breeds success" - that's one reason whenever you see a list of teams that a star is willing to be traded to it's almost exclusively to winning teams (with the exception of the Knicks maybe). Look at the teams Paul and Bosh had on their trade lists - for the most part, they are already successful and they just want to help them win even more.

IMO keeping Gil and trying to win as much as possible over the next couple of years with a young roster gives us a much better chance at getting another top flight player to come to DC whether as a FA or in trade. As others have pointed out, even if we ditch Gil, we're not very likely to get a top pick unless we completely luck out in the lottery again since we should still have enough talent to compete especially if we add a veteran SF.

I'd rather keep Gil and go for it while maintaining fiscal sanity going forward so that our front office can be flexible with trades and FA's going forward. One bad contract isn't too bad especially if he's even 80% of what he was before. Personally, I think he'll be better than that.

[gesa2]

Reading Hoopa and then Induveca's post immediately following illustrates exactly how hard the decisions are for the Wizards organization right now. While this is a great debate here, and the logic, research and subsequent thoughtful posts are cool, all I'm left with after reading over the last week is confusion. What plan to take? I really don't know. I want to keep GIl, but I'm nowhere near sure enough to plan on making anybody else eat crow if that idea works, and will happily applaud everybody that's right if we trade him and have success. I'm just so happy that with Ted, I really believe there will actually BE a plan.

[fishercob]

The only way to have max salary in 2012 is if Arenas is traded, or if he decides to pull a Richard Jefferson and opts out of the last two years of his contract in exchange for an extension. We could also work out some kind of sign and trade with Blatche or McGee if we're angling for an elite big man like Howard (or potentially Oden).

I don't want this to get glossed over, because these are both potentially huge points.

1) Might Gil opt out with 2 years and $42M on his contract? Well, he's walked away from the final year of a deal before in an effort to get a long term deal. It's really going to depend what the CBA rules allow, but you could see a scenario where things are going well for Gil and the team and both sides want him here for the duration of his career. Maybe we sign him for 5 or 6 years at $70M-$90M and it's flat or declining. It's possible that could be attractive to both parties.

2) With Gil, Wall, Dray and McGee, the only starter "hole" is at SF. So if we upgrade up front one of those guys is in all likelihood going to be part of the package. Unless both guys "blow up," there's a reasonable chance that one won't be here for there next contract. Some tema is going to be happy to pay one of those guys $10M a year if they're losing their superstar who wants $20M. The other corollary to this is Seraphin. If he's the real deal as a rotation-quality big, there's even more reason to use Blatche or McGee in a trade for an upgrade at SF, PF or C.

[Kanyewest]

barely, John Wall's going to make other players better similar to how Steve Nash has done for Amare and Shawn Marion. Young, McGee, and Blatche all got better when the Wizards acquired Wall. So did Gilbert, if he stays.

I wonder if it was the system in regards to Marion and Amare. Amare should do fine in D'Antoni's offense.

[DCZards]

Still, for those who are concerned about Gil's locker room behavior, the thought that this team can already be competitive without Gil is actually an argument in favor of trading him because you don't want him to ruin what could be a pretty good thing.

Oh, please, lyrical. When are you going to get over the Gil is a "problem" in the locker room stuff? It just ain't so. Arguments based on talent, injuries, oncourt chemistry, etc. I can buy, but not this nonsense that seems to suggest Gil is a cancer.

If GA is a problem at all for his teammates, it's that he might be calling them at 3 in the morning to go to the Verizon Center to shot baskets and workout.

[Jericho]

I've been lurking for a while, but finally wanted to chime in on this topic.

I've seen some here go to lengths to show how teams improve after getting the #1 pick. That's not exactly rocket science. Of course you'd expect such teams to improve. For one, you're adding a talented player to a poor squad. For another, those teams have virtually no where to go but up. The vast majority of teams DO improve after a # 1 selection. And that's logical. But the question is why?

Let's not forget that the 2001-2002 Wizards improved 18 games after selecting Kwame Brown. And we know it wasn't because of Brown. That might be a unique situation, but it goes to show that all improvement is not just because of one guy. Each team is different, and each situation is different. Even among the small sample of teams, some took big leaps and others took small leaps. And then there's the Thunder/Sonics who actually regressed with Durant. Durent wasn't the #1 pick, but has the talent to be one. The excuse was that was an anomoly. That the Sonics dumped Lewis and Allen. But let's not forget the top 5 players from last year's Wizards team in games started are gone. This is a different team from last year's squad.

The short answer is that I believe many here are vastly overrating the Wizards chance of success in 2010-2011. That's not unique. You go to any team board, and most fans inflate the quality of their squad. I don't see the Wizards as a playoff team. It COULD happen. But it would basically require everyone to be at the top of their potential. And that's just not how things practically go. You never get your best case scenario for all players. Let's also not ignore a few facts:

(1) The Wizards have a grand total of 2 proven NBA players. Those two are Heinrich and Arenas. And both are natural PGs who won't be playing that position for the Wiz. Other guys may yet prove themselves, but no one else has done it over a full season.

(2) After the trades, with both McGee and Blatche playing well, the Wizards stank last season. They did not have Arenas. They did not have Wall. but they did have a decent PG (Livingston) and other quality players no longer with the squad.

(3) This team has no depth. only 4 guys who you think might do anything: Wall, Arenas, Blatche, and McGee. Maybe toss in Heinrich for 5. And that's it. Yi, Thornton, Nick Young. Are these guys supposed to be rotation players on a playoff team?

(4) Defense seems highly suspect.

I don't doubt that if the "Big 4" all do well, that the Wizards will do decent. But most rookies aren't awesome from the get go. Plenty of young guys who play well at the end of one season don't carry it over to the next. Arenas has barely played at all the last 3 years. Lots of things could go wrong.

I like the core of the team. Blatche and McGee bring nice upside that most lower tier teams don't have. Wall is hopefully a franchise player. But the team needs more talent. And it's 4-5 years from being a real championship contender. Arenas will not be a major factor at that time. So if can be moved for a reasonable return, so be it. It makes sense to go that route.

[Silvie Lysandra]

I

That the Sonics dumped Lewis and Allen. But let's not forget the top 5 players from last year's Wizards team in games started are gone. This is a different team from last year's squad.

Again, I reiterate that losing Butler, Miller, Foye, and Jamison were addition by subtraction. Butler and Miller were both below average while Blatche had surpassed Jamison starting from about game 1. Haywood is the only real loss here that would actually have a negative impact on the W&L record.

(1) The Wizards have a grand total of 2 proven NBA players. Those two are Heinrich and Arenas. And both are natural PGs who won't be playing that position for the Wiz. Other guys may yet prove themselves, but no one else has done it over a full season.

(2) After the trades, with both McGee and Blatche playing well, the Wizards stank last season. They did not have Arenas. They did not have Wall. but they did have a decent PG (Livingston) and other quality players no longer with the squad.

Foye is not a quality player.
Miller was not a quality player last year.
Livingston I feel was overrated last year (13/6/3 over 36 is okay, and he shot very well, but teams aren't beating down this guy's door, are they?), he's maybe a fringe starter.

Are you saying Oberto, Singleton, and Boykins are quality players?

Fact is, I consider Seraphin (and for now I'm assuming he comes this season), Booker, Yi, Hinrich as improvements over Oberto, Singleton and Boykins in terms of a supporting cast.

(4) Defense seems highly suspect.

Jamison was such a net negative defensively that our defense *improved* despite also trading Haywood and Butler (who had a very good counterpart PER). We were low-mid 20s defensively pre-trade, we finished 18th. We have at least 3 bona-fide quality defenders in Blatche, Hinrich and Young. McGee could make strides, Seraphin and Booker seem pretty good for his age there, and I do think Arenas will be at least average defensing SGs.

Arenas will not be a major factor at that time. So if can be moved for a reasonable return, so be it. It makes sense to go that route.

[/quote]

That remains to be seen. He hasn't played much the past few years - which means he has less wear and tear on his body. So if the knee is healthy, he might have a year or two more of peak play more than he would otherwise.

I just think people don't see that we have a *lot* more than most "rebuilding" teams to work with, and that compared to what a guy like Paul, Williams, James or Melo had to work with, we're in very good shape.

[AceDegenerate]

^- I see that (Je)Rico decided to join under another account.

You seem to state matter-of-factly what Arenas will or won't be, when the reality is nobody knows and anybody who claims to is wrong.

I can state just as matter-of-factly that Arenas will lead this team to a championship next season, doesn't make what I'm saying any more right or wrong than you.

Also, as I've pointed out here numerous times before; Not you or anyone else has the formula for a "Championship Contender". It's all LUCK. You can guarantee only 2 Franchises will be successful in the NBA; the Lakers and Celtics. The Celtics were bad for a pretty long time too before they got LUCKY again. That's the only consistency you'll find throughout NBA History in "building a championship contender".

The Wizards will be a "Championship Contender" when LUCK is on their side, and the chips fall their way. The only thing you can build in the NBA is a Competitive Team that plays the right way. I'm sick of everybody acting like they have the formula for a "Championship Contender".

[gesa2]

Man I want RC Buford to buy me some lottery tickets then, because he is LUCKY! Somehow he's arranged at least 2 completely different teams around one top player without living in Boston or LA. Detroit too, what a LUCKY town. Never had more than one all NBA player, still fell into championships in 2 different eras.

[AceDegenerate]

Man I want RC Buford to buy me some lottery tickets then, because he is LUCKY! Somehow he's arranged at least 2 completely different teams around one top player without living in Boston or LA. Detroit too, what a LUCKY town. Never had more than one all NBA player, still fell into championships in 2 different eras.

Actually, you further prove my point. A LOT of LUCK went into everything you just stated. Want to talk about Tim Donaghy again? NBA Games both Regular Season & Playoffs were Ref'd by a Crooked Ref for years, How can you tell me Lucky doesn't play a factor?