Pistol King wrote:Smart organizations are the ones that would trade him the first minute they get a chance. Especially now when he has increased his value and can be viewed as a (shorter) Jordan Clarkson volume scorer.
Yep, Poole can be a fun player to watch when he gets hot, he's very creative at finding ways to get buckets, but even when he's on he just doesn't play winning basketball and you know they can score on him right after at any given point. It's clear he wouldn't be satisfied as long as it's not "his" team. Let him go to an organization that has already an established system that can hold him accountable. There is no chance this organization in his current trajectory can hold accountable players like him or Kuzma. We've seen plenty of evidences for that. The only players this organization can "develop" are the ones who are willing listeners type players. Kuzma and Poole wouldn't change their game. It's already clear.
Now I know people gonna say "why caring about playing winning basketball when we need to tank the next 1-2 years anyway". But I believe that if you want to build something really good, it starts from the roots. You can't allow an empty tanking with horrible habits and just by drafting 1-2 top end talents to suddenly become a contender. You first plant the roots of the basketball you envision, and on that you add the talents you think might suit it the best way. And until that, you rely and develop the players you believe are the most likely to be key part of your long term vision.
Yeah, and I really don't think x's and o's are the hallmarks of a good basketball coach, and I don't even necessarily think draft ability is the hallmark of a good GM. These are necessary but not sufficient. Which makes sense if you view the overall organization as a business. Talent acquisition is just one facet of what makes the machine run.
And at the tippy top, the boomer ass owner is running it like an 80's-era corporate raider, trying to increase profitability by cutting costs instead of increasing revenue. His approach to facilities upgrades is like him scoffing at post-AOL internet companies putting in ping pong tables and not understanding that employee morale is a productivity multiplier, or that when you don't have a monopoly on internet access, customer experience dictates your profitability.
When the problem is "oh we can't sell out our tickets, and our floor seats are 1/10 what the Lakers can charge" the answer isn't to improve fan experience, it's to move 6 miles away where there's a higher median income. Just a doofus.
There's a business development professor, Hamilton Helmer, who said that there are 7 ways to achieve and sustain a competitive advantage, meaning if a company wants to distinguish itself from its competitors (other NBA teams, other sports teams, other entertainment options, etc.):
- Scale Economies: This means that as a business grows and produces more, its per-unit cost goes down. Big companies often have this power because they can spread out their fixed costs over larger units, making them more cost-efficient than their smaller competitors.
- Network Economies: This refers to the effect where the value of a product or service increases as more people use it. A classic example of this is social media platforms; the more friends you have on a platform, the more valuable it becomes to you.
- Counter-Positioning: A newcomer adopts a new, superior business model that the incumbent does not mimic due to anticipated damage to their existing business. An example is how Netflix, with its subscription model, counter-positioned against traditional video rental stores.
- Switching Costs: This is when it's difficult or costly for customers to switch from one product to another. This could be due to monetary costs, time and effort, or any other inconvenience. Software products, for instance, might have high switching costs if users have to relearn a new system or migrate large amounts of data.
- Branding: A strong brand can serve as a powerful moat. Consumers are willing to pay a premium for a brand they trust and recognize.
- Cornered Resource: This is when a company has exclusive access to a valuable resource. This could be in the form of a patent, a unique location, a talented team, etc.
- Process Power: When a company develops unique and superior methods of doing things that cannot be easily replicated by competitors. Over time, these processes can provide a sustainable competitive advantage.
We don't have scale economies, we don't have network economies, we don't have switching costs, we don't have branding (knicks and lakers have it).
We don't have a cornered resource relative to other teams, but the NBA as a whole is a cornered resource in the sense that it'd be hard for an ABA league to crop up on its own. I guess Jokic/Lebron/MJ are cornered resources in a sense.
The only way for the Wizards to become a successful business is to improve internal operations in a way that's not easily replicable, like what Riley brings to the Heat, or what the Spurs have. Even what Sam Hinkie did with moneyball isn't true process power, because it's easily replicable. It's much harder to replicate the soft skills that Riley and Pops can do with respect to implementing a culture on a team. Phil Jackson. Red Auerbach. Visionaries. The Patriot way in the NFL (vomit).