Malik Starks wrote:As to the Clippers poor draft picks, it is neither here nor there. It's very easy to cherry pick a teams draft choices a decade later. The consesus at the time were that they were solid picks or had a high ceiling. The point I think mofopimp (he can speak for himself) and I would agree with is that these draft picks devoid of any veteran leadership and a winning culture are not in a position to succeed and therefore winning as many games as REASONABLY possible is the better approach.
To your larger point regarding using draft picks as leverage, I think it's a fairly good point, and can be used in limited circumstances (which I believe the Magic are currently doing anyway). However the examples you site have a lot more to do with the those teams being in large markets than them having stockpiled young prospects.
Chris Paul wanted to go to a larger market and had a list of teams he was going to
go to (I don't recall the exact teams right now) but this was well established.
For Deron Williams, he didn't have a list of teams and hadn't specifically asked for trade, but it was understood that he had his eyes on a bigger market than Salt Lake. Brooklyn looked to acquire him because they knew their market was big enough to keep him.
Ditto for Dwight Howard..no need to rehash that.
And everyone knew that Carmello was going to New York one way or another, the only question was whether he would go in Free-Agency-and take a significant pay cut, or be traded and re-sign. Dolan got nervous and gave away the store to get him but the consensus was he would have signed with them anyway.
"Veteran leadership" is greatly over-appreciated at times. The reason the Thunder are good isn't because of any veterans, it's because they have better players. Just to be clear, I'm not in favor of bottoming out. I just don't understand why everyone thinks you have to be in favor of tanking or strongly anti-draft.
I wasn't trying to cherry pick the Clippers picks, but let's be honest. They aren't bad because the system makes it hard for them. They have had every chance to get better, but Sterling and Elgin Baylor kept them down. I don't remember many people singing the praises of Olowakandi, but I know what you mean. This is why I think we will have an advantage. The Spurs haven't picked in the top 20 in over a decade, but they always find guys because they scout better. Hopefully we can use scouting along with some top 10 picks to build a nice cheap core.
I agree that no team should intentionally lose. I'm happy when we win even if it takes us down to the 10-13 range in the draft. But I have disagreed with BadMofoPimp in his stating that if we are close we should make a trade and go for it. Even if we are .500 at the trade deadline, I don't see how making short-term moves for a 2013 playoff run help us build a sustainable model for a contender. I would rather we play hard and barely miss the playoffs while sticking to whatever plan we came into the year with.
As for the trade situations, Chris Paul flirted with New York, but there was no way they could have afforded him. I'm sure every player wants to play in a larger market, it's just that some of them are crazy enough to say it out loud. This is from an article just before the Paul trade.
Sources told Broussard on Thursday that the Knicks and Magic are on Paul’s list of preferred destinations, but the Lakers are not. Sources told Broussard that the Portland Trail Blazers and Dallas Mavericks are also in the running if Paul were to be traded.
He did not want to be a Laker, the Clippers aren't on his list and I don't call Orlando a large market. The way things went down, the Clippers had a guy like Eric Gordon and Kaman's expiring to dangle and the Hornets/CP had to listen.
Deron got rush traded in the Jerry Sloan aftermath, but I promise you he would not have been traded for anything other than a guy with potential on a rookie deal. He still had two years on his contract. It's not like he was going to walk.
Melo screwed himself by limiting his list to one team and refusing to just wait until the summer when he could have went there via free agency. The Nuggets had the Knicks over a barrel and used the Nets for fake leverage. If young, cheap guys aren't on the table the Nuggets probably just let Carmelo walk.
Dwight is an idiot.
The thing is that having these young guys on good contracts opens up a lot of room for trade conversations. Right now, I think a healthy Anthony Davis is the biggest trade chip in the NBA. He's not better than Kevin Love, but he is 1/3 the price and that gets teams to listen.
To win in the NBA you need a franchise guy. I don't think we can get one to demand a trade here, or to even come here via free agency. Seriously, what's the last major free agent we got without overpaying? That means our top guy will have to come via panic trade or through the draft.