Thunder @ Nuggets

[pickaxe]

the problem is that Nate does not have the value to get you a decent SG, it is going to take someone like Faried and filler to get you a decent SG.

to me it depends on how you feel about the young players on the team currently, and what your goal really is right now. While I understand the reasoning behind the Koufos trade, what I have not really understood was the reasoning in getting foye, robinson, and Hickson.

If you view Fournier as your long term starting SG, and traded your starting center for Arthur indicating you view him as your long term PF either as a starter or at least 6th or 7th man that can defend and spread the floor, then why go out and sign guys at those positions? Foye should be nothing but a place holder, Nate is a good bench scorer but not a good PG, but with those 2 you have 4 PGs or combo guards all of whom are taking minutes from your young SG that looked like he had potential to be a long term answer at SG. Depending on what you feel is going to be Q Millers long term position in the NBA, why would you go out and sign Hickson? Even if the plan is to trade Faried (as has long been rumored) Hickson is the 4th or 5th PF added to the roster, and chandler is a combo forward. Meaning you have 1 true SG on the roster, and 2 centers on the roster, making a terrible unbalanced roster, especially considering how many of these guys are unable to make their own shot.

If the plan was to take a step back and develop some of the young talent on the team, then why bring in a bunch of players to get in their way? Fournier is struggling to get minutes while the Nuggets are giving a ton of minutes to journeymen at his position, meanwhile his confidence sucks. Q. Miller was said to have had a good camp, he looked solid in summer league, but he is not going to get any meaningful minutes behind 4 other guys. Shaw's job is to win games, I do not blame any coach for doing what he feels will help him win those games, but the front office has to think long term, and signing a bunch of rotation type talent to place in front of your young talent is dumb.

I went on this long rant to say this. Now the Nuggets are stuck in a weird position of having a bunch of rotation players without much value taking the playing time and killing the value of the young players. Nate Robinson signed in Denver for basically LLE type money, Hickson signed for MLE money, Foye signed for $3 million a year, in other words there was not exactly a bidding war for their services, meaning they have limited if any trade value. Andre Miller is old, he is not going to bring back much if anything in a trade, they did not pick up Hamilton's option, fournier has not been given enough minutes to even really get into any kind of rhythm and has looked like crap more often than not, Mcgee was trying to play on a broken leg and looked like crap doing it, Q Miller has not gotten off the bench, leaving Faried, lawson, Mozgov, chandler, and possible Galinari, along with that pick, as the only things of any kind of value on the roster right now. The problem is what are you going to get for them, that is better then what they are?

Very good question....why were those players acquired......but we do have to look at the best trade we can make moving forward. With limited trade value we might have to deal with some loss.

Imho here is plenty of time during games where Shaw can accomplish both getting Fournier quality minutes and winning games. The 9 losses we've had.....Fournier should figure in there somehow either to get him experience or to maybe even provide the remedy for what was allowing he score to dip in the first place.

My thing with trading the guys that help us win now is the actual position it would put the team in. Basically compound the damage from the pointless acquisitions by removing what is valuable.

I'd just rather they make one small, smart trade at a time rather than compound the damage. That's all you can do when we probably could have used a more strategic trade for Koufos to put us in a better trading position now.

I.e. if the plan was to trade Faried......at least keep Koufos for the size until the return from a Faried trade proves profitable.

[The Rebel]

Very good question....why were those players acquired......but we do have to look at the best trade we can make moving forward. With limited trade value we might have to deal with some loss.

It depends on what your goal is for the team, if the Nuggets are not going to develop their young players, than you pretty much have to trade them or they are wasted value, but at the same time if your goal is to build a long term contender then you are not going to do that giving Foye, Andre, and Robinson as many minutes as they can handle, while giving 4 PFs minutes, and ignoring the youth like Fournier and Q Miller.

Imho here is plenty of time during games where Shaw can accomplish both getting Fournier quality minutes and winning games. The 9 losses we've had.....Fournier should figure in there somehow either to get him experience or to maybe even provide the remedy for what was allowing he score to dip in the first place.

I would agree, but if what Shaw said in that article in the other thread is what he wants, fournier should be traded now, he is not a spot up shooter, he is a guy who drives and gets layups of good passes, and occasionally hits outside shots to keep defenders honest. Trying to turn him into a spot up shooter is nuts, especially given the needs of this team.

My thing with trading the guys that help us win now is the actual position it would put the team in. Basically compound the damage from the pointless acquisitions by removing what is valuable.

But what is valuable? I have seen nothing valuable from Foye to this point outside of maybe 3 good nights, Robinson would be okay if he was limited to minute or forced to pass somehow.

I'd just rather they make one small, smart trade at a time rather than compound the damage. That's all you can do when we probably could have used a more strategic trade for Koufos to put us in a better trading position now.

One trade at a time is fine, but what do you fix? Adding a guy like Asik only fixes the defensive problems in the post, he actually makes the problem worse on offense. Meaning trading for a defensive specialist while ignoring the other problems is not going to fix anything, but instead will make it worse. Trading for an upgrade at starting sg does not fix the interior problems. This team has more then a couple of problems, they have no one that can create outside of Lawson and Miller, and now with Shaw's quote I am thinking that is what he wants, meaning a trade for a guy at SG who can create for others and hit outside shots when needed, is not going to fix that problem. the have interior defense problems, and yes dealing for Asik would solve that. But they also need a post scorer, and Mozgov while servicable is not the guy they really need, neither is Asik. Then they need Gallo to get healthy.

I.e. if the plan was to trade Faried......at least keep Koufos for the size until the return from a Faried trade proves profitable.

to me trading Koufos for Arthur and then signing Hickson is a symptom of the problem I am seeing. Hickson are Faried are way to similar as players, Faried causes more chaos and is more athletic but Hickson is slightly better on offense. Meaning one of them should go, but Hickson has limited value, and I doubt Faried's value has went up splitting time with all these other PFs. Than they are short a center, why not use that money you used on Hickson to sign a center? you did not have to pay a ton for a 3rd center.

Why if you were bringing in Foye would you then sign Robinson? With the idea that you were going to trade 37 year old PG that you got a late 1st rounder to take in return for your backup PG 2 years ago?

So that leaves me with they have to trade one of Miller, Foye, or Robinson and one of Faried or Hickson, if need be you can also include the pick then that is what you have to do, as you need to get back a center that can start, and if shaw is not going to let Fournier be himself than you have to get an upgrade at SG asap, meaning 2 of Miller, foye, Robinson, and Fournier need to be moved.

[pickaxe]

The part about trading away the value was mostly about Faried. I get very uneasy whenever the Nuggets get too small....I am now forever against undersized power forwards playing center. Trade away Koufos, we got smaller. The size value is an element that is such a necessity to this team that even trading away Koufos puts us in a more uncomfortable position than other teams. Danilo coming back is huge for all of his skills but also his size. I am a firm believer that a good mix of 7 footers can greatly exploit our thin air advantage.......physicality can really wear down opponents and start opening up the game.

Faried is basically our intangible as of right now. He is limited in trade value because of the minute sharing as you said, but he is hugely valuable to the energy and hustle of the team. The one situation I would feel comfortable trading him in is one where somehow we add some player highly effective rebounding, or has an unstoppable motor. If Faried's also our best trade chip then we probably shouldn't trade....he just worth more to our team staying.

The damage was done when Iguodala was acquired, then a year later left and we end up with Nate & Co. Seems those two moves along with Gallo being out and McGee not ready are pushing this team in the wrong direction. Huge hole at SG, not a super-athletic team OR a sharp-shooting team, and caught between where Shaw wants to go and where we still are. I'd like to see the next move to be logical.

Does the FO accept where Shaw is going? Shaw says we're going to be a smashmouth team, I guess, with some interior shooting and tons of post-up. Just seems like what we wanted were a few adjustments and what's coming is a slow and painful overhaul of the entire team.

I loved what the team was doing last year, loved having redundancy at C for once instead of combo pf, enjoyed the fact with Brewer we pretty much had hands everywhere and crazy length and strength from top to bottom. That hugely overwhelming advantage just needed to re-add a SG with improved shooting capability. Now that we are going to rely on just Danilo for posting up, let's hope he stays healthy.

There are too many confusing elements about this team's direction and strengths. Certain things were working for us and we seem to be shying away from those very things.

[pickaxe]

Sorry for my confusing response.....I think I am genuinely confused about the last trade the team did and that won't be sorted out until we see the next move. I maybe can go "ah-ha" once we see it.