RealGM

Key additions: Malcolm Brogdon, TJ Warren, Jeremy Lamb, Goga Bitadze

Key departures: Thad Young, Bojan Bogdanovich, Darren Collison, Corey Joseph


I'll start by saying that all in all, I'm quite satisfied with how things have turned out so far

Am I disappointed that the team didn't get bigger names D'Angelo Russell or proven players like Ricky Rubio; sure, a little

But I'm also happy to see that the team actually took some chances and made some moves, instead of the play it safe routine and bringing back most everyone. Anyway...

Warren VS Bogie:
Unlike most people here, I actually feel that TJ Warren is an upgrade over Bogie; the injuries are a concern, and there is of course the chance that his shooting last season was a flash in the pan, but I think overall, Warren is the better player, and I feel better with entrusting him the SF position long term than I do Bogie - at the very least, he's a much better finisher than Bogie I feel, so for the times when Vic is sitting on the bench and we need someone to throw the ball to, I'm glad we have Warren now, over Bogie or Tyreke or, yikes, CoJo

Brogdon VS DC:
I think most everyone would agree this is an upgrade, the only question is whether it is an upgrade worth $20m and a FRP (especially the FRP)

Jeremy Lamb VS CoJo (or Tyreke)
The reason why I compared Lamb to CoJo is that CoJo hangs on to the ball so much when the 2nd unit plays (it's either him or Tyreke), so Lamb will likely fill this role now (together with Holiday, probably) - and considering how ineffective CoJo can be at times (and how Tyreke turned out), I think this is a good upgrade

Goga VS... Thad?
I'm one who thinks Thad has been great the past two seasons, and under normal circumstances I would have been upset at his departure. But the main problem with Thad was that as long as he is around, Nate's not going to experiment with a Myles-Domas front court, and Leaf's going to be forever stuck in purgatory - so unfortunately, for the team to actually try something new, Thad's departure is probably what it takes to jolt Nate into action - I think the team is in a good place now, playing Domas and Myles at C and PF (or PF and C), with Leaf and Goga soaking up the backup minutes. I think Goga is ready to contribute 8-12 quality minutes, and Leaf should get 15 minutes or so, with a third C and Warren getting any leftover minutes at C and PF


Anyway, I think the team is better now overall compared to last season (if Vic returns 100%), with better talent overall and better distribution of talent across all 5 positions

I hope Holiday, Leaf, and Doug get bigger roles, and I hope they are ready for their increased roles, but more than anything I hope Nate improves as a coach - please no more redshirting the young players, and please for the love of God no more tight 8 man rotations before the all star break

It’s not quite post mortem yet. We still have 3 roster spots, about $5.3-5.8m in salary cap space (depending on how If Myles hit his incentives this year or not) left, and then a $4.7m room exception left. Still could be a couple moves.

We decided not to give long term contracts to veterans Bogie and Thad... just like I said... I wouldnt give 4 year deal to Bojan or 3y to Thad...

Brogdon is big upgrade on PG... it wasnt easy to look the worst PG in league lat year...

Domas will be PF, will see how it will Works, Leaf back up... tat could be problem in PO... maybe we should add some veteran here...

Still a ton of cap space out there. LAC, LAL, Mavs, Knicks, Hawks, Kings. The two LA teams are waiting on Kawhi of course, but after that it is not clear who is worth all that spending money. Possibly we would see cap space teams executing more salary dumping deals (there's already been a bunch of those), though I guess the price of salary dumping goes down now that major FAs are signed.

After the dust settles, Pacers should pick over the best of the rest with their remaining money. Ideally we'd get another PG and another forward at least, but we'll see what opportunities come up.

I think Vorda is gonna miss having DC around to be his scapegoat. But I too love Brogdon. I haven't seen what the protections are on the pick hopefully it's on that can become 2 2nds.

I would have give 3 years to Bogie and Thad, but in this salary cap/Luxury tax world decisions have to be made. I'm assuming Bogie gave the Pacers a chance to match what the Jazz offered him. When we drafted Goga it was the end of Thad's days in Indiana. I know he wanted a long term deal here, liked it here and all that but the Business of Basketball dictated it was time for him to move on. Too bad because he is a great guy to have on your team.

I'm ok with Lamb and Warren. My only concern with Warren is that he's been getting injured a lot. Let's hope he can stay healthy with us.

winter_mute_13 wrote:Still a ton of cap space out there. LAC, LAL, Mavs, Knicks, Hawks, Kings. The two LA teams are waiting on Kawhi of course, but after that it is not clear who is worth all that spending money. Possibly we would see cap space teams executing more salary dumping deals (there's already been a bunch of those), though I guess the price of salary dumping goes down now that major FAs are signed.

After the dust settles, Pacers should pick over the best of the rest with their remaining money. Ideally we'd get another PG and another forward at least, but we'll see what opportunities come up.

My money is on Kahwi going to the Clippers.

winter_mute_13 wrote:After the dust settles, Pacers should pick over the best of the rest with their remaining money. Ideally we'd get another PG and another forward at least, but we'll see what opportunities come up.

If we can somehow squeeze in Elfrid Payton and say Noah Vonleh, that would be quite the grand finale to this offseason

I don't know where we're going to find the playing time for Payton, but I just feel that he's a good candidate for turning his career around with a new team

I'm surprised that Noah Vonleh hasn't been signed yet, given that he's had a good season

basketballwacko2 wrote:My money is on Kahwi going to the Clippers.

76ers lost Jimmy Butler and JJ Redick; they did sign Horford to make up for it a little, but overall I have them as being weaker, especially due the loss of Redick, considering how much they needed shooters; but who knows, maybe with Butler out of the way they can gel better as a team, sort of an addition by subtraction kind of thing

Celtics too lost Horford and downgraded from Kyrie to Kemba, but again, with Kyrie and Rozier off the team now, maybe team chemistry will improve and it'll be another addition by subtraction thing

Bucks lost Mirotic and Brogdon, so they've definitely lost some talent

Knicks struck out in free agency, and Nets although they upgraded from Russell to Kyrie, who knows when Durant will be back

If Raptors lose Kawhi to one of the LA teams as well, the road to the ECF looks wide open to me

Topofthekey wrote:

basketballwacko2 wrote:My money is on Kahwi going to the Clippers.

76ers lost Jimmy Butler and JJ Redick; they did sign Horford to make up for it a little, but overall I have them as being weaker, especially due the loss of Redick, considering how much they needed shooters; but who knows, maybe with Butler out of the way they can gel better as a team, sort of an addition by subtraction kind of thing

Celtics too lost Horford and downgraded from Kyrie to Kemba, but again, with Kyrie and Rozier off the team now, maybe team chemistry will improve and it'll be another addition by subtraction thing

Bucks lost Mirotic and Brogdon, so they've definitely lost some talent

Knicks struck out in free agency, and Nets although they upgraded from Russell to Kyrie, who knows when Durant will be back

If Raptors lose Kawhi to one of the LA teams as well, the road to the ECF looks wide open to me

Well as for the Celtics losing Kyrie and gaining Kemba I have that as about even, Kyrie might be a little more talented but gets hurt a lot and he's not a really good teammate. Kemba is a better leader and better teammate, so it could end up being a wash. That said, I think they over paid Kemba and it might come back to haunt them. Better than over paying Terry Rozier!

I have a question about playing time, because it seems like we have a glut at PG/SG now (maybe SF as well)

Ok, let's start by saying that we expect Vic, Brogdon, Lamb, and Holiday to get significant minutes at PG & SG

Next, let's estimate the amount of playing them they should ideally get:

Vic - 32
Brogdon - 32
Lamb - 30
Holiday - 16

Now, the problem is, there are a total of 96 minutes available at PG and SG, however, if you tally up the minutes for those four players above, it adds up to 110 minutes - basically 14 minutes above 96

Ok, no problem you say, because we can cut those 14 minutes from Lamb, and let him get them from playing SF instead

So we're looking at:

PG: Brogdon (32), Holiday (16)
SG: Vic (32), Lamb (16)

Ok, looks good, so let's try to give Lamb his additional 14 minutes play SF

The problem is, we'll have 3 players who all need minutes at SF: Lamb, Warren, Doug; so if Lamb needs 14 minutes at SF, that leaves only 34 minutes for Warren and Doug - how exactly do we do this?

Doug averaged about 18 minutes of playing time this past season - if we maintain that, that means there'll only be 16 minutes left for Warren at SF

We thus have an awkward situation where the 48 minutes at SF are awkwardly split between 3 players: Doug 18, Warren 16, Lamb 14

That feels really weird, with 3 players splitting time at SF but none playing starter minutes:

PG: Brogdon (32), Holiday (16) = 48
SG: Vic (32), Lamb (16) = 48
SF: Warren (16), Doug (18), Lamb (14) = 48

Seems like we need to start Lamb at SF and let him get most of his time there, split Doug's time backing up both SF and SG, and give Warren significant playing time at PF:

PG: Brogdon (32), Holiday (16) = 48
SG: Vic (32), Lamb (8), Doug (8) = 48
SF: Lamb (22), Warren (16), Doug (10) = 48
PF: minutes for Myles/Domas/Leaf (34), Warren (14) = 48

It seems a little strange starting Lamb at SF over Warren, but I guess that's how it is?

Or maybe I'm just over thinking this

^^^Brogdon and Lamb can both play the 3 at times did you account for that?

Anyone upset with out offseason so far? Take a look at the thread on the Hornets board about the Rozier trade, don't troll them!

All of their mods are banging them hard for the Terry Rozier signing!!

basketballwacko2 wrote:Anyone upset with out offseason so far? Take a look at the thread on the Hornets board about the Rozier trade, don't troll them!

All of their mods are banging them hard for the Terry Rozier signing!!

I went and read their thread and now I actually feel bad for them

On a different note, I'm glad that by signing Brogdon and Lamb we can finally stop all the "Sabonis for Jaylen Brown" trades

Brogdon makes the big difference here, because he is a two way player.

BoBo, Thad, CoJo will be missed next season, but if the new guys can stay healthy and develop chemistry together, the future looks brighter with a higher ceiling. None of our 4 vets were going to turn into special players in the future, Brogdon already is a special player and Warren has some potential to become one. Without the injury concerns, the Pacers probably would never be able to get them. David West deja vu.

It's a bit of a gamble, but with our vets, our ceiling wasn't that high. Lamb is a good player and should be a clear upgrade over Evans, but he is not going to make a significant difference compared with the rest of the league IMO Draft.net once compared him with Reggie Miller, but the killer attitude isn't present.

Either way, Holiday can bring what DC gave us, not so efficient, but with better defense. Another shot blocker in Goga is always handy. The future looks more promising when we stay healthy. And coach has not much other choice but to start Sabonis, so those discussions will hopefully die after next season and will be much fun next season

I'm optimistic, but not as excited as I would have been had we signed Rubio.

I didn't watch as many games last year as I normally would have, and unless the offense looks a lot less painful than it did last year, that trend will probably continue for me.

I think we did very well. I would have preferred to see a star like Russell sign here but the reality is that a player like that is not coming here via Free Agency.

I think we have a couple of minor moves that we will make. I think we will bring in a low cost, defensive combo forward. Someone that can help defend the Greek Freak and Leonard and the stud Forwards in the league.

I also think we will bring in a low cost 3rd string PG who could also play some SG. Maybe Shelvin Mack?

If I recall correctly, Sabonis and Turner played their best together last year when Collison, Joseph and Vic were on the floor. I think they will play for a lot with 3 guards on the floor. Brogdan has enough height, length and strength to guard a lot of 3's so while he will start at PG, I think he will get a lot of time at SG and SF. He will make us very flexible.

Topofthekey wrote:I have a question about playing time, because it seems like we have a glut at PG/SG now (maybe SF as well)

the problem isn't immediate though because Vic isn't going to get 32 minutes early. reallocate those minutes and the problem is gone. there will even be some for Sumner. now if Vic is back at full strength in January, we could make a midseason trade to rebalance the roster. I think that's unlikely though and it is more likely that Vic will be on a pitch count all year and we can wait until next summer to make changes.

one thing is clear - we got a lot younger. we've got a couple of open roster spots. it'll be interesting to see if we fill them with older players on short contracts, or younger players on longer ones. we have a history of using 2 year deals with team options after 1 and some more of those wouldn't surprise me.

If nothing else it should be interesting and I would think competitive. Not having Vic for the first four months of the season presents an opportunity to take a good look at all the pieces we have.

I could see a 3 man rotation at guard with Brogdan, Lamb and Holiday if Holiday is up to it. If he isn't that will open up minutes for Sumner.

It would seem Warren would be the starter at the 3 being backed up by McD but, I would hope we would allow for a competition there. McD had good chemistry with Dom last year so with Dom getting more minutes that might create an opportunity Doug. I would think signing Sumner to a long term deal affords him a look at this position if there are minimal guard minutes available for him.

They say Dom will be the starting 4 and I"m down with that. Seems the Pacers owe it to themselves to see if TJ Leaf can hold down the back minutes here. Spent a FRP on this guy we should give him a chance to see if he can play. if he really steps up maybe he gets backup 5 minutes too.

Seems Turner would be backed up by Goga if he's up to it.

Not sure how many games we win while figuring all this out.

On Vic's return hopefully any guys who appear to be odd men out can be moved for positive assets.

Scoot McGroot wrote:It’s not quite post mortem yet. We still have 3 roster spots, about $5.3-5.8m in salary cap space (depending on how If Myles hit his incentives this year or not) left, and then a $4.7m room exception left. Still could be a couple moves.

Yeah hopefully we will wait out the market a bit with the rest of our space and the room exception. Money dried up super fast and there's going to be a few guys left who should have seen higher paydays. And we can afford to wait as most of our lineup is set now.

Topofthekey wrote:

winter_mute_13 wrote:After the dust settles, Pacers should pick over the best of the rest with their remaining money. Ideally we'd get another PG and another forward at least, but we'll see what opportunities come up.

If we can somehow squeeze in Elfrid Payton and say Noah Vonleh, that would be quite the grand finale to this offseason

I don't know where we're going to find the playing time for Payton, but I just feel that he's a good candidate for turning his career around with a new team

I'm surprised that Noah Vonleh hasn't been signed yet, given that he's had a good season

Elf just signed in NY on a 2 year/$16m deal.