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From the J/S article today:

Hammond said having a lottery pick, as the Bucks will this summer, does not guarantee getting a solid contributor. The Pistons took Tayshaun Prince with the 23rd overall pick in 2002, which proved to be a great pick, but they misfired when they grabbed Darko Milicic with the No. 2 pick in 2003.

"There's no more inexact science than the draft," Hammond said. "That's why most people feel a little more secure with a trade and in free agency."


I agree with this and in a so-so draft like this one this line of thinking becomes even more paramount in my opinion and it's one of the reasons why I've been a strong advocate of trading the pick. Based on his comments, it appears Hammond is not sold on the Bucks' chances of getting a standout player if they remain in the 6-8 range. Certainly, it can be argued that the best work that happened while Hammond was working alongside Dumars didn't come in the lottery (where they not only missed on Darko but also Rodney White) but in terms of being smart in free agency (signing guys like Billups) and making smart trades. They have drafted well in the later part of the draft, most notably with Prince but also getting Maxiell at the end of the first and Amir Johnson in the second.

Hammond appears more comfortable working the trade route and bringing in good vets through free agency rather than constantly chasing after the next big thing in the lottery. That's been the approach I've advocated for some time. Make smart trades, spend wisely in free agency and then add the right pieces in the draft, but don't spend every year in the lottery going nowhere.

I'll be interested to see if his views on the draft result in any attempts to trade down and stockpile picks. If he's not convinced a standout player will be there in the 6-8 range, that idea certainly makes plenty of sense in my opinon.

Good to start another thread on this....I was talking about this in the other thread.....I'll put it here.

Look at the Pistons, and you see that they were built via trades and the MLE. Essentially acquiring younger and middle age players who hadn't quite reached their potential yet.

If you assume that Hammond was the "brains" behind the Pistons, which I'm not sure is accurate or not, then you'd assume he would follow the same blueprint. Which would not be tanking and acquiring draft picks.

Rather you'd see things like clearing some salary to make a full MLE offer to a guy like Josh Childress, hoping he'd bust out here. And dealing a guy like CV for a Francisco Garcia type, hoping he'd take another leap here.

I'd look around the league for 2 to 4 year veterans who look like they might break out in the right situation. That would be the direction the Bucks would go, again assuming that Hammond was behind or in full agreement with Detroit's philosophy.

So we come back to the pick. I say if it is #7 or #8 it gets moved in a draft day or draft week deal to acquire a "young veteran" and maybe drop some salary to free us up to use the full MLE this summer and have it be within the long term budget.

I dont think Darko was all that bad of a pick because they still won a championship the year they picked them and who is to say that Melo may just not have been a good fit for the team that they were putting together. They already had their SF in Tayshaun Prince and he had already developed great chemistry with the two Wallaces's, Billups and Hamilton.

I also would support trading the pick but if there is a guy in the draft that Hammond feels would help the chemistry of the team that he will begin to assemble than im okay with that too.

paulpressey25 wrote:So we come back to the pick. I say if it is #7 or #8 it gets moved in a draft day or draft week deal to acquire a "young veteran" and maybe drop some salary to free us up to use the full MLE this summer and have it be within the long term budget.

This is the approach I've been advocating. Move the pick and acquire a proven vet and if you can dump a bad contract in the process all the better. I'd take someone like Josh Childress, for example, over anyone currently slotted in the 6-8 range in the draft. He not only fills a gigantic need but he's the type of player I believe you can win with.

I just don't see a lot of big-time talent in this draft and based on Hammond's comments he seems to agree. So if the Bucks can turn the pick into a proven vet while also shedding a bad contract I think that would be a smart move to make.

europa wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



This is the approach I've been advocating. Move the pick and acquire a proven vet and if you can dump a bad contract in the process all the better. I'd take someone like Josh Childress, for example, over anyone currently slotted in the 6-8 range in the draft. He not only fills a gigantic need but he's the type of player I believe you can win with.

I just don't see a lot of big-time talent in this draft and based on Hammond's comments he seems to agree. So if the Bucks can turn the pick into a proven vet while also sheeding a bad contract I think that would be a smart move to make.

Hammond did that once too
Ok so it wasnt exactly a bad contract that they turned into Rasheed, but still, the perfect typo.

Andrew34r wrote:I dont think Darko was all that bad of a pick

Darko was one of the worst draft picks of all time. He's a bust who was selected in front of three potential hall of fame talents, and that hasn't happened many times before. That the Pistons have been successful in spite of this horrible move is a testament to the fact that they hadn't been reliant on any particular home-run hit.

Kohl Is A Mome wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



Hammond did that once too
Ok so it wasnt exactly a bad contract, but still, the perfect typo.

Ha. I didn't even catch that.

I'm looking through the FA list to see who Hammond might toss money to....even if an RFA.....

You see guys like Craig Smith, Beno Udrih, Ronny Turiaf (if he can convince Ron Walter to take the medical risk) and Childress.

On the regular list you've got Diop, Quinton Ross, Francisco Elson, Pietrus, Matt Barnes,

Longer shots might be Delonte West, Eduardo Najera

adamcz wrote:-= original quote snipped =-

Darko was one of the worst draft picks of all time. He's a bust who was selected in front of three potential hall of fame talents, and that hasn't happened many times before. That the Pistons have been successful in spite of this horrible move is a testament to the fact that they hadn't been reliant on any particular home-run hit.

Well yeah. But its more so that the only reason they had that pick in the first place is because of a deal from 6 years before that which unthinkably blossomed into that situation.

adamcz wrote:-= original quote snipped =-

Darko was one of the worst draft picks of all time. He's a bust who was selected in front of three potential hall of fame talents, and that hasn't happened many times before. That the Pistons have been successful in spite of this horrible move is a testament to the fact that they hadn't been reliant on any particular home-run hit.

Darko the player was a bad pick... yes. But when a team wins a championship I really could careless if they draft Donald Duck its a smart pick...IMO. Talented players have gone to teams before and completely ruined chemistry it was a smart pick by Detroit. If they had not won a championship I would say it was an absolute failure.

Craig Smith will probably be re-signed by Minnesota but I would love to have him in a Bucks uniform.

Well I think his thinking is a little old school. Under the old CBA rookies got a 5 year contract. So if you draft a bust you are pretty much suck for five years. Now they still get 5 years, but the last three are team options. So if someone bust it will not hurt in the long run. But then again most of these rookies are pretty young and take more than 2 years to mature as a player. Question for GAD or someone who knows. If you pick up the 3rd year option are you picking up the 4th and 5th year also?

Andrew34r wrote:Craig Smith will probably be re-signed by Minnesota but I would love to have him in a Bucks uniform.

Remember when we made him a draft promise and most of the board freaked out, "who the hell is that? Why did we promise to pick him?"

Of course thats probably only funny now because of what we ended up getting out of our actual pick (since Craig was already picked) David Noel.

I'd love to see the Bucks sign Childress. I'd have no problems seeing if the ML could be split up in order to sign Diop and Barnes. I can't see the Nets letting Diop go, though, so if a team wants him they may have to overpay - and that's something I don't see Hammond doing.

Kohl Is A Mome wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



Remember when we made him a draft promise and most of the board freaked out, "who the hell is that? Why did we promise to pick him?"

Of course thats probably only funny now because of what we ended up getting out of our actual pick (since Craig was already picked) David Noel.

Yeah I remember that and than after seeing him play (especially early on in the season) I kept wishing we had got him.

msiris wrote:Well I think his thinking is a little old school. Under the old CBA rookies got a 5 year contract. So if you draft a bust you are pretty much suck for five years. Now they still get 5 years, but the last three are team options. So if someone bust it will not hurt in the long run. But then again most of these rookies are pretty young and take more than 2 years to mature as a player. Question for GAD or someone who knows. If you pick up the 3rd year option are you picking up the 4th and 5th year also?

Ehh I suppose in an odd way youre correct, but not entirely.
They get 4 year deals. (The 5th is when you give them the Qualifying offer and they either choose to go with RFA or sign the QO and play the year out). In the old one The 4th year was an option for the team. In the new one its the 3rd and 4th. And no you do those seperately, just picking up the 3rd doesnt accept the 4th as well.

Back on that Draft Pick trade for a second (the one that ended up being used on Darko), Otis Thorpe sure had a knack for being in trades with guys that either were big stars or could have been.
Clyde Drexler, Chris Webber, Mitch Richmond, Jamal Mashburn, Eddie Jones, Anthony Mason

Kohl Is A Mome wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



Ehh I suppose in an odd way youre correct, but not entirely.
They get 4 year deals. (The 5th is when you give them the Qualifying offer and they either choose to go with RFA or sign the QO and play the year out). In the old one The 4th year was an option for the team. In the new one its the 3rd and 4th. And no you do those seperately, just picking up the 3rd doesnt accept the 4th as well.

Thanks. My point is the risk is reduced if you make a bad pick. You can dump the player after 2 years.

I think you should get the lucky piece in the draft, then build around that piece with smart trades, solid draft picks and good contracts without screwing it up.

We don't even have the lucky piece and no team will be letting that go in free agency. The Bucks are at square one. Acctually, they're worse than square 1. They're in the negative with bad contracts and no talent.

europa wrote:I'd love to see the Bucks sign Childress. I'd have no problems seeing if the ML could be split up in order to sign Diop and Barnes. I can't see the Nets letting Diop go, though, so if a team wants him they may have to overpay - and that's something I don't see Hammond doing.

Childress would be a great solution for the Bucks small forward spot...
I'm sure other teams will be willing to offer a full mid level deal, but I think the Bucks Can Make a good push by showing that he'd be the starting sf and lead the rebuilding process as part of a childress/yi/bogut frontline.