Skybox wrote:POR has around $180m in salaries next year...way above the cap (including 2 lottery pick slots)...and they're terrible. Small market, bad team, poorly assembled in the inverse to ours (all guards and then a mediocre frontcourt with 2 very large vet salaries). Let's help them out of cap hell, so they can really get moving on their rebuild...clinging to Simons while Shaedon and Scoot are the future makes no sense...they should cash in AND get off his salary. I'm sure they value him, but he'll be ready for a bigger new deal (due to inflated tank numbers) right when Sharpe and Scoot are ready to take his minutes and role....
1. Let Harris, Fultz, Okeke, Goga walk
2. Trade DEN 25 frp, ORL 26 frp (top 5), Cole Anthony, Jett Howard, Joe Ingles to POR for Simons, Rob Williams, & Brogdon
-POR hopes Cole can fill Simons' role (enough) for half the money...Jett might be an offensive star. Mostly tons of cap/tax savings
-ORL weaponizes their short-term cap space for a big one-year deal, a middling 2 years of an injured big, and Simons
....if Time Lord is healthy, ORL's defense gets even better - play him very limited minutes like we did with Isaac and see.
the expectation is that he's dead salary and taking him is a big savings to POR and not a big deal for ORL. If he comes
around, Weltman is Exec of the Year and Mose has another eraser to play with. If not, just money - we're still better.
...Brogdon can still really play and it's just one year - he'll be off the books when first rookie extensions kick in
...Simons drops right in to the starting backcourt and lights it up...maybe best fit of anyone in the league.
Isaac,Time Lord (?), M. Wagner
Paolo, WCJ, M. Wagner
Franz, Black, Houstan (24 frp?)
Suggs, Brogdon, Houstan
Simons, Black, Brogdon
(so many combos as just about everyone is multi-positional...much better shooting and guard play, much deeper defensively). AB, in particular, can get quality minutes at point forward (where Ingles plays now) due to his size and ability to defend up. He'd be able to play with more prolific scorers in Brogdon & Simons, to balance his skillset while he continues to grow. Having WCJ backing up 4/5 would be tremendous...and pairing him (or Mo) with Isaac and/or Williams is another nice balance to let WCJ do his thing offensively.
*Not sure of value...I figure Simons is at least 2 frps, Brogdon is 1, TimeLord negative value...how much value to getting them out of the tax. Maybe need to add another frp or (happily) a handful of srps?
I would say there is a very little chance that this front office would want Simons much less give up assets for him. His D EPM is second worst in the whole league at -3.2. He is about 20% worse than the next lowest guy who gets significant minutes. More perspective is Cole Anthony is -0.8 and he gets hunted. Now his offensive number is high but he is still at a net negative. That’s before getting into his size (though he does have a decent wingspan). I probably get your perspective that look were so good on defense we can afford to take a risk on a glass cannon lol. I don’t think the FO sees it that way because especially in the playoffs your weakest link can be just hunted and based on his history he might be one hell of a weak link.
You can disagree with FO approach but their vision has been very much communicated and clear. They want to have a top 5 defensive team and hopefully get the offense to 10-15 to reach contention. It’s a bet that the league is going to try and push advantages back to the defense. We are seeing that start to happen. Scoring and offense has really gotten out of hand. Will they get serious about that and have it persist? History would say probably not but this time it feels different. The offense needs to improve but my guess based on FO history that they won’t sacrifice defense significantly to do it.
