Official Speculation Thread (Pt.LX Offseason Edition)

[IGotDaMagicInMe]

this sounds obvious, but teams get into trouble when they pay players for more than theyre worth. Who on the heat is overpaid? now think of all the players we overpaid when we had dwight

[LBPTarHeel27]

this sounds obvious, but teams get into trouble when they pay players for more than theyre worth. Who on the heat is overpaid? now think of all the players we overpaid when we had dwight

Joel Anthony is really the only guy. Mike Miller is debatable but he tends to come up big when it matters. The only bad part of his deal is the player option next summer. Everyone else is fairly paid or underpaid.

[tiderulz]

this sounds obvious, but teams get into trouble when they pay players for more than theyre worth. Who on the heat is overpaid? now think of all the players we overpaid when we had dwight

Joel Anthony is really the only guy. Mike Miller is debatable but he tends to come up big when it matters. The only bad part of his deal is the player option next summer. Everyone else is fairly paid or underpaid.

Miller usually only comes thru about 1 or 2 games per playoff, not series but entire playoffs. Maybe if he was healthy, but he hasnt been able to stay healthy since he signed with them.

[Greenraida]

this sounds obvious, but teams get into trouble when they pay players for more than theyre worth. Who on the heat is overpaid? now think of all the players we overpaid when we had dwight

Joel Anthony is really the only guy. Mike Miller is debatable but he tends to come up big when it matters. The only bad part of his deal is the player option next summer. Everyone else is fairly paid or underpaid.

Miller usually only comes thru about 1 or 2 games per playoff, not series but entire playoffs. Maybe if he was healthy, but he hasnt been able to stay healthy since he signed with them.

He had 2 signature games the entire finals series both years - miami would LOVE to get rid of him and his contract.

[TheMagicOne]

Tell that to the Miami Heat, who didn't develop talent. They went out and got free agents and won a championship...twice. Their third championship? Accomplished by trading for Shaq.

Tell me how the Dallas Mavericks developed all their draft picks into an NBA Championship. Oh wait, they didn't. They did develop Dirk, but it was twelve years and a billion roster changes before they got there with players that they didn't draft (Kidd, Marion, Terry).

How about the Lakers? Kobe, and then a bunch of players they didn't draft.

the Celtics? Pierce, and then a bunch of players they didn't draft.

the Spurs are probably the only team that has really made a great consistent team through drafting, but even then you have to realize that they got extremely lucky with Parker and Ginobili, a late 1st and a 2nd rounder who became HOF players. Other key contributors like Robert Horry and Michael Finley weren't drafted by them.

I'll also point out that none of these teams were sitting around developing talent waiting to draft a franchise player. You draft a franchise player if you can, otherwise you trade or go out and sign them.

My point? You can't just draft, draft, draft and hope to develop talent into an NBA Championship. it's a combined effort. You need to draft young players and develop them yes, but you also need to trade those players for vets and go out and sign free agents.

edit: and your what if scenario regarding all that junk is just absurd speculation on your part. It's an impossibility to predict how things would've turned out had we done things differently. Maybe we finish in a different seed for the lottery and don't get Dwight. Maybe other teams make different decisions based on what we did. Butterfly effect stuff.

You fail to recognize that each team you listed DRAFTED a franchise guy FIRST. At this point the Magic don't have an obvious FRANCHISE player, so your point is what? Without a franchise player we can not assemble a team to win a championship because no player of a high caliber will want to play here on his own. I.e. see Dwight, TMAC & Penny.

Tell you what, show me all the teams that have won a championship without being the team who drafted one of its franchise players. The only one I can think of remotely close is the Pistons, HOWEVER, they used their franchise player in Hill to parlay that in to Wallace, Adkins and signing Billups. They used franchise player Stackhouse to trade for Hamilton an the drafted Prince.

[Greenraida]

http://i.imgur.com/nT0qNqB.png

Best 5 man lineups from last season - we were not on there at all

[eyriq]

Would it be wise to give Kyle Korver 8 million per year and then tell him he has the grenlight to take crazy shots? Of course not. Low usage, high efficiency guys are easy to find in this league. The problem is that most of them aspire for more and think that being on a bad team makes them "the man" again.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

Ok, so I filtered the last 4 seasons for players with a usage rate less than 22%, an offensive rating greater than 115, with at least 2 three point attempts per game while playing at least 29 mpg (what I'd call starters minutes), in an attempt to isolate these low usage, high efficiency guys. I found a total of 16.

In '10 we only had Jason Kidd
In '11 we had Landry Fields, Richard Jefferson, Nicolas Batum, Ray Allen, Beno Udrih, Lamar Odom, Danilo Gallinari, and our own Arron Afflalo
In '12 we had Jared Dudley, Jose Calderon, and again Arron Afflalo
In '13 we had George Hill, Kyle Korver, and another appearance for Jose Calderon

In not one of those seasons did any of these players fall below league average for WS/48, with all of them netting 5 or more win shares over the entire season.

Not sure that is the end all be all of the discussion but I do think it demonstrates that low usage/high efficiency wing players that can play starters minutes are both pretty rare and pretty valuable. I'm too lazy to look at win percentages for their teams or to see what separates these players from others that may meet the same criteria but in less minutes. I'm sure that would be interesting too.

[KingRobb02]

Would it be wise to give Kyle Korver 8 million per year and then tell him he has the grenlight to take crazy shots? Of course not. Low usage, high efficiency guys are easy to find in this league. The problem is that most of them aspire for more and think that being on a bad team makes them "the man" again.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

Ok, so I filtered the last 4 seasons for players with a usage rate less than 22%, an offensive rating greater than 115, with at least 2 three point attempts per game while playing at least 29 mpg (what I'd call starters minutes), in an attempt to isolate these low usage, high efficiency guys. I found a total of 16.

In '10 we only had Jason Kidd
In '11 we had Landry Fields, Richard Jefferson, Nicolas Batum, Ray Allen, Beno Udrih, Lamar Odom, Danilo Gallinari, and our own Arron Afflalo
In '12 we had Jared Dudley, Jose Calderon, and again Arron Afflalo
In '13 we had George Hill, Kyle Korver, and another appearance for Jose Calderon

In not one of those seasons did any of these players fall below league average for WS/48, with all of them netting 5 or more win shares over the entire season.

Not sure that is the end all be all of the discussion but I do think it demonstrates that low usage/high efficiency wing players that can play starters minutes are both pretty rare and pretty valuable. I'm too lazy to look at win percentages for their teams or to see what separates these players from others that may meet the same criteria but in less minutes. I'm sure that would be interesting too.

Great! Someone else who uses numbers. Ok, I took your search in a slightly different direction. Instead of offensive rating, I went with straight efg since it can get rid of the effect that assists have on offensive rating. I thought 55% was a good enough number to separate the good shooters from the bad. I also lowered the usage threshold to 20 and lowered the minutes threshold to as well. I just think that we shouldn't ignore guys whose coaches are too dumb to play them. 20 minutes is a large enough number to say who is making a contribution.

Link

Guys like Ray Allen and Chandler Parsons should definitely be on the list when considering high efficiency, low usage shooter. It found 40+ cases in the last 4 years of guys who are good at just standing in a corner and waiting for open shots. I like my search a bit better because it includes guys like Danny Green and Steve Novak and those are the types of guys I think of when I think of the great shooters on good teams. If you don't agree fine, just letting you know where my idea came from. High efficiency shooting is available.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

[pogiro]

Tell that to the Miami Heat, who didn't develop talent. They went out and got free agents and won a championship...twice. Their third championship? Accomplished by trading for Shaq.

Tell me how the Dallas Mavericks developed all their draft picks into an NBA Championship. Oh wait, they didn't. They did develop Dirk, but it was twelve years and a billion roster changes before they got there with players that they didn't draft (Kidd, Marion, Terry).

How about the Lakers? Kobe, and then a bunch of players they didn't draft.

the Celtics? Pierce, and then a bunch of players they didn't draft.

the Spurs are probably the only team that has really made a great consistent team through drafting, but even then you have to realize that they got extremely lucky with Parker and Ginobili, a late 1st and a 2nd rounder who became HOF players. Other key contributors like Robert Horry and Michael Finley weren't drafted by them.

I'll also point out that none of these teams were sitting around developing talent waiting to draft a franchise player. You draft a franchise player if you can, otherwise you trade or go out and sign them.

My point? You can't just draft, draft, draft and hope to develop talent into an NBA Championship. it's a combined effort. You need to draft young players and develop them yes, but you also need to trade those players for vets and go out and sign free agents.

edit: and your what if scenario regarding all that junk is just absurd speculation on your part. It's an impossibility to predict how things would've turned out had we done things differently. Maybe we finish in a different seed for the lottery and don't get Dwight. Maybe other teams make different decisions based on what we did. Butterfly effect stuff.

You fail to recognize that each team you listed DRAFTED a franchise guy FIRST. At this point the Magic don't have an obvious FRANCHISE player, so your point is what? Without a franchise player we can not assemble a team to win a championship because no player of a high caliber will want to play here on his own. I.e. see Dwight, TMAC & Penny.

Tell you what, show me all the teams that have won a championship without being the team who drafted one of its franchise players. The only one I can think of remotely close is the Pistons, HOWEVER, they used their franchise player in Hill to parlay that in to Wallace, Adkins and signing Billups. They used franchise player Stackhouse to trade for Hamilton an the drafted Prince.

What franchise player did Houston draft? They haven't won a championship but they'll have as good of a chance as any.

[OMPunk]

I think you can stretch the Lakers into that argument since they got their best player, Kobe Bean Bryant, the night he was drafted. The Hornets were actually making the pick for the Lakers.

I'LL ALLOW IT!!!!

[RickB-Orlando]

I think you can stretch the Lakers into that argument since they got their best player, Kobe Bean Bryant, the night he was drafted. The Hornets were actually making the pick for the Lakers.

I'LL ALLOW IT!!!!

But he was drafted 13th, which sort of breaks the 'tanking is the only true path' argument, doesn't it? The Lakers were 53-29 the year before, traded for one of the best players ever in the middle of a deep draft, and the rest is history.

It just proves there are many, many ways to build a winning team. Tanking is not the only way.

[OMPunk]

I think you can stretch the Lakers into that argument since they got their best player, Kobe Bean Bryant, the night he was drafted. The Hornets were actually making the pick for the Lakers.

I'LL ALLOW IT!!!!

But he was drafted 13th, which sort of breaks the 'tanking is the only true path' argument, doesn't it? The Lakers were 53-29 the year before, traded for one of the best players ever in the middle of a deep draft, and the rest is history.

It just proves there are many, many ways to build a winning team. Tanking is not the only way.

I apologize I missed that part of your argument I thought it was strictly teams that drafted their superstar that won titles. I completely agree with you. The MiAmi Heat are a perfect example of that. They tanked for Rose but ended up with Beasely then got capspace and pulled one of the greatest moves in sports by getting Lebron Wade and Bosh.

[TheMagicOne]

Tell that to the Miami Heat, who didn't develop talent. They went out and got free agents and won a championship...twice. Their third championship? Accomplished by trading for Shaq.

Tell me how the Dallas Mavericks developed all their draft picks into an NBA Championship. Oh wait, they didn't. They did develop Dirk, but it was twelve years and a billion roster changes before they got there with players that they didn't draft (Kidd, Marion, Terry).

How about the Lakers? Kobe, and then a bunch of players they didn't draft.

the Celtics? Pierce, and then a bunch of players they didn't draft.

the Spurs are probably the only team that has really made a great consistent team through drafting, but even then you have to realize that they got extremely lucky with Parker and Ginobili, a late 1st and a 2nd rounder who became HOF players. Other key contributors like Robert Horry and Michael Finley weren't drafted by them.

I'll also point out that none of these teams were sitting around developing talent waiting to draft a franchise player. You draft a franchise player if you can, otherwise you trade or go out and sign them.

My point? You can't just draft, draft, draft and hope to develop talent into an NBA Championship. it's a combined effort. You need to draft young players and develop them yes, but you also need to trade those players for vets and go out and sign free agents.

edit: and your what if scenario regarding all that junk is just absurd speculation on your part. It's an impossibility to predict how things would've turned out had we done things differently. Maybe we finish in a different seed for the lottery and don't get Dwight. Maybe other teams make different decisions based on what we did. Butterfly effect stuff.

You fail to recognize that each team you listed DRAFTED a franchise guy FIRST. At this point the Magic don't have an obvious FRANCHISE player, so your point is what? Without a franchise player we can not assemble a team to win a championship because no player of a high caliber will want to play here on his own. I.e. see Dwight, TMAC & Penny.

Tell you what, show me all the teams that have won a championship without being the team who drafted one of its franchise players. The only one I can think of remotely close is the Pistons, HOWEVER, they used their franchise player in Hill to parlay that in to Wallace, Adkins and signing Billups. They used franchise player Stackhouse to trade for Hamilton an the drafted Prince.

What franchise player did Houston draft? They haven't won a championship but they'll have as good of a chance as any.

First I don't see them winning it. But if they did they would be the exception, not the rule.

Go back in history and look at every team. EVERY TEAM started with a franchise player they drafted.

[magicman112]

I think you can stretch the Lakers into that argument since they got their best player, Kobe Bean Bryant, the night he was drafted. The Hornets were actually making the pick for the Lakers.

I'LL ALLOW IT!!!!

But back then was the early days of high school players entering the draft and the jury was still out on them. KG was the first one the previous year. Though credit goes to the Laker FO for seeing Kobe's potential and swinging the deal.

[TheMagicOne]

edit: and your what if scenario regarding all that junk is just absurd speculation on your part. It's an impossibility to predict how things would've turned out had we done things differently. Maybe we finish in a different seed for the lottery and don't get Dwight. Maybe other teams make different decisions based on what we did. Butterfly effect stuff.

Did you not read???

I started my scenario WITH Dwight. I used it as an example of what Rob is doing NOW. We draft Dwight (an unknown at the time). But traded TMAC. Had Weisbrod had the same mindset as Rob we would have easily had the following young talent/roster

PG - Nelson, Barbosa, Lue, Gaines
SG - Joe Johnson, Stevenson
SF - Hedo, Grant Hill
PF - Varejao,Gooden, Juwan Howard, Garrity
C - HOWARD, Kasun

Plus future picks from the Suns.

That is FACT. Not some hypothetical. Start right there with your idiotic butterfly effect and nothing changes. If we start tanking ...errr... developing Dwight and Jameer instead of making Dwight one dimensional and delay Jameer's growth by two years we become a more solid team. We don't endure Francis, Mobley, Christie & Cato.

Then while tanking we start moving our Veterans as we showcase them. We might have got something out of Grant Hill since he was healthy finally. May have showcased enough to move Gooden, Garrity, Kasun, Lue, Stevenson, Gaines...who really knows but my point is had we taken a player development approach and let Dwight, Jameer, Varejao, Johnson, Gooden & Hedo all work on their game WEAKNESSES we would have been much better off than we are now. We would have had cap room to chase the high profile free agents and surrounded our team with what we needed. We would not have used our Amesty on Christie and at worst used it in Juwan. THIS IS FACT and not something that can be changed by the butterfly effect!!! PERIOD!!!

I for one would think a young core of Nelson, Johnson, Hedo, Varejao & Howard growing TOGETHER would have been one of the best teams in the league between 2008 - 2012. Plus add in to it future draft picks from the Suns and our own picks..whoever they would end up being and we are stacked FOR YEARS!!!!

So understand that is what we are doing now. Rob is not letting this team make the same mistake it did with Dwight Howard!!!

I don't want to hear this losing breeds losing B.S. because you learn from adversity not from success. Use Dwight as the Example of how not to develop talent. Then unless you want history to repeat itself, you deal with us losing and developing players, sit there and try to understand it is what is best for the team LONG TERM!!!

[TheMagicOne]

I think you can stretch the Lakers into that argument since they got their best player, Kobe Bean Bryant, the night he was drafted. The Hornets were actually making the pick for the Lakers.

I'LL ALLOW IT!!!!

But back then was the early days of high school players entering the draft and the jury was still out on them. KG was the first one the previous year. Though credit goes to the Laker FO for seeing Kobe's potential and swinging the deal.

No actually Reggie Harding was the first one drafted(1962) but was prohibited to play. In 1971 the US Supreme Court ruled against the NBA''s 4 years of college rule provided they could prove hardship and Thus Moses Malone became the first drafted High School player allowed to play professionally.

Then in 1975 Darryl Dawkins was the second one, drafted out of Orlando's "Maynard Evans High School" & Bill Willoughby was the third.

Then it twenty years plus for another.

His name was Shawn "I am your daddy" Kemp, in 1989 after he enrolled in school but could not make it out of bed to class and thus never played in college.

THEN in 1995 came Kevin Garnett.

But to your point, it was an unknown commodity drafting a high school player.

[Blue_and_Whte]

edit: and your what if scenario regarding all that junk is just absurd speculation on your part. It's an impossibility to predict how things would've turned out had we done things differently. Maybe we finish in a different seed for the lottery and don't get Dwight. Maybe other teams make different decisions based on what we did. Butterfly effect stuff.

Did you not read???

I started my scenario WITH Dwight. I used it as an example of what Rob is doing NOW. We draft Dwight (an unknown at the time). But traded TMAC. Had Weisbrod had the same mindset as Rob we would have easily had the following young talent/roster

PG - Nelson, Barbosa, Lue, Gaines
SG - Joe Johnson, Stevenson
SF - Hedo, Grant Hill
PF - Varejao,Gooden, Juwan Howard, Garrity
C - HOWARD, Kasun

Plus future picks from the Suns.

That is FACT. Not some hypothetical. Start right there with your idiotic butterfly effect and nothing changes. If we start tanking ...errr... developing Dwight and Jameer instead of making Dwight one dimensional and delay Jameer's growth by two years we become a more solid team. We don't endure Francis, Mobley, Christie & Cato.

Then while tanking we start moving our Veterans as we showcase them. We might have got something out of Grant Hill since he was healthy finally. May have showcased enough to move Gooden, Garrity, Kasun, Lue, Stevenson, Gaines...who really knows but my point is had we taken a player development approach and let Dwight, Jameer, Varejao, Johnson, Gooden & Hedo all work on their game WEAKNESSES we would have been much better off than we are now. We would have had cap room to chase the high profile free agents and surrounded our team with what we needed. We would not have used our Amesty on Christie and at worst used it in Juwan. THIS IS FACT and not something that can be changed by the butterfly effect!!! PERIOD!!!

I for one would think a young core of Nelson, Johnson, Hedo, Varejao & Howard growing TOGETHER would have been one of the best teams in the league between 2008 - 2012. Plus add in to it future draft picks from the Suns and our own picks..whoever they would end up being and we are stacked FOR YEARS!!!!

So understand that is what we are doing now. Rob is not letting this team make the same mistake it did with Dwight Howard!!!

I don't want to hear this losing breeds losing B.S. because you learn from adversity not from success. Use Dwight as the Example of how not to develop talent. Then unless you want history to repeat itself, you deal with us losing and developing players, sit there and try to understand it is what is best for the team LONG TERM!!!

Agree COMPLETELY!!! Also to add my 2 cents, I too thought that Otis, in a sense, improved too quickly. We drafted Dwight, then seemingly immediately signed Hedo then Lewis instead of maybe trying to land some more high draft picks to develop around Howard then hit free agency.

I feel as though the losing breeds losing mantra is stupid as well. These guys are learning from their mistakes, recognizing where they fall short, and improving on those shortcomings while learning how to win. I dont know where people are getting that every team just starts out on top.

[BadMofoPimp]

Hindsight is a biatch. Half them players never played for the Magic and Dwight or TMAC don't anymore. But, Ola, Hark, Harris, BBD and Vucci do!!!!

[UCFJayBird]

edit: and your what if scenario regarding all that junk is just absurd speculation on your part. It's an impossibility to predict how things would've turned out had we done things differently. Maybe we finish in a different seed for the lottery and don't get Dwight. Maybe other teams make different decisions based on what we did. Butterfly effect stuff.

Did you not read???

I started my scenario WITH Dwight. I used it as an example of what Rob is doing NOW. We draft Dwight (an unknown at the time). But traded TMAC. Had Weisbrod had the same mindset as Rob we would have easily had the following young talent/roster

PG - Nelson, Barbosa, Lue, Gaines
SG - Joe Johnson, Stevenson
SF - Hedo, Grant Hill
PF - Varejao,Gooden, Juwan Howard, Garrity
C - HOWARD, Kasun

Plus future picks from the Suns.

That is FACT. Not some hypothetical. Start right there with your idiotic butterfly effect and nothing changes. If we start tanking ...errr... developing Dwight and Jameer instead of making Dwight one dimensional and delay Jameer's growth by two years we become a more solid team. We don't endure Francis, Mobley, Christie & Cato.

Then while tanking we start moving our Veterans as we showcase them. We might have got something out of Grant Hill since he was healthy finally. May have showcased enough to move Gooden, Garrity, Kasun, Lue, Stevenson, Gaines...who really knows but my point is had we taken a player development approach and let Dwight, Jameer, Varejao, Johnson, Gooden & Hedo all work on their game WEAKNESSES we would have been much better off than we are now. We would have had cap room to chase the high profile free agents and surrounded our team with what we needed. We would not have used our Amesty on Christie and at worst used it in Juwan. THIS IS FACT and not something that can be changed by the butterfly effect!!! PERIOD!!!

I for one would think a young core of Nelson, Johnson, Hedo, Varejao & Howard growing TOGETHER would have been one of the best teams in the league between 2008 - 2012. Plus add in to it future draft picks from the Suns and our own picks..whoever they would end up being and we are stacked FOR YEARS!!!!

So understand that is what we are doing now. Rob is not letting this team make the same mistake it did with Dwight Howard!!!

I don't want to hear this losing breeds losing B.S. because you learn from adversity not from success. Use Dwight as the Example of how not to develop talent. Then unless you want history to repeat itself, you deal with us losing and developing players, sit there and try to understand it is what is best for the team LONG TERM!!!

lol. How is any of what you said fact? You can't prove that those offers and players wouldv'e been available or that Weisbrod or the Magic would've been able to get them. You're speculating. You're making biased conclusions based on what you want to believe was possible. You also make the argument that Dwight would've developed better under different management. The Magic brought in tons of big men coach and gave Dwight everything he needed to develop. He just didn't develop the way we wanted. It was no one's fault but Dwight's.

If you can't understand the butterfly effect, I'm not going to bother explaining it to you. You clearly don't.

Screaming opinions as fact does not make it true.

[UCFJayBird]

Tell that to the Miami Heat, who didn't develop talent. They went out and got free agents and won a championship...twice. Their third championship? Accomplished by trading for Shaq.

Tell me how the Dallas Mavericks developed all their draft picks into an NBA Championship. Oh wait, they didn't. They did develop Dirk, but it was twelve years and a billion roster changes before they got there with players that they didn't draft (Kidd, Marion, Terry).

How about the Lakers? Kobe, and then a bunch of players they didn't draft.

the Celtics? Pierce, and then a bunch of players they didn't draft.

the Spurs are probably the only team that has really made a great consistent team through drafting, but even then you have to realize that they got extremely lucky with Parker and Ginobili, a late 1st and a 2nd rounder who became HOF players. Other key contributors like Robert Horry and Michael Finley weren't drafted by them.

I'll also point out that none of these teams were sitting around developing talent waiting to draft a franchise player. You draft a franchise player if you can, otherwise you trade or go out and sign them.

My point? You can't just draft, draft, draft and hope to develop talent into an NBA Championship. it's a combined effort. You need to draft young players and develop them yes, but you also need to trade those players for vets and go out and sign free agents.

edit: and your what if scenario regarding all that junk is just absurd speculation on your part. It's an impossibility to predict how things would've turned out had we done things differently. Maybe we finish in a different seed for the lottery and don't get Dwight. Maybe other teams make different decisions based on what we did. Butterfly effect stuff.

You fail to recognize that each team you listed DRAFTED a franchise guy FIRST. At this point the Magic don't have an obvious FRANCHISE player, so your point is what? Without a franchise player we can not assemble a team to win a championship because no player of a high caliber will want to play here on his own. I.e. see Dwight, TMAC & Penny.

Tell you what, show me all the teams that have won a championship without being the team who drafted one of its franchise players. The only one I can think of remotely close is the Pistons, HOWEVER, they used their franchise player in Hill to parlay that in to Wallace, Adkins and signing Billups. They used franchise player Stackhouse to trade for Hamilton an the drafted Prince.

It's too early to tell whether the Magic will have drafted a franchise player. Maybe Oladipo turns into a franchise player, maybe Harris and/or Vucevic does. Wishful thinking? Perhaps. But not every player comes in right away and is a superstar.