Official Speculation Thread ‘18-19’: XIX: Rise of the BIG

[PennytoShaq]

Why would anyone want Gordon though? What is the appeal? We screwed him up and they can fix him? What GM is going to look at him and say, "that's exactly what we need!"?

The Suns have nothing at PF. They have had interest in AG before and were rumored to be interested in him at FA, but they didn’t have the cash.

It’s funny that someone would make this argument about AG and yet half the board is incredulous that Vuc has not been traded yet.

For more on why the Suns would want AG -

https://www.brightsideofthesun.com/2018/10/26/18026072/its-time-for-the-suns-to-start-t-j-warren

“In a lineup with a glut of natural small forwards, there has yet to be anyone who has stepped up at power forward and proven they want the role. Ryan Anderson has been playing as if Dragan Bender found a Zoltar machine at the State Fair and wished to be “Big”. Bender has played only three more minutes than Charles Barkley this season for the Suns. And after that, the roster is fairly devoid of talent at that position.”

[BadMofoPimp]

Why would anyone want Gordon though? What is the appeal? We screwed him up and they can fix him? What GM is going to look at him and say, "that's exactly what we need!"?

The Suns have nothing at PF. They have had interest in AG before and were rumored to be interested in him at FA, but they didn’t have the cash.

It’s funny that someone would make this argument about AG and yet half the board is incredulous that Vuc has not been traded yet.

For more on why the Suns would want AG -

https://www.brightsideofthesun.com/2018/10/26/18026072/its-time-for-the-suns-to-start-t-j-warren

“In a lineup with a glut of natural small forwards, there has yet to be anyone who has stepped up at power forward and proven they want the role. Ryan Anderson has been playing as if Dragan Bender found a Zoltar machine at the State Fair and wished to be “Big”. Bender has played only three more minutes than Charles Barkley this season for the Suns. And after that, the roster is fairly devoid of talent at that position.”

FYI. Magic desperately need a quality PG and Suns don't have one to trade. Unless it is Booker or Ayton, don't like anyone else on that team for AG.

[PennytoShaq]

Why would anyone want Gordon though? What is the appeal? We screwed him up and they can fix him? What GM is going to look at him and say, "that's exactly what we need!"?

The Suns have nothing at PF. They have had interest in AG before and were rumored to be interested in him at FA, but they didn’t have the cash.

It’s funny that someone would make this argument about AG and yet half the board is incredulous that Vuc has not been traded yet.

For more on why the Suns would want AG -

https://www.brightsideofthesun.com/2018/10/26/18026072/its-time-for-the-suns-to-start-t-j-warren

“In a lineup with a glut of natural small forwards, there has yet to be anyone who has stepped up at power forward and proven they want the role. Ryan Anderson has been playing as if Dragan Bender found a Zoltar machine at the State Fair and wished to be “Big”. Bender has played only three more minutes than Charles Barkley this season for the Suns. And after that, the roster is fairly devoid of talent at that position.”

FYI. Magic desperately need a quality PG and Suns don't have one to trade. Unless it is Booker or Ayton, don't like anyone else on that team for AG.

We need a PG? Wow, I had no idea. Lol.

FYI - we also need wing scoring and shooting and this trade addresses that. Getting back young wing assets on good contracts is a realistic trade scenario involving AG and Vuc. Probably won’t happen, but it’s at least something that could realistically occur.

We can address the PG next, possibily in free agency.

[Catledge]

I have a very clear memory of everybody persuasively declaring that Wiggins and Parker would be sure-fire superstars before they were drafted. There were disagreements about which would be better, but very few people doubted that they would be stars. The consensus on this was so strong that I believed it must be true. Obviously, everybody was wrong.

My point is that I think it would be a mistake to make long-term strategic decisions based on our assessments of players about whom we know even less than we knew (or thought we knew) about Wiggins and Parker when they were drafted.

i will never let a chance to brag about the fact that i've rated embiid, gordon, and smart higher (in that order) than parker and wiggins back then go. i was mocked pretty heavily back then for my big board, and to this day i'm pretty proud of it. sorry for hijacking your post

Where did you have Exum? It drives me crazy that most people who were up in arms over not taking him don't seem to have loss any confidence in their ability to make basketball-related predictions.

[BadMofoPimp]

The Suns have nothing at PF. They have had interest in AG before and were rumored to be interested in him at FA, but they didn’t have the cash.

It’s funny that someone would make this argument about AG and yet half the board is incredulous that Vuc has not been traded yet.

For more on why the Suns would want AG -

https://www.brightsideofthesun.com/2018/10/26/18026072/its-time-for-the-suns-to-start-t-j-warren

“In a lineup with a glut of natural small forwards, there has yet to be anyone who has stepped up at power forward and proven they want the role. Ryan Anderson has been playing as if Dragan Bender found a Zoltar machine at the State Fair and wished to be “Big”. Bender has played only three more minutes than Charles Barkley this season for the Suns. And after that, the roster is fairly devoid of talent at that position.”

FYI. Magic desperately need a quality PG and Suns don't have one to trade. Unless it is Booker or Ayton, don't like anyone else on that team for AG.

We need a PG? Wow, I had no idea. Lol.

FYI - we also need wing scoring and shooting and this trade addresses that. Getting back young wing assets on good contracts is a realistic trade scenario involving AG and Vuc. Probably won’t happen, but it’s at least something that could realistically occur.

We can address the PG next, possibily in free agency.

I don't like any of their wings better than Fournier especially worth trading AG for.

[PennytoShaq]

TJ Warren is averaging 15 points a game in 23 mins a game while shooting 47% from 3 this year. What this shows me is a guy who is still improving his game and has the potential to average 20 points a night, which replaces Vuc’s PPG in a trade.

Additionally, he is set to make only $11 a year for the next 4 years, which is a great bargain for a guy who is worst case, as good as Fournier is. This year, it is not even close - Fournier has been quite bad, and yet he makes $17 mill a year, and will most likely continue to until 2021.

We have no idea what Bridges can be yet, but many posters here wanted us to take him at #6, so I would assume he would be a guy that people believe can contribute for us over time.

[IllMagic04]

Man we really messed up with our refusal to go all in on tanking. Doesn't sound like this draft is all that strong. The last 2 years were the years to really go all out and we failed to do so. At this point I dunno what to do. I dunno if Id even trade Voch at this point. He's on the last year of his deal so what value can we really get? Last year is when he shoulda been traded to push along the most important tank mission we've had. Trading him now would help the tank but what's the point of tanking if its not a strong draft? It would help from the stand point of putting Bamba in the starting line up. Force us to run some more plays for him to see what he can do. But with the coach we selected I don't see that happening. Maybe once the college season starts I'll get back on team tank like I've always been but I'm just completely worn down as a fan at this point. They have broken me.

[pepe1991]

Just few thoughts

Parker and Wiggins were projected to be great.
But one had two ACL tears in a row, it's amazing that he can even walk let alone play.
Wiggins suffers from " i was told i'm a star since i could walk" syndrome. Players that think everything will fall in order for their stardom. He simply does not have attitude needed to be star player. From talent perspective he is one of most talented players in last decade. 6'8 , long arms, 45 inch vert, solid shooting touch. Lazy as hell ( Butler called him out on that ).
5 years into nba and he still looks like toothpick despite having guy with college degree to tell him what to eat and how to train to gain weight.


I don't think Suns would throw first round pick in any trade. They suck for years in conference where it's harder to get better.
But i guess Anderson and MIkal for Gordon would do it. I would not take that deal tho.

New lottery kind a sucks.
Team with 6th worst record is almsot bound to draft 7th.
Team with worst record is almost bound to draft 5th with 48% odds to land there.
Magic can be 8# worst team and draft 10# .


Rozier thing is odd. He has some great games but overall for 5 years in regular season he is just another brick shooting guard. Guy for whole career shots 37,8% from the floor, 35,7% for 3 and draws literally no fouls whatsoever.
Over 6 games this year he made it to FT line 3 times.

D'angelo is off to a hot start and i belive Nets will resign him. He is RFA so they control does he get out or not.

Yes, players like them would make Magic better team but how much better? Again, most people keep banking on 2019 draft like it's next Kobe Bryant is waiting for you there along with free agency, like team already has player signed.

As i said before, main reason why team refuses to trade Vučević,Evan or Gordon is ticket sale because nobody would want to watch team that gets blown out by some random average team because team can't put up 80 points per game.

[PennytoShaq]

I wouldnt say that anyone thinks the next Kobe Bryant is in the 2019 draft.

What I am aware of is that this draft’s top players are mainly wings that would fit in quite well with what the Magic are looking to do.

As for trying to project players. I wouldn’t do that so soon. Many players who have been projected to be busts here recently, have simply not been so far.

[Catledge]

As i said before, main reason why team refuses to trade Vučević,Evan or Gordon is ticket sale because nobody would want to watch team that gets blown out by some random average team because team can't put up 80 points per game.

This is possible, but the other possibility is that WeHam believe that it's foolish to put 7-8 young guys on a roster and not expect it to turn into a dysfunctional frat house. That's what Henny did, and it was such a mess that we were never able to accurately assess what we had.

I think the best plan is to put established NBA players around BIG and hope that one or more of those three turns into a star. If none does after 3-4 years, then we cash in our chips and start over.

[JBSouthpaw]

with the firing of Lue in CLE, I wonder if we could get some parts?
I like Clarkson, who could start at PG.
We could offer some Cap relief for them, they are already over next year's cap.

[fklt]

I have a very clear memory of everybody persuasively declaring that Wiggins and Parker would be sure-fire superstars before they were drafted. There were disagreements about which would be better, but very few people doubted that they would be stars. The consensus on this was so strong that I believed it must be true. Obviously, everybody was wrong.

My point is that I think it would be a mistake to make long-term strategic decisions based on our assessments of players about whom we know even less than we knew (or thought we knew) about Wiggins and Parker when they were drafted.

i will never let a chance to brag about the fact that i've rated embiid, gordon, and smart higher (in that order) than parker and wiggins back then go. i was mocked pretty heavily back then for my big board, and to this day i'm pretty proud of it. sorry for hijacking your post

Where did you have Exum? It drives me crazy that most people who were up in arms over not taking him don't seem to have loss any confidence in their ability to make basketball-related predictions.

gordon was third in my big board, and i was pulling for us to draft gordon at fourth in every post. embiid was first, smart was fourth. i don't want to talk about exum at all though

to me, there were very big red flags with wiggins and parker. wiggins for basically being a glorified harkless, with no basketball talent and fire. and parker was a poor mans anthony, whom i deeply hate. he seemed like tobias without the professionalism at best. exum had so few tapes and he was a total mystery box. So even though i was not hyped with him, I couldn't see a red flag about his game either. my board was getting weird as it was with gordon that high up, (he was being rated between 6 and 9 back then) so I put him ahead of gordon.

couldn't find my big board, but here's my mock draft from back then that I found from google. smart is second here in the mock unlike the big board cause I thought "smart is a better prospect than both wiggins and parker, and he will provide the fire, leadership and most of all loyalty that a small market team needs, for bucks, in a position of need."

this is my mock draft.
I gave a lot of though into this, really think it's gonna be much more accurate than most of the mock drafts out there. I'm still nitpicking the bottom seven and think payton could go higher than this, but really want him in magic so I my hopes might have altered the final order

1. embiid by cleveland
2. smart by bucks
3. exum by sixers
4. gordon by magic
5. parker by jazz
6. saric by boston
7. wiggins by lakers
8. stauskas by kings
9. vonleh by hornets
10. (kyle) anderson by sixers
11. nurkic by denver
12. payton by magic
13. ennis by wolves
14. payne by suns

edited: porzingis removed[/b]

you can checkout the thread for the very warm responses I got it's a fun read.
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=1325755&start=520

[thelead]

The team is a dumpster fire with no end in sight.

[BadMofoPimp]

The team is a dumpster fire with no end in sight.

The KINGS of the East! (Pun Intended)

[BadMofoPimp]

i will never let a chance to brag about the fact that i've rated embiid, gordon, and smart higher (in that order) than parker and wiggins back then go. i was mocked pretty heavily back then for my big board, and to this day i'm pretty proud of it. sorry for hijacking your post

Where did you have Exum? It drives me crazy that most people who were up in arms over not taking him don't seem to have loss any confidence in their ability to make basketball-related predictions.

gordon was third in my big board, and i was pulling for us to draft gordon at fourth in every post. embiid was first, smart was fourth. i don't want to talk about exum at all though

to me, there were very big red flags with wiggins and parker. wiggins for basically being a glorified harkless, with no basketball talent and fire. and parker was a poor mans anthony, whom i deeply hate. he seemed like tobias without the professionalism at best. exum had so few tapes and he was a total mystery box. So even though i was not hyped with him, I couldn't see a red flag about his game either. my board was getting weird as it was with gordon that high up, (he was being rated between 6 and 9 back then) so I put him ahead of gordon.

couldn't find my big board, but here's my mock draft from back then that I found from google. smart is second here in the mock unlike the big board cause I thought "smart is a better prospect than both wiggins and parker, and he will provide the fire, leadership and most of all loyalty that a small market team needs, for bucks, in a position of need."

this is my mock draft.
I gave a lot of though into this, really think it's gonna be much more accurate than most of the mock drafts out there. I'm still nitpicking the bottom seven and think payton could go higher than this, but really want him in magic so I my hopes might have altered the final order

1. embiid by cleveland
2. smart by bucks
3. exum by sixers
4. gordon by magic
5. parker by jazz
6. saric by boston
7. wiggins by lakers
8. stauskas by kings
9. vonleh by hornets
10. (kyle) anderson by sixers
11. nurkic by denver
12. payton by magic
13. ennis by wolves
14. payne by suns

edited: porzingis removed[/b]

you can checkout the thread for the very warm responses I got it's a fun read.
viewtopic.php?f=25&t=1325755&start=520

If the Sixers had taken Exum instead of Embiid or Bucks had taken Embiid, then the Sixers would have been garbage right now. See how one lucky pick can make all the difference in the world!

[NavalAviator94]

The Doom and Gloom around here is depressing.

[OrlandoNed]

The Doom and Gloom around here is depressing.

7 straight years in the NBA toilet will do that to ya.

[NavalAviator94]

The Doom and Gloom around here is depressing.

7 straight years in the NBA toilet will do that to ya.

I know. I'm not ready to self-medicate yet.

[OrlandO]

The Doom and Gloom around here is depressing.

7 straight years in the NBA toilet will do that to ya.

I try not to look at it that way since this is only Weltman and Hammond's second year and we know a lot of change is coming soon. Gotta hit the reset on expectations and patience, and treat it almost like the Hennigan era never happened.

[Knightro]

I try not to look at it that way since this is only Weltman and Hammond's second year and we know a lot of change is coming soon. Gotta hit the reset on expectations and patience, and treat it almost like the Hennigan era never happened.

This is obviously how it actually is, but a huge portion of fans don't see it this way.

Oh well.