2024-25 Season Discussion and Speculation Part IV

[KdoubleDees23]

Lets finesse the Mavs !!!

KD for PJ Washington, Gafford, and their #1 with no protection! Let's get it done.

Would be hilarious if they ended up winning the lottery and getting Flagg!!

[Slim Charless]

Lets finesse the Mavs !!!

KD for PJ Washington, Gafford, and their #1 with no protection! Let's get it done.

Would be hilarious if they ended up winning the lottery and getting Flagg!!

Lotto happens before we're able to trade them KD and they won't trade Flagg for KD if they get that lucky.

Ceiling will be probably 4th overall.

[Ghost of Kleine]

Read on Twitter

This is just so grotesquely stupid that it's really almost unimaginable! Ishbia and Isiah Thomas should be banned from the NBA for life with Ishbia being forced to sell the team to the league office itself until a competent NBA owner can he identified and put into place!!

It just blows my mind that this guy could be so unbelievably delusional! 15 yr rebuild incoming in the next 2-3 years. There needs to he a massive boycott and protests until he sells the team! He's going to go down as the worst owner in Arizona history by a wide margin!

EFFIN' TED STEPIEN 2.0!!!

I believe they are right on this.
If you have Booker at the perfect age to fight for a ring, then you need some veterans around to create a competitive roster.
So the steps are to trade KD and Beal and may be more players to get 2-3-4 good players than can fit our needs.
Then picks are not useful because they mean spending more if they are high picks.

While I appreciate you sharing your perspective and can respect your opinion, this is unfortunately very, very wrong! They are absolutely not right about any of the decisions they have made, and this only further compounds their already egregiously imbecilic shortsighted moves they've already made, which have left us with no viable or sustainable future, no cap flexibility, very little if any youth development, and no legitimate or respectable competitive trajectory from now on along with exponentially depreciating assets! They've dug us a very deep hole in which we can't easily climb out of if we can at all, because they just keep digging deeper. Let's break things down a bit more from your specific points:

'If you have Booker at the perfect age to fight for a ring, then you need some veterans around to create a competitive roster."

- Booker being 28 may still be in his prime for a few more years, and I love his loyalty! BUT we're clearly not fighting or competing for a ring even with him, KD, and Beal right now as it is, and clearly we already have plenty of veterans as we're currently the oldest team in the league trying to zig while the entire rest of the league is zagging! All anyone needs to do is look at our record, our plus/minus, our lack of domination while also being dominated rather easily by the younger, bigger, more athletic, more physical legitimate playoff teams that actually are contenders to see that we're nowhere close to competitive. All we're really competing for now is how valuable of a high lottery pick we'll be giving Houston every other year! We are the softest, most mentally fragile, apathetic team in the entire NBA. We're honestly about as far as you can get from being truly competitive!

"So the steps are to trade KD and Beal and may be more players to get 2-3-4 good players than can fit our needs."

- While I like and agree with this thought process, man, currently even with KD we're something like 4 1/2 games out of the play-in tournament. Regardless of adding a few pieces here and there, we're obviously not adding equal talent to what we're giving up in KD so we'd still at best only get measurably worse with even less high-level offensive threats. This means no other stars or high-end talent to draw defenders away from Booker, so he'll only be seeing heavier double and triple teams. So either way we're not getting better at all. Again, even with 3 max players (all stars) we still can't even make the playoffs and are a low-key lotto team. The rest of the NBA is already way ahead of the curve with young athletic talent as evidenced by how the younger teams are atop of the league. And we're just way behind trying to catch up as we're getting lapped in embarrassing fashion!

Our rebuild is inevitable and will only get longer and more difficult/ painful, the longer we put it off, as bookers' value will continue to deteriorate further into his early 30's. And the premise of trading Beal is unfortunately absolutely useless man as he has his notorious 'no-trade' clause. So he has full veto authority on any/all trades and has already mentioned that he loves it here and so does his family, and his family will play a huge role in any potential decision on moving! Beal really isn't going anywhere unfortunately.
" Then picks are not useful because they mean spending more if they are high picks.''

- This is honestly irrelevant because in this current NBA climate, picks (draft assets) and young talent are key desirable assets in trades and primary currency because they're cost controlled (4 yr deals) which offers premium value under this current CBA! Also, Ishbia seems to have no issues with spending, as he throws around money like it's nothing. And gives away premium assets for "pennies on the dollar'' returns. We're already in the 2nd apron as it is, but obviously trading KDs' 54 million salary for younger high-end athletic prospects, even lottery talents would reduce our overall cap significantly and again give us 4 yrs of contractual cost-controlled salaries to work with. And those same younger prospects would help us get younger, more athletic, more energetic, and physical while giving us legitimately desirable cost controlled assets to leverage!

[schnakenpopanz]

Imagine having CamJo, Bridges, Camara and Dunn on this team. All needed was a rim protector and a better starting PG. we had it all in our hands

[lilfishi22]

I have not been following so please excuse me if this has been covered, what is the aftermath of the Nurkic trade? We gave up Nurkic and a first round pick for what again? Was it entirely a dollar savings move?

The Phoenix Suns traded center Jusuf Nurkic and a 2026 first-round pick to the Charlotte Hornets for Cody Martin, Vasilije Micic and a 2026 second-round pick,

Both are unguaranteed next year. They got out the 2nd apron for Orlando’s 1st next year.

Not quite enough but it gets us within one more salary move away from getting under.

[lilfishi22]

Beal does not work well with KD and Booker because they need a good defender and scorer as the third option. Like say for Boston Jrue Holiday. It's not all on Beal he can play some defense at times but is not consistent. I would rather trade Beal and keep Durant and Booker. The problem is Beal is impossible to trade due to his NTC. So yeah the Beal trade ruined the KD and Booker era of Suns basketball.

He's also 6'4, there's only so much he can do. He's been a more consistent and impactful defender than Booker.

It was a mistake to trade for him, I get why we did it but it ended up being a bad gamble. That said, I don't think Beal is impossible to trade, it'll just cost us and it's the price that will decide whether he's still around or not.

[Rebound Mound]

Read on Twitter

This is just so grotesquely stupid that it's really almost unimaginable! Ishbia and Isiah Thomas should be banned from the NBA for life with Ishbia being forced to sell the team to the league office itself until a competent NBA owner can he identified and put into place!!

It just blows my mind that this guy could be so unbelievably delusional! 15 yr rebuild incoming in the next 2-3 years. There needs to he a massive boycott and protests until he sells the team! He's going to go down as the worst owner in Arizona history by a wide margin!

EFFIN' TED STEPIEN 2.0!!!

I believe they are right on this.
If you have Booker at the perfect age to fight for a ring, then you need some veterans around to create a competitive roster.
So the steps are to trade KD and Beal and may be more players to get 2-3-4 good players than can fit our needs.
Then picks are not useful because they mean spending more if they are high picks.

While I appreciate you sharing your perspective and can respect your opinion, this is unfortunately very, very wrong! They are absolutely not right about any of the decisions they have made, and this only further compounds their already egregiously imbecilic shortsighted moves they've already made, which have left us with no viable or sustainable future, no cap flexibility, very little if any youth development, and no legitimate or respectable competitive trajectory from now on along with exponentially depreciating assets! They've dug us a very deep hole in which we can't easily climb out of if we can at all, because they just keep digging deeper. Let's break things down a bit more from your specific points:

'If you have Booker at the perfect age to fight for a ring, then you need some veterans around to create a competitive roster."

- Booker being 28 may still be in his prime for a few more years, and I love his loyalty! BUT we're clearly not fighting or competing for a ring even with him, KD, and Beal right now as it is, and clearly we already have plenty of veterans as we're currently the oldest team in the league trying to zig while the entire rest of the league is zagging! All anyone needs to do is look at our record, our plus/minus, our lack of domination while also being dominated rather easily by the younger, bigger, more athletic, more physical legitimate playoff teams that actually are contenders to see that we're nowhere close to competitive. All we're really competing for now is how valuable of a high lottery pick we'll be giving Houston every other year! We are the softest, most mentally fragile, apathetic team in the entire NBA. We're honestly about as far as you can get from being truly competitive!

"So the steps are to trade KD and Beal and may be more players to get 2-3-4 good players than can fit our needs."

- While I like and agree with this thought process, man, currently even with KD we're something like 4 1/2 games out of the play-in tournament. Regardless of adding a few pieces here and there, we're obviously not adding equal talent to what we're giving up in KD so we'd still at best only get measurably worse with even less high-level offensive threats. This means no other stars or high-end talent to draw defenders away from Booker, so he'll only be seeing heavier double and triple teams. So either way we're not getting better at all. Again, even with 3 max players (all stars) we still can't even make the playoffs and are a low-key lotto team. The rest of the NBA is already way ahead of the curve with young athletic talent as evidenced by how the younger teams are atop of the league. And we're just way behind trying to catch up as we're getting lapped in embarrassing fashion!

Our rebuild is inevitable and will only get longer and more difficult/ painful, the longer we put it off, as bookers' value will continue to deteriorate further into his early 30's. And the premise of trading Beal is unfortunately absolutely useless man as he has his notorious 'no-trade' clause. So he has full veto authority on any/all trades and has already mentioned that he loves it here and so does his family, and his family will play a huge role in any potential decision on moving! Beal really isn't going anywhere unfortunately.
" Then picks are not useful because they mean spending more if they are high picks.''

- This is honestly irrelevant because in this current NBA climate, picks (draft assets) and young talent are key desirable assets in trades and primary currency because they're cost controlled (4 yr deals) which offers premium value under this current CBA! Also, Ishbia seems to have no issues with spending, as he throws around money like it's nothing. And gives away premium assets for "pennies on the dollar'' returns. We're already in the 2nd apron as it is, but obviously trading KDs' 54 million salary for younger high-end athletic prospects, even lottery talents would reduce our overall cap significantly and again give us 4 yrs of contractual cost-controlled salaries to work with. And those same younger prospects would help us get younger, more athletic, more energetic, and physical while giving us legitimately desirable cost controlled assets to leverage!

I believe you are referring ro future mistakes and past mistakes as almost the same reality.
Let's see if I can explain myself.
I would say first and foremost that I did not like the way they made up this roster. Signing KD was not a good idea, in my opinion, because we already had Booker, who is not a get-to-the-rim kind of player, neither a superb 3-point machine. He is not Tatum, although we could say they hold similar talent levels. Tatum is physically at another level, clearly. So adding KD, who is a similar player in which he does not get to the basket, he does not make the three his first weapon and, playing the 4 these days, he is no post presence and not a rebounding in traffic player, we are stacked with similar players, so to say, in the way they get their points. If we have had a Kobe type of player, for example, in which that he scored from multiple areas, even posting up, then that would have been different. Also there is a factor here, which is that KD was 36 when got here to play with us. 9 years older than Booker. Things did went well, but could have been much worse and KD could be showing symptoms of aging. So, as a general thought, not the best fit for Booker as a player and for his age.
Supposedly we got KD to try to do a run as the Warriors did with him, only that we did not have that champion mentality, even though we were one year from playing in the Finals.

Then one of the worst decisions in basketball history came to some genius mind and only because Beal was available, we traded for him. Another SG who scores in a similar way than that of Booker, same or similar high, similar defensive characteristics, etc. Deplorable. Well, beyond that, because he had a no-trade clause that we did not force to forget as supposedly he was coming to a dream destination: warm weather, a good team with a high goal, etc.

A year and a have later we are in the worst possible scenario that could possibly happen, but that some envision. The group lacks desire, chemistry and desire. Commitment. So it is clear that we need to do some serious changes.

Which could be those changes?
Well, we have to see what other teams do well and try to go that way. Teams with success take care of the ball, shoot well form three (and shoot quite a lot from three), run, everybody moves without the ball, have the commitment to care for the mistakes of the others and defend. But, especially, they are groups who share desire, pride in being a group, listen to their coaches, who know how to get the best from them...

So we need trades to get players who can do that and possibly a coach who can do that.
Can BDH get that done? I would have said YES until I read the news about him saying Booker to be less talkative.
Can JJ be the GM who can identify weaknesses and find players who can fill both our talent and character needs?
I doubt it.
Is Isiah the counselor the owner needs to listen to in order to have the right idea of how a roster, a team, a group, a franchise can be well run? I seriously doubt that (by reading the book Basketball and knowing better what kind of person he is and the kind of relationships he has and had and how he run (sic) the Knics, I wonder why Ishbia even has a relationship with him, unless Ishbia is not what I think he is...

With all that said, I firmly believe we need changes, but not a complete reconstruction. There are 7 players that should stay: Booker, Gillespie, Dunn, Oso, Bol, Richards, Plumlee. Then one of Allen and Oneale, being Oneale my preferred player to be moved (I do not like 6-5 guys playing PF, even if he defend like crazy and shoots well). By finding a PG, a PF and a SF that fit our timeline and the style of play that we want to play in, we could be really good if the players buy the system.

But what I believe we lack is a much better understanding of what players can offer, how to develop them, see talent when talent is two years down the road. I mean, a case like that of Ty Jerome and his impact in the Cavs results is a shame when he was here last year and was completely underused...

I do not see the point of a full reconstruction, because it takes years to be on top again. But, well, if someone could tell me that we are going to get 2/3 good young players + pick 1 - pick 4 - pick 8, I could agree, because this year's draft is amazing and ending up with Flag, his C teammate in Duke,rookie PG, Allen, Oneale, Bol, Richards, Morris, Oso, Dunn and then maybe Jabari and a couple more of exciting young players could be inticing...

Thank you for taking the time to answer to me in detail as you did.

[BobbieL]

Beal does not work well with KD and Booker because they need a good defender and scorer as the third option. Like say for Boston Jrue Holiday. It's not all on Beal he can play some defense at times but is not consistent. I would rather trade Beal and keep Durant and Booker. The problem is Beal is impossible to trade due to his NTC. So yeah the Beal trade ruined the KD and Booker era of Suns basketball.

He's also 6'4, there's only so much he can do. He's been a more consistent and impactful defender than Booker.

It was a mistake to trade for him, I get why we did it but it ended up being a bad gamble. That said, I don't think Beal is impossible to trade, it'll just cost us and it's the price that will

Trade booker
trade durant
dump O'Neale and Allen
just ride out Beal at least for one more year
The cost to trade Beal is worth more than you would be getting back as it probably requires draft picks

[Ghost of Kleine]

I believe they are right on this.
If you have Booker at the perfect age to fight for a ring, then you need some veterans around to create a competitive roster.
So the steps are to trade KD and Beal and may be more players to get 2-3-4 good players than can fit our needs.
Then picks are not useful because they mean spending more if they are high picks.

While I appreciate you sharing your perspective and can respect your opinion, this is unfortunately very, very wrong! They are absolutely not right about any of the decisions they have made, and this only further compounds their already egregiously imbecilic shortsighted moves they've already made, which have left us with no viable or sustainable future, no cap flexibility, very little if any youth development, and no legitimate or respectable competitive trajectory from now on along with exponentially depreciating assets! They've dug us a very deep hole in which we can't easily climb out of if we can at all, because they just keep digging deeper. Let's break things down a bit more from your specific points:

'If you have Booker at the perfect age to fight for a ring, then you need some veterans around to create a competitive roster."

- Booker being 28 may still be in his prime for a few more years, and I love his loyalty! BUT we're clearly not fighting or competing for a ring even with him, KD, and Beal right now as it is, and clearly we already have plenty of veterans as we're currently the oldest team in the league trying to zig while the entire rest of the league is zagging! All anyone needs to do is look at our record, our plus/minus, our lack of domination while also being dominated rather easily by the younger, bigger, more athletic, more physical legitimate playoff teams that actually are contenders to see that we're nowhere close to competitive. All we're really competing for now is how valuable of a high lottery pick we'll be giving Houston every other year! We are the softest, most mentally fragile, apathetic team in the entire NBA. We're honestly about as far as you can get from being truly competitive!

"So the steps are to trade KD and Beal and may be more players to get 2-3-4 good players than can fit our needs."

- While I like and agree with this thought process, man, currently even with KD we're something like 4 1/2 games out of the play-in tournament. Regardless of adding a few pieces here and there, we're obviously not adding equal talent to what we're giving up in KD so we'd still at best only get measurably worse with even less high-level offensive threats. This means no other stars or high-end talent to draw defenders away from Booker, so he'll only be seeing heavier double and triple teams. So either way we're not getting better at all. Again, even with 3 max players (all stars) we still can't even make the playoffs and are a low-key lotto team. The rest of the NBA is already way ahead of the curve with young athletic talent as evidenced by how the younger teams are atop of the league. And we're just way behind trying to catch up as we're getting lapped in embarrassing fashion!

Our rebuild is inevitable and will only get longer and more difficult/ painful, the longer we put it off, as bookers' value will continue to deteriorate further into his early 30's. And the premise of trading Beal is unfortunately absolutely useless man as he has his notorious 'no-trade' clause. So he has full veto authority on any/all trades and has already mentioned that he loves it here and so does his family, and his family will play a huge role in any potential decision on moving! Beal really isn't going anywhere unfortunately.
" Then picks are not useful because they mean spending more if they are high picks.''

- This is honestly irrelevant because in this current NBA climate, picks (draft assets) and young talent are key desirable assets in trades and primary currency because they're cost controlled (4 yr deals) which offers premium value under this current CBA! Also, Ishbia seems to have no issues with spending, as he throws around money like it's nothing. And gives away premium assets for "pennies on the dollar'' returns. We're already in the 2nd apron as it is, but obviously trading KDs' 54 million salary for younger high-end athletic prospects, even lottery talents would reduce our overall cap significantly and again give us 4 yrs of contractual cost-controlled salaries to work with. And those same younger prospects would help us get younger, more athletic, more energetic, and physical while giving us legitimately desirable cost controlled assets to leverage!

I believe you are referring ro future mistakes and past mistakes as almost the same reality.
Let's see if I can explain myself.
I would say first and foremost that I did not like the way they made up this roster. Signing KD was not a good idea, in my opinion, because we already had Booker, who is not a get-to-the-rim kind of player, neither a superb 3-point machine. He is not Tatum, although we could say they hold similar talent levels. Tatum is physically at another level, clearly. So adding KD, who is a similar player in which he does not get to the basket, he does not make the three his first weapon and, playing the 4 these days, he is no post presence and not a rebounding in traffic player, we are stacked with similar players, so to say, in the way they get their points. If we have had a Kobe type of player, for example, in which that he scored from multiple areas, even posting up, then that would have been different. Also there is a factor here, which is that KD was 36 when got here to play with us. 9 years older than Booker. Things did went well, but could have been much worse and KD could be showing symptoms of aging. So, as a general thought, not the best fit for Booker as a player and for his age.
Supposedly we got KD to try to do a run as the Warriors did with him, only that we did not have that champion mentality, even though we were one year from playing in the Finals.

Then one of the worst decisions in basketball history came to some genius mind and only because Beal was available, we traded for him. Another SG who scores in a similar way than that of Booker, same or similar high, similar defensive characteristics, etc. Deplorable. Well, beyond that, because he had a no-trade clause that we did not force to forget as supposedly he was coming to a dream destination: warm weather, a good team with a high goal, etc.

A year and a have later we are in the worst possible scenario that could possibly happen, but that some envision. The group lacks desire, chemistry and desire. Commitment. So it is clear that we need to do some serious changes.

Which could be those changes?
Well, we have to see what other teams do well and try to go that way. Teams with success take care of the ball, shoot well form three (and shoot quite a lot from three), run, everybody moves without the ball, have the commitment to care for the mistakes of the others and defend. But, especially, they are groups who share desire, pride in being a group, listen to their coaches, who know how to get the best from them...

So we need trades to get players who can do that and possibly a coach who can do that.
Can BDH get that done? I would have said YES until I read the news about him saying Booker to be less talkative.
Can JJ be the GM who can identify weaknesses and find players who can fill both our talent and character needs?
I doubt it.
Is Isiah the counselor the owner needs to listen to in order to have the right idea of how a roster, a team, a group, a franchise can be well run? I seriously doubt that (by reading the book Basketball and knowing better what kind of person he is and the kind of relationships he has and had and how he run (sic) the Knics, I wonder why Ishbia even has a relationship with him, unless Ishbia is not what I think he is...

With all that said, I firmly believe we need changes, but not a complete reconstruction. There are 7 players that should stay: Booker, Gillespie, Dunn, Oso, Bol, Richards, Plumlee. Then one of Allen and Oneale, being Oneale my preferred player to be moved (I do not like 6-5 guys playing PF, even if he defend like crazy and shoots well). By finding a PG, a PF and a SF that fit our timeline and the style of play that we want to play in, we could be really good if the players buy the system.

But what I believe we lack is a much better understanding of what players can offer, how to develop them, see talent when talent is two years down the road. I mean, a case like that of Ty Jerome and his impact in the Cavs results is a shame when he was here last year and was completely underused...

I do not see the point of a full reconstruction, because it takes years to be on top again. But, well, if someone could tell me that we are going to get 2/3 good young players + pick 1 - pick 4 - pick 8, I could agree, because this year's draft is amazing and ending up with Flag, his C teammate in Duke,rookie PG, Allen, Oneale, Bol, Richards, Morris, Oso, Dunn and then maybe Jabari and a couple more of exciting young players could be inticing...

Thank you for taking the time to answer to me in detail as you did.

You're very welcome man! And thank you in kind for your very salient/ on point, and well articulated response and objective observations. I have to say that I emphatically agree with pretty much every point that you've shared here! A truly excellent post response

I think the only real variance in perspective is solely the premise of how we should percieve the concept of a full rebuild or reconstruction as it were. Perhaps we might be closer in agreement on this than it appears?

Now whilst I do agree with you that we should keep the names you mentioned above (Plumlee being the lone exception for me), the premise of a full rebuild per my interests would be to get a new front office, new GM, new coach, retrieve our lost firsts from Houston because we're already very bad with our current roster and not going to get better post KD trade with even less talent, etc.

I say full rebuild because our current condition offers no assets, very limited youth development, no picks for trades, massive redundancy and dysfunctional positional roster composition, critical issues on all levels as you yourself even pointed out, and worst of all, our entire culture has been fractured for multiple seasons now. We're so soft, passive, mentally fragile and apathetic, that I just don't see how changing out a few pieces here and there is going to fix anything?

We've tried this same " bandaid" strategy for multiple seasons now and it's really gotten us nowhere. Even with Book and KD and Beal, we're still not even good enough to make the playoffs and probably not even the play in either! And to add insult to injury, giving up our 1sts to Houston and letting other teams capitalize on value we've surrendered is incredibly negligent asset management.

My belief is to do a full rebuild by maximizing our remaining valuable assets to reclaim our critical 1sts to add such cost controlled lottery talent and franchise cornerstone players for our core while reinventing our core culture to match the more physical, tenacious and athletic trends of the league so we can keep pace. And keep those names that you've mentioned for our long term youth development.

I do also have multiple Booker ( stays) reload suggestions too wherein we just move KD and reload around young vet talent and a modicum of picks from teams such as San Antonio, Denver, Minnesota, Miami and Dallas. So I'm keeping an open mind depending upon the KD trade framework. But if only doing a reload, our process needs to be absolutely immaculate in its framework and value returns.

[sunskerr]

Booker is not a player on the level of SGA or Doncic who are his peers in terms of similar age/position. Like if you trade KD you are basically betting that Booker takes THAT leap next year OR you are betting we get another Chris Paul walking through the doors. But I don't see it happening. He like...MIGHT be a top 10-15 player in the league (he certainly could be - this year has been kind of down for him) but there is still a standard deviation of skill/impact between being top 15 and top 5.

It's not a very high percentage play to build around Booker imo. Of course, we can try to retool, then if it fails trade him mid-season to the Rockets for the remainder of our picks + young players + whomever they take with our pick this year. Im guessing that's still on the table.

Idk, maybe KD really is that much of a burden on the locker room. It's not out of the question. But I'm looking at the rest of the roster and the cap space/assets we have to work with and even if KD is a cancer/negative for morale, we're still working with the most meager scraps. If we're comparing similar teams to a Booker/Beal potential lead duo, wouldn't the Blazers with Lillard+McCollum be considered superior? And they didn't do anything of note.

It's funny but looking back it really is just that simple that our problems came from passing on Doncic/Hali. That would've taken so much pressure off the future of our franchise. But I know we can only work with what we have and y'all gotta be tired of hearing that from me.

And maybe not to rub salt in the wounds but the Lakers keeping Reeves in a Luka trade is...wild. Yep, that's his O-EPM at +3.2. Their path post-LeBron might be Reeves as the #2 playmaker behind Doncic. And if nothing else he's a big time asset to use if need be.

[ImNotMcDiSwear]

While I've long been in the tear down & rebuild camp, it makes complete sense why the FO would keep Booker. We can't rebuild without our picks, so what else is there to do?

[Ghost of Kleine]

While I've long been in the tear down & rebuild camp, it makes complete sense why the FO would keep Booker. We can't rebuild without our picks, so what else is there to do?

Well man, The thought process around a rebuild would be to first recognize and accept that even with keeping Booker and going that route trying to rebuild around him, we'd very obviously still not be good enough to make the playoffs and maybe not even be fully competitive enough to make the play-in tournament either? So we'd still suck, and be hemmoraging lottery value to other teams just for the privilege of getting embarrassed for 98% of the season possibly ven with a worse record than we already have! While Booker's value would also continue to depreciate even more each season.

So we'd essentially be paying lottery value and setting up other teams withlong term potential franchise cornerstone pieces just to keep limping through the next 2-3 seasons until Booker reaches his breaking point and asks for a trade elsewhere and then we've effectively wasted another couple of years trying to ignore our inevitable rebuild just because our owners' arrogant and delusional hubris won't allow him to take accountability and do what's right for our future! We'd have to just keep repeating this suffering on top of a soon-to-be a 15-year rebuild (escalating consequences) because we didn't move Booker while he still had optimal value.

Because IF our owner could just put his fragile ego aside and we WOULD TRADE BOOKER, then we actually would/could get our picks back to get a new influx of exciting young athletic core talent via the trade package and our lottery picks! That is why doing a full rebuild and trading BOTH KD and Booker make far more sense than trying to keep pushing the same failed experiment over and over again!

Because what's the definition of doing the same thing over and over again but expecting a different result?? Insanity!!!

Ishbia is the very definition of someone that seets his home on fire but won't call the fire department to save the property, but would rather try to put it out himself by using a spray bottle to try and douse the fire but doesn't bother reading that the bootl has lighter fluid or gasoline in it!

[KdoubleDees23]

Imagine having CamJo, Bridges, Camara and Dunn on this team. All needed was a rim protector and a better starting PG. we had it all in our hands

tbh even Ayton on this team with CP3

CP3 / Tyus Jones
Booker /
Bridges / CamJo
Dunn / Camara
Ayton / Plumlee / Richards (if we still got him)

Man that would have been a fun team.

[Ghost of Kleine]

Read on Twitter

Another reason why the Bucks KD trade should be a consideration in a reload scenario!
KD for Kuzma/Portis/ Connaughton/ KPJr/ Jackson/ Smith/ MIL 31' 1st.

[Slim Charless]

Booker is not a player on the level of SGA or Doncic who are his peers in terms of similar age/position. Like if you trade KD you are basically betting that Booker takes THAT leap next year OR you are betting we get another Chris Paul walking through the doors. But I don't see it happening. He like...MIGHT be a top 10-15 player in the league (he certainly could be - this year has been kind of down for him) but there is still a standard deviation of skill/impact between being top 15 and top 5.

It's not a very high percentage play to build around Booker imo. Of course, we can try to retool, then if it fails trade him mid-season to the Rockets for the remainder of our picks + young players + whomever they take with our pick this year. Im guessing that's still on the table.

Idk, maybe KD really is that much of a burden on the locker room. It's not out of the question. But I'm looking at the rest of the roster and the cap space/assets we have to work with and even if KD is a cancer/negative for morale, we're still working with the most meager scraps. If we're comparing similar teams to a Booker/Beal potential lead duo, wouldn't the Blazers with Lillard+McCollum be considered superior? And they didn't do anything of note.

It's funny but looking back it really is just that simple that our problems came from passing on Doncic/Hali. That would've taken so much pressure off the future of our franchise. But I know we can only work with what we have and y'all gotta be tired of hearing that from me.

And maybe not to rub salt in the wounds but the Lakers keeping Reeves in a Luka trade is...wild. Yep, that's his O-EPM at +3.2. Their path post-LeBron might be Reeves as the #2 playmaker behind Doncic. And if nothing else he's a big time asset to use if need be.

I don't nescessarily think he won't trade Booker at all. I think he wants a star-for money among other reasons but a rebuild most likely is not in his viewpoint. So what if we trade Booker for another star? Someone that can sell tickets and jerseys?

LaMelo and Trae seem like options there and would solve the PG issue. Booker has better value than both of those guys so we might be able to get something else on top of them.

[Ghost of Kleine]

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this would be my top KD trade IF keeping Booker and trying to stay competitive while adding key vet depth pieces and still also getting young talent and picks:

KD for Hartenstein/ Caruso/ Dieng/ Topic/ LAC 25' 1st swap (14th pick)/ MIA 25' 1st ( 16th pick)/ DAL 28' 1st (swap).

- Trade Allen for Bidatze.
- Trade O'neale for Sochan.

14th pick- Colin Murray Boyles.
16th pick- Carter Bryant.
29th pick- Jo'an Beringer.
54th pick- Koby Brea.



Caruso/ Booker/ Dunn/ Hartenstein/ Bidatze.
Morris/ Beal/ Sochan/ Bol Bol/ Richards.
Topic/ Brea / CMB / Bryant/ Ighodaro.
** Jo'an Beringer in G league for development.

[Ghost of Kleine]

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The Twins 2.0

[SunsRback4Good]

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The Twins 2.0

I love twins!

[Saberestar]

Mavs, Blazers and Kings lost their games tonight.

20 games left.

We are 2.5 games away from that 10th seed and 4 games away from 8th and we have the tiebreaker over the Clippers.

IF we can steal the next game @ Denver we can get 3 wins on a row because the next game is @ Dallas.

[They_Them_Hatin]

Mavs, Blazers and Kings lost their games tonight.

20 games left.

We are 2.5 games away from that 10th seed and 4 games away from 8th and we have the tiebreaker over the Clippers.

IF we can steal the next game @ Denver we can get 3 wins on a row because the next game is @ Dallas.

Denver game is winnable. Gordon is probably still out, which means MPJ gets the KD matchup and bbq chicken. KD needs to get out of the corner and demand the ball like he did last game. Jokic is a little banged up, we don’t have Nurkic for his Super Bowl, Richards is awful against good centers and Jokic is amazing so I expect a lot of Plumlee. They don’t have 3 point snipers Booker, Grayson, Tyus and Beal will let torch them like they normally do. Definitely going to need both Bol Bol not to get himself benched and Colin to go off against their former team. Royce & Grayson have to make some shots! Also Booker to even out the Murray matchup. He refuses to play defense this season but he at least needs to go off and get out of his feelings.

Even if we don’t win the Denver game, the Mavs are about to free fall and it looks like Deni is hurt for the Blazers. They’re likely going to make the play in. I think Timberwolves keep 7th. Suns can beat the Clippers and Kings. OKC wins but KD isn’t getting swept by them. I just want to avoid the Wolves in the play in.