Season Speculation, Trade Ideas & Discussion 2: End This Knightmare!

[thamadkant]

Philly needs a PG, and if they are considering swapping Okafor for Jrue Holiday, then we better be offering them Knight for Okafor.

I think 76ers is happy with their current cheap PG doing well.


They want a lottery pick for Okafor.


People crapping on Okafor in the GB... Forgetting his per 36 is very similar to Porzingis and KAT. And posted 17.5ppg 7rpg 1.2bpg shot 51% as a 19-20 year old rookie.

If Cousins can develop a mid to long range as a 25 year old... I dont see how a 21 year old cant.
Also Okafor's moves inside are so sublime... He will score on most one on one post situations.

The way McD talks about how our team is built in that Ringer article just posted,

“We have built a team to be versatile,” McDonough said, adding the long-term goal is to be able to switch defensive screens at every position. “Golden State obviously does that better than anybody. So, if you can move your feet defensively and guard smaller guys as a big and stretch the floor and shoot in the mid-upper 30s from 3, that’s really valuable.”

makes it sound to me like there is no way they would go after a guy like Okafor.

Because of teams like warriors.

But i think i like the Spurs model... Big but surrounded by good versatile defenders and a solid coach.

[TeamTragic]

The Dunc'd on Mock Trade Deadline podcast had us executing one trade at the end of 2 1/2 hours, reproduced here in all of its glory:

Spoiler:

Tucker and Barbosa to Houston for Brewer and HOU '17

Not a bad trade. Barbosa deserves to be on a winnning team and Dantoni wants a defensive stopper for the playoffs.

[bwgood77]

The Dunc'd on Mock Trade Deadline podcast had us executing one trade at the end of 2 1/2 hours, reproduced here in all of its glory:

Spoiler:

Tucker and Barbosa to Houston for Brewer and HOU '17

Not a bad trade. Barbosa deserves to be on a winnning team and Dantoni wants a defensive stopper for the playoffs.

That wouldn't be bad. D'Antoni obviously knows Barbosa well, and that team definitely could use some D. Tucker is almost at 34% 3 pt shooting so if he could up it to about 37% he'd love it. Even close to 34% is not really a negative shot...same as 50% from 2.

[TeamTragic]

The Dunc'd on Mock Trade Deadline podcast had us executing one trade at the end of 2 1/2 hours, reproduced here in all of its glory:

Spoiler:

Tucker and Barbosa to Houston for Brewer and HOU '17

Not a bad trade. Barbosa deserves to be on a winning team and Dantoni wants a defensive stopper for the playoffs.

That wouldn't be bad. D'Antoni obviously knows Barbosa well, and that team definitely could use some D. Tucker is almost at 34% 3 pt shooting so if he could up it to about 37% he'd love it. Even close to 34% is not really a negative shot...same as 50% from 2.

Agreed. Definitely the most realistic trade proposal I have seen posted on this forum. Houston doesn't need their pick and McD has stated that he wants picks/younger players.

[ImNotMcDiSwear]

An excellent interview with Watson today, focusing mostly on the dilemma at C: http://arizonasports.com/category/podcast_player/?a=329222&sid=1004&n=Doug+%26+Wolf

Maybe two weeks ago, McD said that we have the financial flexibility to sign Alex and keep Tyson. Now this morning, Watson says he can't really play both Alex and Tyson. Wolf said that he'd heard there was chatter around the league that we aren't developing Alex properly and that others would be interested in trading for him.

Watson also mentioned that he was more concerned with getting Ulis minutes than with the dilemma at center.

Tick tock

[bwgood77]

An excellent interview with Watson today, focusing mostly on the dilemma at C: http://arizonasports.com/category/podcast_player/?a=329222&sid=1004&n=Doug+%26+Wolf

Maybe two weeks ago, McD said that we have the financial flexibility to sign Alex and keep Tyson. Now this morning, Watson says he can't really play both Alex and Tyson. Wolf said that he'd heard there was chatter around the league that we aren't developing Alex properly and that others would be interested in trading for him.

Watson also mentioned that he was more concerned with getting Ulis minutes than with the dilemma at center.

Tick tock

I think you are taking that out of context a bit. He's basically just saying with small ball it's hard to play them both a ton of minutes against teams that go small.

I don't think there is really a dilemma as much as depending on who we are playing they won't always both get a ton of minutes. Chandler is clearly going to decline soon. Len is already a much better rim protector than Chandler and was just about as good a rebounder up until this year, where Chandler is on fire...but still Len is a great rebounder in his own regard.

With where this team is, Len obviously fits our long term future moreso than Chandler, but I'm not saying we will move Chandler either.

He talks about GS. Len is like our Bogut. We will see how they fare without a rim protector against Cleveland. When Bogut was out the last three games in the finals, it didn't bode well for the Warriors.

I'd be pretty surprised if McD traded Len.

[Phoenix-Sons]

File this under "duh" but Sam Amick on the latest A to Z podcast said that the Suns are looking to movie Brandon Knight again, so I wonder if he actually will be moved around the deadline or will we wait it out.

There's been a few people who have said no ones interested in him (Gambo, Lowe)

[Saberestar]

An excellent interview with Watson today, focusing mostly on the dilemma at C: http://arizonasports.com/category/podcast_player/?a=329222&sid=1004&n=Doug+%26+Wolf

Maybe two weeks ago, McD said that we have the financial flexibility to sign Alex and keep Tyson. Now this morning, Watson says he can't really play both Alex and Tyson. Wolf said that he'd heard there was chatter around the league that we aren't developing Alex properly and that others would be interested in trading for him.

Watson also mentioned that he was more concerned with getting Ulis minutes than with the dilemma at center.

Tick tock

I think you are taking that out of context a bit. He's basically just saying with small ball it's hard to play them both a ton of minutes against teams that go small.

I don't think there is really a dilemma as much as depending on who we are playing they won't always both get a ton of minutes. Chandler is clearly going to decline soon. Len is already a much better rim protector than Chandler and was just about as good a rebounder up until this year, where Chandler is on fire...but still Len is a great rebounder in his own regard.

With where this team is, Len obviously fits our long term future moreso than Chandler, but I'm not saying we will move Chandler either.

He talks about GS. Len is like our Bogut. We will see how they fare without a rim protector against Cleveland. When Bogut was out the last three games in the finals, it didn't bode well for the Warriors.

I'd be pretty surprised if McD traded Len.

Bogut was/is (when healthy) a terrific player. He understands the game like a PG, his vision and passing are AMAZING for a player of his size.

Defensively he has been always an smart player and he intimidates without even jumping. He is always on the right place, and he was better in his first few years in the league.

He was a #1 pick for a reason...Len is way worse than Bogut and it is not on the same tier. IMO it is similar to comparing Warrick to Amare.

Len reminds me of Asik, probably he can be like him in his prime. Decent big man to get some minutes of the bench, starter depending of matchups.

Hopefully he improves...but my expectations are really low since the preseason.
I seriously think that we are gonna try to trade him before the deadline.

[bwgood77]

An excellent interview with Watson today, focusing mostly on the dilemma at C: http://arizonasports.com/category/podcast_player/?a=329222&sid=1004&n=Doug+%26+Wolf

Maybe two weeks ago, McD said that we have the financial flexibility to sign Alex and keep Tyson. Now this morning, Watson says he can't really play both Alex and Tyson. Wolf said that he'd heard there was chatter around the league that we aren't developing Alex properly and that others would be interested in trading for him.

Watson also mentioned that he was more concerned with getting Ulis minutes than with the dilemma at center.

Tick tock

I think you are taking that out of context a bit. He's basically just saying with small ball it's hard to play them both a ton of minutes against teams that go small.

I don't think there is really a dilemma as much as depending on who we are playing they won't always both get a ton of minutes. Chandler is clearly going to decline soon. Len is already a much better rim protector than Chandler and was just about as good a rebounder up until this year, where Chandler is on fire...but still Len is a great rebounder in his own regard.

With where this team is, Len obviously fits our long term future moreso than Chandler, but I'm not saying we will move Chandler either.

He talks about GS. Len is like our Bogut. We will see how they fare without a rim protector against Cleveland. When Bogut was out the last three games in the finals, it didn't bode well for the Warriors.

I'd be pretty surprised if McD traded Len.

Bogut was/is (when healthy) a terrific player. He understands the game like a PG, his vision and passing are AMAZING for a player of his size.

Defensively he has been always an smart player and he intimidates without even jumping. He is always on the right place, and he was better in his first few years in the league.

He was a #1 pick for a reason...Len is way worse than Bogut and it is not on the same tier. IMO it is similar to comparing Warrick to Amare.

Len reminds me of Asik, probably he can be like him in his prime. Decent big man to get some minutes of the bench, starter depending of matchups.

Hopefully he improves...but my expectations are really low since the preseason.
I seriously think that we are gonna try to trade him before the deadline.

I was only saying that Len, being one of the premier rim protectors in the league (shown multiple times here), is similar to what Bogut clearly on the downside of his career, provided for GS last year. In the finals it helped them take a 3-1 lead, then he went down.

He wasn't doing much more than protecting the rim at that point. It would be ridiculously stupid to trade Len in our current situation barring getting a superstar or better young center in return.

[Saberestar]

It would be ridiculously stupid to trade Len in our current situation barring getting a superstar or better young center in return.

I do not think so.

Imagine that McDonough gets some info around the league and he knows for sure that Len is gonna get at least an $80M/4 years contract this summer...it would be better to trade him for another young player or a future pick.

The Bucks made that decision about Knight...and we traded for him.

We have Chandler, Bender, Chriss and Williams to play minutes at C next season.

[bwgood77]

It would be ridiculously stupid to trade Len in our current situation barring getting a superstar or better young center in return.

I do not think so.

Imagine that McDonough gets some info around the league and he knows for sure that Len is gonna get at least an $80M/4 years contract this summer...it would be better to trade him for another young player or a future pick.

The Bucks made that decision about Knight...and we traded for him.

We have Chandler, Bender, Chriss and Williams to play minutes at C next season.

I think McD likes having RFA's. I also think he just said they have plenty of cap flexibility. We are not strapped financially either. If we let him go he will end up being a really solid center somewhere else.

[jcsunsfan]

It would be ridiculously stupid to trade Len in our current situation barring getting a superstar or better young center in return.

I do not think so.

Imagine that McDonough gets some info around the league and he knows for sure that Len is gonna get at least an $80M/4 years contract this summer...it would be better to trade him for another young player or a future pick.

The Bucks made that decision about Knight...and we traded for him.

We have Chandler, Bender, Chriss and Williams to play minutes at C next season.

I do not believe Len will get anywhere near that offer. Look at the teams who made bad decisions on centers in the last few years trying to dump bad contracts: Monroe, Asik, Plumlee, Mozgov, Noah.

He will get a $10-12 million offer.

[GotEm]

I do not think so.

Imagine that McDonough gets some info around the league and he knows for sure that Len is gonna get at least an $80M/4 years contract this summer...it would be better to trade him for another young player or a future pick.

The Bucks made that decision about Knight...and we traded for him.

We have Chandler, Bender, Chriss and Williams to play minutes at C next season.

I do not believe Len will get anywhere near that offer. Look at the teams who made bad decisions on centers in the last few years trying to dump bad contracts: Monroe, Asik, Plumlee, Mozgov, Noah.

He will get a $10-12 million offer.

He will likely get Miles Plumlee/Ian Mahimi type money.

And yeah there are bad and dumb enough GMs out there who would throw that at Len.

A team like Brooklyn for example who has Brook Lopez coming off the books soon and doesn't have any picks of their own to improve the team much could find it worthwhile to throw a crazy number at Len. They already did that this past summer with Tyler Johnson and Allen Crabbe so they'll likely do it again with players like Alex Len.

[King4Day]

I see Len getting around what Mozgov got. The initial talk we had that he'd get around 15 mil is probably accurate. I'd actually be OK giving him that.

[Mulhollanddrive]

If we can get Len $15m, Warren $13m I'd be happy with that.

Worst case scenario tradable for pick, unlike a couple of our players.

[Jdiddy701]

If we can get Len $15m, Warren $13m I'd be happy with that.

Worst case scenario tradable for pick, unlike a couple of our players.

I get bigs are harder to find in today's game but no way Len makes more than TJ Warren.


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[lilfishi22]

I want to avoid a Portland type situation where they spent $18.5m to resign Crabbe, close to $24m to resign CJ and to a lesser extent, they signed Turner for $16m. The Blazers are sitting at 9th in the West right now, with the 3rd highest payroll and will have the top 2 highest payroll well into 2020. They have one of the biggest payrolls and will be capped out for the next 3 seasons yet they don't look particularly dangerous even with internal growth. They've done well to resign the guys they've developed but their talent are fairly pedestrian outside of CJ and Lilliard and even those two arguably aren't a good pairing long term. This is a team that could be treadmilling for years even with arguably better talent than we do.

Is Len a guy I want for $13-18m? Is TJ a guy I want for $15-20m? Do I want Tucker for $8-12m a year? We have money to spend but we can very quickly fall into the trap that many young teams fall into by resigning their own marginal talent, especially if they don't have a solid foundation of players to resign. I've said it before but I'm not convinced we have the foundations of a future contender. We just need to be real careful with the kind of contracts we hand out even if there's money to be spent.

[bwgood77]

I want to avoid a Portland type situation where they spent $18.5m to resign Crabbe, close to $24m to resign CJ and to a lesser extent, they signed Turner for $16m. The Blazers are sitting at 9th in the West right now, with the 3rd highest payroll and will have the top 2 highest payroll well into 2020. They have one of the biggest payrolls and will be capped out for the next 3 seasons yet they don't look particularly dangerous even with internal growth. They've done well to resign the guys they've developed but their talent are fairly pedestrian outside of CJ and Lilliard and even those two arguably aren't a good pairing long term. This is a team that could be treadmilling for years even with arguably better talent than we do.

Is Len a guy I want for $13-18m? Is TJ a guy I want for $15-20m? Do I want Tucker for $8-12m a year? We have money to spend but we can very quickly fall into the trap that many young teams fall into by resigning their own marginal talent, especially if they don't have a solid foundation of players to resign. I've said it before but I'm not convinced we have the foundations of a future contender. We just need to be real careful with the kind of contracts we hand out even if there's money to be spent.

Portland was forced to match, but their problem is that they are way over the cap anyway, so letting guys go doesn't help them...retaining them at least gives them players they can use or potentially trade. They have a multi-billionaire owner who doesn't care about the cap so now they just have more assets under control to play with, since you can retain your own players...he doesn't care about any tax either.

We need to keep the guys who we drafted. TJ won't get that much. Len will probably get somewhere in that range. I mean you can't let TJ go...even with this mysterious injury and playing like crap for a while after being our best player prior to that injury, he still measures out better than Booker overall in advanced stats....

http://bkref.com/tiny/D66am

Had he not had that mysterious injury he might still be our best player right now.

[Qwigglez]

Evan Turner broke his hand would you guys be willing to do this...
Suns get-
Meyers Leonard
Festus Ezeli
Blazers 1st (top 10 protection)

Blazers get-
Tyson Chandler
PJ Tucker

Blazers need defense and veteran leadership. They give up their 1st, but they still have Cleveland's 1st. Leonard is just straight terrible, but his contract isn't as bad as others (Miles Plumlee). I'd do this because of the pick, but also because we'd be forced to start Len the remainder of the season and I really want to see what he can do as a starter.
This trade would likely be a domino effect and would mean the front office is ready for a rebuild. Thoughts?

Or in a different direction (just for fun!)...
Suns get-
Allen Crabbe
Cavs pick

Blazers get-
PJ Tucker
Serge Ibaka

Magic get-
Brandon Knight
Blazers pick

[AtheJ415]

I want to avoid a Portland type situation where they spent $18.5m to resign Crabbe, close to $24m to resign CJ and to a lesser extent, they signed Turner for $16m. The Blazers are sitting at 9th in the West right now, with the 3rd highest payroll and will have the top 2 highest payroll well into 2020. They have one of the biggest payrolls and will be capped out for the next 3 seasons yet they don't look particularly dangerous even with internal growth. They've done well to resign the guys they've developed but their talent are fairly pedestrian outside of CJ and Lilliard and even those two arguably aren't a good pairing long term. This is a team that could be treadmilling for years even with arguably better talent than we do.

Is Len a guy I want for $13-18m? Is TJ a guy I want for $15-20m? Do I want Tucker for $8-12m a year? We have money to spend but we can very quickly fall into the trap that many young teams fall into by resigning their own marginal talent, especially if they don't have a solid foundation of players to resign. I've said it before but I'm not convinced we have the foundations of a future contender. We just need to be real careful with the kind of contracts we hand out even if there's money to be spent.

Portland was forced to match, but their problem is that they are way over the cap anyway, so letting guys go doesn't help them...retaining them at least gives them players they can use or potentially trade. They have a multi-billionaire owner who doesn't care about the cap so now they just have more assets under control to play with, since you can retain your own players...he doesn't care about any tax either.

We need to keep the guys who we drafted. TJ won't get that much. Len will probably get somewhere in that range. I mean you can't let TJ go...even with this mysterious injury and playing like crap for a while after being our best player prior to that injury, he still measures out better than Booker overall in advanced stats....

http://bkref.com/tiny/D66am

Had he not had that mysterious injury he might still be our best player right now.

I don't get why anyone really thinks we need to let go of Len. We have the cap space to sign him, and he isn't untradeable at all. He's at worst a rotation big who will be signed into an ever increasing cap. And despite all of that he still has his upside.

He may never develop into the Marc Gasol-type offensive player we hoped, but we don't really need him to be. Our scoring is going to come from Booker and Warren in the future, with many of our other perimeter guys helping out.