RealGM

I'm glad that saga is put to rest.

Good on the Jazz and Lauri. They got him cheaply in the DM trade, built him up to an all star level player, it doesn't seem right to trade him away for mid 1st rounders and some guy called "Moody".

I'm fine keeping him, too. But we need to trade other veterans to not bottom out - with this roster when everyone played we were a .500 team. Clarkson and Collins - at minimum - need to be traded. I want to keep Sexton, but we might be too good to really bottom out with him, Lauri, and any non-marginal improvements by the young players.

babyjax13 wrote:I'm fine keeping him, too. But we need to trade other veterans to not bottom out - with this roster when everyone played we were a .500 team. Clarkson and Collins - at minimum - need to be traded. I want to keep Sexton, but we might be too good to really bottom out with him, Lauri, and any non-marginal improvements by the young players.

I understand what you’re getting at but u could argue we have a better chance of tanking with our 2 JC’s than without them

AGE1207 wrote:

babyjax13 wrote:I'm fine keeping him, too. But we need to trade other veterans to not bottom out - with this roster when everyone played we were a .500 team. Clarkson and Collins - at minimum - need to be traded. I want to keep Sexton, but we might be too good to really bottom out with him, Lauri, and any non-marginal improvements by the young players.

I understand what you’re getting at but u could argue we have a better chance of tanking with our 2 JC’s than without them

Sexton has an unambiguously positive impact on the game, if you are referring to him, and our end-of-season losing streak really occurred because of shifting Clarkson's possessions to George (from very bad, to abysmal, as George was pretty spent by that time and had just picked up a ton of responsibility to run the team). So, despite Clarkson not playing well, we were still better with than without him.

babyjax13 wrote:

AGE1207 wrote:

babyjax13 wrote:I'm fine keeping him, too. But we need to trade other veterans to not bottom out - with this roster when everyone played we were a .500 team. Clarkson and Collins - at minimum - need to be traded. I want to keep Sexton, but we might be too good to really bottom out with him, Lauri, and any non-marginal improvements by the young players.

I understand what you’re getting at but u could argue we have a better chance of tanking with our 2 JC’s than without them

Sexton has an unambiguously positive impact on the game, if you are referring to him, and our end-of-season losing streak really occurred because of shifting Clarkson's possessions to George (from very bad, to abysmal, as George was pretty spent by that time and had just picked up a ton of responsibility to run the team). So, despite Clarkson not playing well, we were still better with than without him.

I am with you on keeping Sexton but I think that if u are going to try and trade Clarkson & Collins u are going to run into all kinds of salary cap issues and/or may get players in return that actually fit our team better.
So, I am not sure we should do this if we really want to tank.

AGE1207 wrote:

babyjax13 wrote:

AGE1207 wrote:
I understand what you’re getting at but u could argue we have a better chance of tanking with our 2 JC’s than without them

Sexton has an unambiguously positive impact on the game, if you are referring to him, and our end-of-season losing streak really occurred because of shifting Clarkson's possessions to George (from very bad, to abysmal, as George was pretty spent by that time and had just picked up a ton of responsibility to run the team). So, despite Clarkson not playing well, we were still better with than without him.

I am with you on keeping Sexton but I think that if u are going to try and trade Clarkson & Collins u are going to run into all kinds of salary cap issues and/or may get players in return that actually fit our team better.
So, I am not sure we should do this if we really want to tank.

I'd do something like Clarkson for Gabe Vincent and a 2nd and just never play Vincent, and use our worst first in 2025 or 2027 to dump Collins for an expiring guy we can just waive. We should add zero rotation players in those deals, whatever we do (so, I agree, to an extent).

I did expect the Jazz to extend Lauri, but I didn't expect them to give him more than he otherwise would have been able to get with a 5 yr max. Not my money.

babyjax13 wrote:I'm fine keeping him, too. But we need to trade other veterans to not bottom out - with this roster when everyone played we were a .500 team. Clarkson and Collins - at minimum - need to be traded. I want to keep Sexton, but we might be too good to really bottom out with him, Lauri, and any non-marginal improvements by the young players.

I was surprised when there was a hold up of the Clippers deal that we didn't end up trading for PJ Tucker as part of the deal, such as for Clarkson.

I'm not sure who the Jazz could trade for at their salaries (JCs) that would make the team worse.

Posted elsewhere, but may be useful in thinking about the 'value' of this deal:

Just looking at the projected percentage of the cap:

24-25: 30%
25-26: 28.2%
26-27: 27.8%
27-28: 27.1%
28-29: 26.3%

Now, I am assuming spottrac is operating under the assumption of 10% raises per year, which has been well-reported for at least the next two seasons after this one. I'm not sure if that large of an increase continues afterward, but in a sense this is a "declining contract" relative to the cap. I've put the "today" dollar equivalents below (i.e., normalized to a ~$141 million cap):

24-25: 30%: $42.3 million
25-26: 28.2%: $39.8 million
26-27: 27.8%: $39.2 million
27-28: 27.1%: $38.2 million (more dubious, but at worst, similar to 26-27)
28-29: 26.3%: $37.1 million (more dubious, but at worst, similar to 26-27)


I think Lauri will have quite a bit of trade value on this contract. It's the kind of contract third options will be getting two years from now.

It's good the Jazz locked him down for 5 years. He's still very tradable now that he's on a long-term deal. If Ainge managed to get what he got for Gobert and Mitchell I have no reason to doubt that he'll be able to get good value for Markkanen down the line if he decides to trade him. Until then:

1. I'll enjoy watching him on the Jazz
2. we all get to not worry about it for the entire season
3. Markkanen got his money so it'll be easier to sit him with strained earlobes injuries this season for the tank
4. It's nice to have a top-25 player who wants to stay in Utah so the fans and FO don't need to worry too much about him forcing his way out.

Inigo Montoya wrote:It's good the Jazz locked him down for 5 years. He's still very tradable now that he's on a long-term deal. If Ainge managed to get what he got for Gobert and Mitchell I have no reason to doubt that he'll be able to get good value for Markkanen down the line if he decides to trade him. Until then:

1. I'll enjoy watching him on the Jazz
2. we all get to not worry about it for the entire season
3. Markkanen got his money so it'll be easier to sit him with strained earlobes injuries this season for the tank
4. It's nice to have a top-25 player who wants to stay in Utah so the fans and FO don't need to worry too much about him forcing his way out.

A Star player who wants to stay is untouchable for Utah.

AingesBurner wrote:

Inigo Montoya wrote:It's good the Jazz locked him down for 5 years. He's still very tradable now that he's on a long-term deal. If Ainge managed to get what he got for Gobert and Mitchell I have no reason to doubt that he'll be able to get good value for Markkanen down the line if he decides to trade him. Until then:

1. I'll enjoy watching him on the Jazz
2. we all get to not worry about it for the entire season
3. Markkanen got his money so it'll be easier to sit him with strained earlobes injuries this season for the tank
4. It's nice to have a top-25 player who wants to stay in Utah so the fans and FO don't need to worry too much about him forcing his way out.

A Star player who wants to stay is untouchable for Utah.

I suppose it depends on who and how we define as a star player but from what I remember Gobert liked it in Utah and was still traded. Ainge is cold-blooded.

Inigo Montoya wrote:

AingesBurner wrote:

Inigo Montoya wrote:It's good the Jazz locked him down for 5 years. He's still very tradable now that he's on a long-term deal. If Ainge managed to get what he got for Gobert and Mitchell I have no reason to doubt that he'll be able to get good value for Markkanen down the line if he decides to trade him. Until then:

1. I'll enjoy watching him on the Jazz
2. we all get to not worry about it for the entire season
3. Markkanen got his money so it'll be easier to sit him with strained earlobes injuries this season for the tank
4. It's nice to have a top-25 player who wants to stay in Utah so the fans and FO don't need to worry too much about him forcing his way out.

A Star player who wants to stay is untouchable for Utah.

I suppose it depends on who and how we define as a star player but from what I remember Gobert liked it in Utah and was still traded. Ainge is cold-blooded.

I love Gobert but he was a flawed star.