RealGM

Greetings all- long time reader, haven't posted for a couple of years. Anyway, definitely a deflating season, though I think we all knew this was a flawed team. You just can't contend for a championship if you can't stop people on the blocks... or slow dribble penetration... or, oh yeah, defend three point shooting. This team had clearly made a commitment to all around defense- and that was to ignore it. Just an embarrassing team to watch on that end of the floor, and it has nearly as much to do with scheme as it does personnel.

Here's one plan to address our personnel shortcomings while being somewhat sensitive to our financial situation. Future moves will be needed to alleviate the looming tax penalty, because in order to secure the players we need, we'll have to take on some dead weight as well. (You can't expect to acquire a teams assets with out relieving them of some liabilities.) So without further adieu, here is my premature, overly optimistic off season plan; after all, isn't that what being a fan all is about?

1. Sloan lost this team. Shake up the culture with fresh blood. No sense repainting walls which are crumbling to the ground.

2. Resign/ extend Boozer, Millsap, Memo, Korver, Collins and Price to reasonable contracts. Pick up Fesenko's option. We have spent years acquiring personnel and draft assets; the time has come to parlay those assets into a contending team. It would be horrible basketball and business decision making to let any of those assets walk away with no compensation. Management must do everything in its power to ensure that doesn't happen.

3. Make trade(s) to acquire the talent we need to contend.

4. Supplement front-court depth by drafting Blair. Package 2nd's or future considerations to move up if necessary to get him. (Gotta move Milsap to get what we need; I know Boozer plays no D, but we can't lose his O.)

5. Trade Harpring's expiring contract before the deadline for future considerations (pick[s]).

6. Use additional assets to package with bad contracts we accrue in trades to get them off our books.

7. Fill out the remaining roster spots with minimum salaried players.

One trade idea:

Utah sends:
Milsap, Okur, Kirilenko, CJ Miles, Fesenko, NYK 2010 1st.
Utah receives:
Kirk Hinrich, Tyson Chandler, Morris Peterson, Gerald Wallace, DeSagana Diop

Chicago sends:
Hinrich, Brad Miller, 2009 1st
Chicago receives:
Okur, Milsap

New Orleans sends:
Tyson Chandler, Morris Peterson
New Orleans receives:
Brad Miller, CJ Miles, Fesenko, 2009 Chicago 1st

Charlotte sends:
Wallace, Diop
Charlotte receives:
AK, 2010 NYK 1st

Analysis:
Utah emerges with the most potent, deep and versatile 1-2-3 personnel combo in the nba, while fielding a great offense/defense combo in the starting front-court. Our depth at 5 will be awesome with Chandler starting, Koufous getting burn, Diop for defense (until we can unload his contract) and Collins for insurance. We need the additional help of Blair and a cheap free agent athlete at the 4. Koufous can help here, too.

Chicago gets the help it needs down low, while hugely upgrading to Okur from Miller. Hinrich is not needed, they will re-sign Gordon and, of course, have Rose.

Charlotte made a mistake in their all NC draft a few years ago- two busts out of two. Time to move forward, building around Okafor. They let Wallace go and invest in the future. NYK's 2010 pick could be a superstar. In the meantime, AK will be huge for them- he will be a primary contributer on offense and will complement Okafor very well on D. Ak shines on crappy teams; by the time Charlotte improves, AK's contract is up.

New Orleans sheds two contracts it can't afford for the expiring Miller, reasonably priced starting 3 in CJ, cheap future contributer at 5 in Fesenko and Chicago's #1 pick this year. (I didn't check- does Chicago have a pick and are they eligible to trade it?). Can Charlotte get a better package for Chandler while unloading Peterson at the same time?

Gotta unload Harpring, Peterson and Diop when possible, maybe pay the tax for one year. If its my money, I pay it for this line-up:

Starting Bench
PG Williams Hinrich, Price
SG Brewer Hinrich, Korver
SF Wallace Korver, Harpring, Peterson
PF Boozer Blair, Harpring, Koufous, FA
C Chandler Koufous, Diop, Colllins

Thanks for reading : ) Thoughts?

^ My thoughts are that as soon as you said this:

2. Resign/ extend Boozer, Millsap, Memo, Korver, Collins and Price to reasonable contracts.

Your post went down the rabbit hole into this place called 'Holy Toledo!'.

1. Sloan lost this team. Shake up the culture with fresh blood. No sense repainting walls which are crumbling to the ground.

It wasn't Sloan who played no defense.

2. Resign/ extend Boozer, Millsap, Memo, Korver, Collins and Price to reasonable contracts. Pick up Fesenko's option. We have spent years acquiring personnel and draft assets; the time has come to parlay those assets into a contending team. It would be horrible basketball and business decision making to let any of those assets walk away with no compensation. Management must do everything in its power to ensure that doesn't happen.

Anyone who suggests that we should resign Collins and/or Price must be drunk. Collins is a total stiff and has no place in the NBA. Price can't even beat out Brevin Knight for PT. He is a nice spark off the bench but is NOT an NBA PG. Can't shoot, can't run the offense, can't play in the half court game. This is obviously a position of need but Price/Knight is not the answer.

Ty Lawson, Jeff Teague and Eric Maynor are all mid first round PG upgrades. Move up 3-5 spots to get one.

Gotta move Milsap to get what we need; I know Boozer plays no D, but we can't lose his O.)

Keep them both? AK is the one who has to go. It has to kill the team to know he is our highest paid player. He must be moved. If we have to sweeten we sweeten with Miles or Brewer or Goofus or Fes. All of whom would interest someone and none of whom are vital to our team. Or...

3. Make trade(s) to acquire the talent we need to contend.

My personal favorite is Boozer and Brewer for Amare.

5. Trade Harpring's expiring contract before the deadline for future considerations (pick[s]).

Please yes.

I think it comes down to the Jazz budget and how much they want to spend.

Maybe you should still to just reading....

I want Kevin Martin.

ColdBlue wrote:^ My thoughts are that as soon as you said this:

2. Resign/ extend Boozer, Millsap, Memo, Korver, Collins and Price to reasonable contracts.

Your post went down the rabbit hole into this place called 'Holy Toledo!'.

You took note of my reasoning behind utilizing the assets we already have, no?

awesomator wrote:Anyone who suggests that we should resign Collins and/or Price must be drunk. Collins is a total stiff and has no place in the NBA. Price can't even beat out Brevin Knight for PT. He is a nice spark off the bench but is NOT an NBA PG. Can't shoot, can't run the offense, can't play in the half court game. This is obviously a position of need but Price/Knight is not the answer.

Ty Lawson, Jeff Teague and Eric Maynor are all mid first round PG upgrades. Move up 3-5 spots to get one.

Of course Price is not the answer at PG, Hinrich is. Price would be what you said he is: a nice spark off the bench. Just what a team needs for minimum contracts. As far as Collins goes, do you have any suggestions of true centers which can be had for the veteran's minimum who will play position defense more effectively against Yao, Shaq, Bynum etc.? As a third or fourth option at 5, Collins ain't all bad.

awesomator wrote:

Gotta move Milsap to get what we need; I know Boozer plays no D, but we can't lose his O.)

Keep them both? AK is the one who has to go. It has to kill the team to know he is our highest paid player. He must be moved. If we have to sweeten we sweeten with Miles or Brewer or Goofus or Fes. All of whom would interest someone and none of whom are vital to our team. Or...

I really don't feel we can afford to keep two undersized power forwards while suffering at other positions. Underutilization of assets. Also, as you can see from my post, I agree we gotta move AK.

awesomator wrote:

3. Make trade(s) to acquire the talent we need to contend.

My personal favorite is Boozer and Brewer for Amare.

But you just said you wanted to keep both Booz and Milsap? If we could actually execute all of the aspects of my admittedly optimistic plan, then trade Booz & Brew for Amare, I wouldn't complain; but I think we would miss the impact Brew can have in a game.

slambamJazz wrote:I think it comes down to the Jazz budget and how much they want to spend.

Yeah, I would say it comes down to how much they want to spend vs. how much they want to win.

J_Ray wrote:Maybe you should still to just reading....

[/quote]

Thanks for the constructive criticism- insightful, articulate and funny, too! Maybe you can tell us with a straight face that you think the Jazz wouldn't be vastly improved if they could pull off all of the moves in my post... Or put forth the effort to submit your own ideas on what the Jazz could realistically do to improve this off-season?

Long time reader = Duiz fan.

If someone doesn't post for that long even though has been reading all that while, it can only mean they are intimidated by my crisp logical commentaries.

If you fear me, you love me.

I would love Wallace in our team. But have you checked if all trades are even possible?

kamazilla wrote:

ColdBlue wrote:^ My thoughts are that as soon as you said this:

2. Resign/ extend Boozer, Millsap, Memo, Korver, Collins and Price to reasonable contracts.

Your post went down the rabbit hole into this place called 'Holy Toledo!'.

You took note of my reasoning behind utilizing the assets we already have, no?

Being a new poster, I don't want to be too critical... but on the open market these guys are not going to be resigned with reasonable contracts. To go further, if we somehow do manage to resign these guys to reasonable contracts, it would only be in a sign and trade scenario... which is making your plan even more complex and so specific... it's almost pointless to propose it at this time... especially when it involves 3 team scenarios with 10 players seen once every 10 years.

Yeah it might be fun to entertain the idea... but only when we are all on shrooms.

Yeah- there was that whole "overly optimistic" disclaimer... but if at any time good players could be signed to reasonable contracts, it would be this year, right? And by reasonable, I mean fair market value. And Okur might not opt out, so the only s&t would be Millsap. Still an impossibly complicated deal, I know...

What I haven't seen anyone answer- would that not be a Jazz team which could truly contend? And from a value and need perspective, it doesn't seem outlandish to me from the other teams perspective. But of course, its hard not to be a homer...

Oh, and aren't your coms tracked in a massive government database when you type words like "shrooms"? uh- whoops.