Shoe wrote:Fanciful thinking. Trading lottery picks to bulk up on late round selections is not a real strategy. An intelligent GM would rather have Paul George than James Anderson/Donatas Montiejunas....
Well, now you're just being silly. An intelligent GM would also rather have Paul George than Evan Turner, Wesley Johnson & Ekbe Udoh combined -- 3 of the top 6 picks actually in that same draft (which Anderson was but Motiejunas was not).
Not to mention that the same IGM would way rather have any of Hassan Whiteside, Nemanja Bjelica or Lance Stephenson (R2 picks that year, all of them) than oh... lets say Xavier Henry (#12) so that we don't pick on poor Evan Turner again.
Eric Bledsoe over a Cole Aldrich & Patrick Patterson combo?
Shoe wrote:...or CJ McCollum than Tony Snell/Bruno Cabocolo.
Why do you do this to yourself? Better McCollum than one of the following non-lottery picks that year? Better than Giannis Antetekounmpo? Better than Rudy Gobert? Better than Gorgui Dieng?
Shoe wrote:...To take those two #20's is a greater risk than choosing one of the top prospects.
The #1 pick in the draft has the highest likelihood of being successful. No surprise. The 3d pick in the draft has the 2d highest likelihood of being successful.
Uh-oh.... How did that happen? Shouldn't it be the 2d pick? But, it isn't. I'm not going to quote you studies; you want them, find them yourself -- they exist. & what does this show? It shows how quick the decay is in the ability of GMs to make accurate picks.
Still, the top 3 picks do have a higher likelihood of success than those picked below them. It is, however, not long thereafter that there ceases to be any meaningful correlation between pick position & player productivity.
Again, the work has been done, & if you're interested in something more deeply founded than your own opinion perhaps you'll take the trouble to find them. Or, tbh, you can just trust me, because I'm not lying: overall in the NBA, after the first 3 picks, correlation between productivity & pick position is extremely low, well below the usual tiers for statistically meaningful results.
For that reason, having 2 #20 picks is preferable to having 1 #10 pick, because you get two tries. 2 raffle tickets are better than 1 raffle ticket (please don't respond in a silly way by pointing to a really good #10 pick. If you think for one minute you'll understand how irrelevant that is to this discussion: there have been good & bad picks at every pick position, as goes w/o saying -- given it's close to random after #3).
Shoe wrote:...Will Barton and Khris Middleton are not as good as Beal, and definitely not as valuable...
No argument that they aren't as valuable. If by valuable you mean expensive to acquire. As to "good," it's a term I don't really like to use as it doesn't refer to anything specific, why don't we substitute "productive?" I.e. of numbers that help create wins (& of course negative numbers that help prevent wins). Numbers per 40 minutes of PT (all 3 of them were drafted the same year & have played a lot).
On their careers overall, both Middleton & Barton have been more productive than Beal. Look at the numbers yourself. Oh, & try if you possibly can to get a little deeper than "points per game."
Aside from overall career, the other fair way to judge might be to pick each guy's best year & compare those. Same result.
Now, in fairness, both KM & WB play some 3 in addition to playing 2, & 3's have a slight advantage over 2's in producing numbers -- they always have. So, it's fair to compensate a bit in Beal's favor. Even so, both those other guys are still ahead of him.
Thing is, even if they were slightly behind Brad, you'd prefer to have one of them instead of him. Why? B/c -- as someone wrote -- "to win in the current NBA you have to have really good FAs" (roughly what you wrote I think...?), & their salaries give you room under cap & tax to acquire those FAs. Brad's max salary is a big problem. Not as big a problem as John's upcoming super-max, but a problem all the same.
Shoe wrote:...Target multiple late round picks and you're gonna end up with Mitch McGary + P.J. Hairston or R.J. Hunter + Chris McCullough more often than not. Somehow you have hyped yourself up for late round picks even more than lottery picks.
Here's the thing, Shoe. you don't know what I'm "gonna end up with."
You don't know who I've said we should acquire in the draft (or free agency for that matter); you haven't been around enough.
So maybe you would wind up with those guys, but I would wind up with Taj Gibson & Patrick Beverley & danny green & Bledsoe/Whiteside/Stephenson & Jimmy Butler & Demarre Carroll & Jonas Jerebko & Cory Joseph & Moore/IT & Draymnd Green & Middleton & Barton & Kyle O'Quinn & Dieng & Roberson & Gobert &James Ennis & Clint Capela & Spencer Dinwiddie & Jerami Grant & Glenn Robinson & Nikola Jokic & Larry Nance & Kevon Looney & Montrezl Harrell & Josh Richardson & Pat Connaughton &... well, you get the picture.
Oh & that's while you target lets say the #1-2 & #4-6 picks & you wind up with Michael Beasley, Joe Alexander, Hasheem Thabeet, Evan Turner, Ekbe Udoh, Jonny Flynn, Brandon Jennings, Terrence Wiliams, Derrick Williams, Jan Vesely, Brandon Knight, Jimmer Fredette, both of the Morris twins, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Thomas Robinson, Terrence Ross, Austin Rivers, Dion Waiters, Anthony Bennett, Alex Len, Ben McLemore, Trey Burke, Andrew Wiggins, Jabari Parker, Dante Exum, Nik Stauskas, D'Angelo Russell, Jahlil Okafor, Mario Hezonja, Emmanuel Mudiay, some of whom fall to you through good luck b/c after all sometimes you are below #6 but still have a terrific high lottery pick, right? Enabling you to get a guy like Stanley Johnson for example. Right?
Shoe wrote:Also, the GM who consistently hits on late picks doesn't exist and will never exist.
True enough. Ditto the GM who consistently hits on any pick lower than #3 overall. As should be obvious from the above.
