payitforward wrote:An offseason plan should begin with the idea of change. You couldn't ask for a better poster child for that fact than the Washington Wizards.
That's "change," not "we need to get better." Everyone needs to get better. The Wizards need to change, & change radically.
Beal has downgraded -- hoping he will "return to form" is not part of a plan. We all hope all good things happen, but that doesn't help them happen. It would be a difficult decision & move to trade him; if we do trade him, that will be a strong indicator that our FO is actually doing some planning.
Porzingis has helped no NBA team succeed at anything whatever in his 7-year career. It was still a great trade that acquired him -- b/c of what we got rid of. To view his acquisition in the light of a plan to improve, however, is inaccurate.
KCP is on the downward slope of his career. He has more value now than he'll have in a year. The only sensible conclusion is: get something for him now, while you can.
Kuzma is not a good NBA player. He's not awful, but he's not good -- really, he's not even quite average. Get the most for him that you can while you can. It's not even critical how much that is -- though of course the more you get the better. If Kuz is still on the team on opening day, that will be a strong indication that in fact there is no plan. Of any kind. Just muddle along.
Rui has done nothing in his 3 year career to establish himself as a valuable player overall, though he has improved radically in one skill -- perhaps that portends radical improvements this year in other skills. If so, great. But, of course, the odds are somewhat long -- as they would be on any player entering his 4th year in the league. The plan should be to see whether he improves, & unless he does -- a lot -- move him for whatever forward-looking asset(s) you can get. If he doesn't get substantially better, but all the same we don't cut his cable, that will be another indicator that there is no plan.
Deni, Gafford & Kispert have all shown enough that they should be penciled in to any plan.
If we can sign Gill cheaply for a couple-three years, that would be sensible. Might be reasonable to sign Bryant cheaply as well, with a team option for a 2d year, just to see whether he can return to form.
Ish is at the end of his career. He can't possibly be part of any plan. Carey & Todd have shown nothing or less than nothing. Put them on the floor for a while early in the season. If they don't perform, cut them -- eat their guaranteed salaries.
Sign the best FA we can afford at no matter what position. We don't need to improve "fit," we need talent; the younger that FA is the more he's worth to us (i.e. Shane Larkin, who's about to turn 30, is worth nothing to us).
My only disagreement here involves Porzingis.
Porzingis played much better in DC than he did in Dallas or New York. The problem is, he only did it for 19 games so I seriously doubt it has boosted his trade value much. Trading him now won't bring back value. But since he did play better for 19 games, there's a pretty good chance that the improvement is due to scheme and coaching here - which suggests that it might be sustainable going forward. The clear choice then is to keep him here and hope that he can sustain that good play for at least another half-season. At that point, he may well have boosted his trade value quite a bit. Then and only then should we consider trading him.
In other words, buy low and sell high. We did indeed buy low on Porzingis. And signs suggest his trajectory is upward. Let's give him a chance to boost his value before selling. And maybe, just maybe, he even proves that he is a keeper. Centers sometimes take a real long time to really figure out how to impact winning - particularly the really tall but not-so-mobile guys. I'm thinking of guys like Marc Gasol, Jonas Valanciunas and Brook Lopez. All 3 guys didn't really help their teams win until age 27.
We cannot supermax Beal.
