nomansland wrote:Alatan wrote:nomansland wrote:Every time I read that "he traded Gobert and Mitchell" I want to throw coffee at my computer. So annoying and it ignores the context of those moves.
GM's build organizations. So if he hired good scouts and was part of the drafting process, yes he gets credit for that. The Nuggets are also good at player development. If some of those picks had gone to lesser organizations they might be playing in Israel right now. He also gets credit for that. In those areas I'd say he's among the best in the NBA.
He's not very adept when it comes to trades and salary negotiations though. The Gobert trade is an example of that. And Minnesota probably overpaid him, but that's what small market teams have to do sometimes.
The crazy thing is that they hired one of the best GM's when it comes to drafting and then traded a bunch of their draft picks, essentially playing away from his greatest strengths. Whatever though, I always liked Connelly and wish him well.
He didnt trade Gobert of Mitchell in the usual sense but the argument is very valid. He had the opportunity to pick Gobert and Mitchell for himself and passed it in favor of terrible selections. That proves he his talent evaluation is terrible and his draft successes are mostly luck.
In the 2014 draft he selected Jokic with the 41st pick while having TWO 1st round picks available. He literally passed on Jokic TWICE before selecting him with a throwaway pick. Was he so confident that Jokic would be there all the way in the mid 2nd round if he thought that he had the potential to be what he is today? Or was it just dumb luck? I call the later.
No, it isn't very valid, unless you're going to throw the same shade at the 11 other teams that passed on Mitchell and the other 27 teams that passed on Gobert.
Also remember that in the Mitchell situation, Denver already had Murray. They didn't need another SG and were trying to parlay that pick into OG and Lyles. Where TC screwed up was not just taking OG with the 13th pick. He got a little too cute and it backfired.
Utah took chances on those guys and it paid off for them. They get the credit, but the fact that TC didn't take those guys is not really that grave of an error.
The thing about Gobert is that we were coming off a 57 win season and lost arguably their best player in Gallo to injury heading into the playoffs. There was no way to know that Lawson was going to lose control of his drinking, Gallo's 1st surgery would be botched, and that Wilson Chandler was going to have his hip injury. That team was built for defense and fast breaks, Gobert would have been a terrible fit, maybe they missed that he would be a DPOY defender, but most of the rest of the NBA did as well, I guarantee they were shopping the pick as Connelly had just taken over the front office.
For Mitchell, we not only had Murray, we had pre-injury Harris, Malik Beasley who still had a ton of potential, Mudiay who there was some slight hope for, and were drafting Morris in the 2nd round. Mitchell may never have gotten a chance to show much with all that young talent, if Igoudala had come back like the front office was sure was a done deal.
