Discussing Other Teams' Moves - Part 8

To be fair... They already had Booker and Ayton when their GM was appointed.
Their signings/extensions of Saric, Payne, Shamet, Paul, and Ayton were too high.
2020: They drafted Jalen Smith ahead of Vassell, Haliburton, Josh Green, and Maxey
2021: They traded their 2021 1st (Aldama, JRE, Herb Jones, etc. went in the next 10) for Shamet

They traded away all their prospects and most of their picks through the end of the decade.
They have $300M tied up to 4 guys over the next 2 years (2 of which are in their mid/late 30's).
Their bench is full of Vet Min players ~30.

To me, this is clearly a 1-2 year win now window. Then, they'll need to get creative, probably by moving Ayton for smaller pieces.

Kanyewest · Post #449 » by **Kanyewest** » Thu Feb 9, 2023 7:23 pm

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long suffrin' boulez fan · Post #450 » by **long suffrin' boulez fan** » Thu Feb 9, 2023 7:25 pm

Kanyewest wrote:

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JW2DC

TGW · Post #451 » by **TGW** » Thu Feb 9, 2023 7:55 pm

TGW wrote:The Warriors are trading for picks to use to try and get Annunoby. I don't think it's going to entice the Raptors.

Nevermind. It was for GPIII. Weird transactions.

9 and 20 · Post #452 » by **9 and 20** » Thu Feb 9, 2023 8:13 pm

pcbothwel wrote:
TGW wrote:A few years ago, the Suns were trash on par with the Wizards in talent. Now they are finals contenders.

That's how you GM.

To be fair... They already had Booker and Ayton when their GM was appointed.
Their signings/extensions of Saric, Payne, Shamet, Paul, and Ayton were too high.
2020: They drafted Jalen Smith ahead of Vassell, Haliburton, Josh Green, and Maxey
2021: They traded their 2021 1st (Aldama, JRE, Herb Jones, etc. went in the next 10) for Shamet

They traded away all their prospects and most of their picks through the end of the decade.
They have $300M tied up to 4 guys over the next 2 years (2 of which are in their mid/late 30's).
Their bench is full of Vet Min players ~30.

To me, this is clearly a 1-2 year win now window. Then, they'll need to get creative, probably by moving Ayton for smaller pieces.

At least they have a window. Wiz out here flailing with Johnny Davis and Kyle Kuzma.

Post #453 » by **Ruzious** » Thu Feb 9, 2023 10:49 pm

It's still mind-boggling to me that the Suns got Durant. Mikhail Bridges andCam Johnson are fine players, but to turn them into Durant... So Durant, Booker, Paul, Ayton, and anybody else... how do you defend them? Crowder would have been an ideal type of fit - too bad they had to trade him. Milwaukee's happy.

payitforward · Post #454 » by **payitforward** » Thu Feb 9, 2023 11:44 pm

gambitx777 wrote:Looks like Russ is gonna get a buy out? I would love to have him on a decent deal. He's played well enough this year to be an upgrade for us at starting PG. Get him back with Beal !

He'd be a significant downgrade at starting PG based on his year so far. That said, I put nothing past Russell Westbrook!

This year, however, though Russ is still getting rebounds & assists, turnovers & horrible shooting are his undoing.

payitforward · Post #455 » by **payitforward** » Thu Feb 9, 2023 11:48 pm

pcbothwel wrote:
TGW wrote:A few years ago, the Suns were trash on par with the Wizards in talent. Now they are finals contenders.

That's how you GM.

To be fair... They already had Booker and Ayton when their GM was appointed.
Their signings/extensions of Saric, Payne, Shamet, Paul, and Ayton were too high.
2020: They drafted Jalen Smith ahead of Vassell, Haliburton, Josh Green, and Maxey
2021: They traded their 2021 1st (Aldama, JRE, Herb Jones, etc. went in the next 10) for Shamet

They traded away all their prospects and most of their picks through the end of the decade.
They have $300M tied up to 4 guys over the next 2 years (2 of which are in their mid/late 30's).
Their bench is full of Vet Min players ~30.

To me, this is clearly a 1-2 year win now window. Then, they'll need to get creative, probably by moving Ayton for smaller pieces.

Agreed. They're all in for now, but the cliff is approaching fast.

payitforward · Post #456 » by **payitforward** » Fri Feb 10, 2023 12:00 am

this is definitely funny:

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payitforward · Post #457 » by **payitforward** » Fri Feb 10, 2023 12:43 am

The Nets had two guys who asked to be moved. Essentially demanded it.
They just plain didn't want to be there. & in one case would be able to leave at the end of the season.

Essentially, Brooklyn, back against the wall, was forced to trade them both. Yet, they got...

5 unprotected first-round picks
a 2028 R1 pick swap
2 second-round picks
Mikal Bridges,
Cameron Johnson,
Spencer Dinwiddie
Dorian Finney-Smith
Jae Crowder.

Somehow, I can't help but think that in retrospect this trade deadline is gonna look very good for Brooklyn.

AFM · Post #458 » by **AFM** » Fri Feb 10, 2023 1:00 am

It turns out, good players are valuable. (We wouldn't know)

FAH1223 · Post #459 » by **FAH1223** » Fri Feb 10, 2023 5:39 pm

THIS SOUNDS LIKE THE WIZARDS

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PORTLAND, Ore. — If you believed the Trail Blazers when they said they were committed to building a winner around franchise icon Damian Lillard, well, Thursday must have been one helluva gut punch.

On the edges of a Play-In berth, with their 32-year-old star having perhaps his best season ever, the Blazers at the NBA trade deadline did not go for it. They did not get better. They provided almost zero help to their star. Instead, they did what they always do — played around the margins of their roster while kicking the can down the road, with promises that this is all by design, all part of a greater plan at work. General manager Joe Cronin didn’t speak Thursday, but you can bet at Friday’s press briefing he will have some version of “just wait until the summer” when the Blazers can make their real push.

For those who have the stomach to rehash the faceplant over again, the Blazers this week traded away one of their best defenders and one of the league’s best rebounding small forwards in Josh Hart and traded away Gary Payton II, their prized free-agent signing from the summer and also one of their best defenders, and received the following: a guy whose coach hasn’t played him since Dec. 3 (Cam Reddish), a guy who averaged 14 minutes on one of the league’s worst teams (Kevin Knox) and a noted defender who couldn’t make the rotation of a championship-contending team because of his offensive limitations (Matisse Thybulle). There is also a 2023 first-round pick from the Knicks that will likely land in the high teens or low 20s and an end-of-the-bench guard in Ryan Arcidiacono.

It was such a buzzkill that coach Chauncey Billups couldn’t hide his disappointment on Thursday. This is a coach who has practically begged before and after every game for more size to be added to the roster. And this is a coach who has very bluntly said he needs more experience beyond his starters, saying he was coaching two teams — his starters and “the babies” — in reference to a rotation that has included two rookies (Shaedon Sharpe and Jabari Walker) and second-year forward Trendon Watford.

He got neither. Instead, he got two projects who have flamed out with multiple teams and one defensive specialist who will help with a glaring problem but will unlikely make any season-changing impact.

I asked Billups point blank if the Blazers got better with the trades, and one of the NBA’s most upbeat and eloquent coaches was flat and sounded hollow: “We’ll see. We’ll see. We’ll see,” he said.

Of greater concern is not what happened at this deadline. It’s what is happening to this once proud organization and the uncertainty that creates this summer with Jerami Grant. If you pay close attention to the players who have left Portland in the last year, there has been an unabashed excitement upon getting traded. Almost like a relief. Norman Powell and Robert Covington expressed their excitement when they arrived at the Clippers. Hart had an Instagram story of him singing after he was traded. Larry Nance Jr. this week celebrated the one-year anniversary of his and CJ McCollum’s trade to New Orleans by retweeting the team’s post marking the event. He tagged McCollum on his post, saying “Not a bad day, huh?”

A source, who was granted anonymity so that they could speak freely, says a reason Payton was traded was he indicated he didn’t want to be in Portland and was ecstatic to return to Golden State, an embarrassing development for Cronin’s first free-agent signing.

That leads to Grant, who told The Athletic earlier this month that he has been offered a four-year, $112 million extension by the Blazers. He said he will likely wait until after the season to make a decision on the offer, and in earlier conversations with The Athletic, he indicated that winning would be the top, or near the top, of his priorities when considering Portland. He has until June 30 to accept the offer, after which he becomes a free agent. If he decides to head to free agency, the Blazers will be able to offer him more years and more money than other teams, but a source close to Grant said the difference in money is not life-altering enough to sacrifice his desire to win.

So for all the talk about keeping Lillard happy (more on that in a bit) a larger dynamic was at work this week with the Blazers’ handling of the deadline: convincing Grant that this is a place where he can win. Unless Grant happens to be a draft geek and is jazzed about the five second-round picks Cronin managed to land from Golden State in exchange for Payton, it’s hard to see how he can trust this front office has the gumption and tools to be considered seriously.

Which brings us to Lillard, who has spent much of the past three years saying the franchise hasn’t taken the necessary steps to build a winner. He said he wanted the organization to want it as badly as he did, and as much as he will never admit it publicly, he was all in favor of having someone else other than Neil Olshey in the office of general manger.

Now? Well, he has a new maximum contract extension, has the ear of Cronin and has distanced himself from bold statements about winning now. On Thursday, the team did not make him available to the media, instead bringing out Anfernee Simons. Later, while Billups was addressing the media, Lillard emerged from the training area across the court and did a playful little dance. So if he was upset at Thursday’s moves or lack thereof, he certainly didn’t show it in that moment.

Of all his talents, perhaps Lillard’s greatest is his belief, and the ability to will his team to victory. And even in his most frustrated moments at the trade deadlines during the Olshey era, he was always a good soldier and said the right thing and played the right way. And if there is a positive, it’s that Lillard has shown his window of being an elite player is not dramatically closing. In fact, as Billups pointed out earlier this week, Lillard this season has shown he is still “very, very much in his prime” … which has eased the urgency on Cronin taking, and connecting, on a big swing.

Still, Billups and Cronin have steadfastly said this would not be a season like last spring, when the team played to lose to enhance their lottery chances. The actions on Thursday said that is exactly the path they are taking, especially considering how drastically the teams around them improved. The Suns, the Lakers, the Clippers, the Mavericks, the Timberwolves all made major moves. The Blazers took on two projects and a specialist and suddenly the tone went from go-for-it to developing.

It made for an awkward media session with Billups, who labored through questions, trying to hide his disappointment. He even went as far as to justify the Blazers’ empty showing to the surprising nature of the Suns’ blockbuster deal to acquire Kevin Durant.

“That threw everybody off a little bit … well, surprised everybody at least,” Billups said before changing his tone to a defense of Cronin. “That’s a really, really hard job, sitting at that table that Joe is sitting at. But I know all of us really trust and believe in Joe, in what he has done thus far in his short amount of time. And I trust and believe in the moves he is making now, in a major way.”

The Blazers (27-28) will now embark on the final 27 games of their season ostensibly in pursuit of a playoff spot, even though they would benefit from not making the playoffs. If they miss the playoffs, they keep their own first-round pick and will have New York’s pick, providing the Knicks don’t collapse and miss the playoffs. If Portland makes the playoffs, it loses its first-round pick to Chicago as part of the three-team deal in 2021 with Cleveland and Chicago that netted Nance. Portland will likely run out a starting lineup of Lillard, Simons, Nassir Little, Grant and Jusuf Nurkić with a bench that includes Thybulle, Reddish, Drew Eubanks and Sharpe.

“With the new players, you just have to see,” Billups said. “But I know I’m very happy we got our best players intact. So, yeah. We’ll just have to see. There’s a lot of promise from some of the young guys we will be having.”

Dat2U · Post #460 » by **Dat2U** » Fri Feb 10, 2023 5:48 pm

Frichuela wrote:Pity...I thought Bones was a risk worth taking...

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Yes for a rebuilding team as he's still finding a comfort zone between being a PG and a high volume scorer. His defense is also atrocious. If he came in either Morris or Wright would have had to go and I'm sure Shepp saw that as a downgrade in the moment.