WaltFrazier wrote:YogurtProducer wrote:Duffman100 wrote:
That concoction of the team really failed because of the consistent lack of a bench. The starters were actually pretty good.
Even with a bench, they weren't going to win a title. But we would have had another 50(ish) win team on our hands to build off of. Losing the assets of the title and missing on all the fringe pickups really hampered our ability to build that bench.
Yeah for two years there I can remember thinking "it would be nice just once if our bench stole us a game". We got so accustomed for a half decade of our bench winning us games that when we went to the other polar extreme it was a culture shock
I think/hope that is where we are going again. Get 10 guys on the team who can all play to push each other and win games with multiple combinations. Then consolidate trade when it is time.
Our top end talent is worse now, but we conceivably have 9 or so guys right now (plus 3 possible picks this year) that I am comfortable seeing on the floor. It was tough with Svi and Hernangomez and Birch being our like 7th/8th men for two years
Re last paragraph, are there really 9 solid players now? I keep reading other posters say half the guys playing now won't be back.
What do you mean by right now? As in in our current state of tanking? If so yeah, I expect most of them to be gone. I am talking JFL, Carton, Boucher, Ramsey, McDaniels, etc.
But I think we do have 9/10 guys you can conceivably being guys who can talk yourself into being able to play (some) minutes on good teams: IQ, GTJ, Dick, Brown, Barrett, Agbaji, Barnes, Porter, Olynyk, Poeltl.
If we keep our pick and even get one rotational guy from IND/DET picks then we are looking at a 10-12 man roster you can build something with. Brown is likely traded, and I would bet only one of Agbaji/Porter actually become dependable bench guys but that is a huge step up from say 2021-22 when we last made the playoffs where after our starters (FVV/GTJ/Barnes/OG/SIama) our bench was Precious, Boucher, Thad, and Birch.