2023-24 Season Discussion and Speculation 5 - the calm before the storm

[NapoleonII]

Point Book + Mikal/Cam/Ayton is not a better team than current one. You still need at least a Rubio level PG to be top 4 team in WC. Once again, Haliburton would've been perfect. Biggest Jones blunder IMO.

No, it's not a better team now, but like Redick said on his pod, you need stars and role players, not just stars. But we likely are a better team 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 years from now with a lot of cheap rookie contracts with a pretty nice young core.

Though even without the KD trade, I still would have made that no brainer CP3 and Shamet for Beal trade, Jae for Grayson Allen and Ayton for the best we could get...or the same Ayton deal and the 5 2nds for Jae.

I think Beal/Book/Bridges/Cam/Nurkic + Allen as 6th man, keep Payne, still get Royce O'Neale when available, etc would be good. Beal definitely could be secondary scorer and Bridges a solid 3rd guy that is highly valued around the league.

But yeah, we are probably better this year....and maybe next if KD stays healthy again.

in today's league, virtually nobody builds a team considering 5+ years from now, unless you are playing the forever tank game like Philly and OKC, and that doesn't always work. Even Houston wanted to accelerate their rebuild by bringing in FVV and Udoka.

And a Beal/Book/Bridge/Cam/Nurk lineup is most definitely not doing better than what we have. upside is much lower, and assuming Beal and Book would have been injured at the start of the season, there would have been no KD to carry us. Did we already forget how many games he singlehandedly kept us in when it was just him out there? Bridges and Cam weren't doing that, or are there people who still think Mikal is a legit 1st or even 2nd option on a good team?

This.

I also think KD is going to age pretty damn well, especially since he didn't gain a lot of mileage in between his GS days and Brooklyn, coming back from injury, etc.

With how perimeter oriented his game is (and the league has become), he's going to be an effective engine of any offense until he's 38/39. With his length, he'll be able to defend 4/5's pretty damn easily, whichever is the weaker one.

I can't believe some of y'all would rather roll with Bridges and Cam and future picks going into these playoffs with a behemoth like Denver (who we match up well against, and CAN beat IMO), old-ass GSW and Lakers, a dangerous Dallas, and young-ins like Minny and OKC.

You get KD 98/100 times and sleep well.

[schnakenpopanz]

Overpaying was the issue. Nets did not have the upper hand, but the Suns acted crazy

[SunsRback4Good]

Overpaying was the issue. Nets did not have the upper hand, but Matt Ishbia acted crazy

[flagstaff]

No, it's not a better team now, but like Redick said on his pod, you need stars and role players, not just stars. But we likely are a better team 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 years from now with a lot of cheap rookie contracts with a pretty nice young core.

Though even without the KD trade, I still would have made that no brainer CP3 and Shamet for Beal trade, Jae for Grayson Allen and Ayton for the best we could get...or the same Ayton deal and the 5 2nds for Jae.

I think Beal/Book/Bridges/Cam/Nurkic + Allen as 6th man, keep Payne, still get Royce O'Neale when available, etc would be good. Beal definitely could be secondary scorer and Bridges a solid 3rd guy that is highly valued around the league.

But yeah, we are probably better this year....and maybe next if KD stays healthy again.

in today's league, virtually nobody builds a team considering 5+ years from now, unless you are playing the forever tank game like Philly and OKC, and that doesn't always work. Even Houston wanted to accelerate their rebuild by bringing in FVV and Udoka.

And a Beal/Book/Bridge/Cam/Nurk lineup is most definitely not doing better than what we have. upside is much lower, and assuming Beal and Book would have been injured at the start of the season, there would have been no KD to carry us. Did we already forget how many games he singlehandedly kept us in when it was just him out there? Bridges and Cam weren't doing that, or are there people who still think Mikal is a legit 1st or even 2nd option on a good team?

This.

I also think KD is going to age pretty damn well, especially since he didn't gain a lot of mileage in between his GS days and Brooklyn, coming back from injury, etc.

With how perimeter oriented his game is (and the league has become), he's going to be an effective engine of any offense until he's 38/39. With his length, he'll be able to defend 4/5's pretty damn easily, whichever is the weaker one.

I can't believe some of y'all would rather roll with Bridges and Cam and future picks going into these playoffs with a behemoth like Denver (who we match up well against, and CAN beat IMO), old-ass GSW and Lakers, a dangerous Dallas, and young-ins like Minny and OKC.

You get KD 98/100 times and sleep well.

I agree, I just read in a link above the Nets will be looking at building around Bridges. He is a good player for them, but not someone you build around. Give me KD minus the picks also.

[ImNotMcDiSwear]

The good thing is, we are playing very well now, so if we can win a ring, it will have been worth it, and we can go for it again next year. It just may be real tough after that to not be in no man's land unless they trade Book which I'm not sure they will ever be willing to do unless he asks for it.

I think KD and Booker's futures are intertwined: either both stay, or both go. If KD's got a better option elsewhere, I'm sure he'd discuss it with Book before making any kind of request, and Book. I think the Suns would choose to work on a trade together rather than make Booker waste his prime trying to rebuild without draft picks. Basically, I think any KD trade would remove us from the championship conversation immediately, and Booker would want out.

... Are we playing well? I've just been smiling at the box scores. Haven't had a chance to really watch. Maybe you and I are finally in agreement at least that Booker is not suited to PG?

[bwgood77]

Point Book + Mikal/Cam/Ayton is not a better team than current one. You still need at least a Rubio level PG to be top 4 team in WC. Once again, Haliburton would've been perfect. Biggest Jones blunder IMO.

No, it's not a better team now, but like Redick said on his pod, you need stars and role players, not just stars. But we likely are a better team 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 years from now with a lot of cheap rookie contracts with a pretty nice young core.

Though even without the KD trade, I still would have made that no brainer CP3 and Shamet for Beal trade, Jae for Grayson Allen and Ayton for the best we could get...or the same Ayton deal and the 5 2nds for Jae.

I think Beal/Book/Bridges/Cam/Nurkic + Allen as 6th man, keep Payne, still get Royce O'Neale when available, etc would be good. Beal definitely could be secondary scorer and Bridges a solid 3rd guy that is highly valued around the league.

But yeah, we are probably better this year....and maybe next if KD stays healthy again.

in today's league, virtually nobody builds a team considering 5+ years from now, unless you are playing the forever tank game like Philly and OKC, and that doesn't always work. Even Houston wanted to accelerate their rebuild by bringing in FVV and Udoka.

And a Beal/Book/Bridge/Cam/Nurk lineup is most definitely not doing better than what we have. upside is much lower, and assuming Beal and Book would have been injured at the start of the season, there would have been no KD to carry us. Did we already forget how many games he singlehandedly kept us in when it was just him out there? Bridges and Cam weren't doing that, or are there people who still think Mikal is a legit 1st or even 2nd option on a good team?

What? A bunch of teams build for 5+ years out. Just in the last year or so, you had the Spurs trade Murrray for 3 first rounders. Houston, after competing for a number of years, rebuilt with 3-4 young players in Green, Jabari Smith, Sengun, etc....that started 3-4 years ago. Then yes, they wanted to add a couple of vets. Utah just traded Gobert for 5 firsts and then Mitchell for Markkanen, Sexton, etc. The Pelicans traded AD for a ton of picks, a very young Ingram, Ball, etc, and then had a few high picks for Zion, Jones, etc. The Raptors are doing it now. Of course OKC did it trading Westbrook and then George for a ton of picks, then Paul, Horford, etc. In 2021, the Magic, after a couple years in the playoffs, traded Aaron Gordon, Vucevic, Fournier, Payton, etc, for picks and young players to get high draft picks for a few years. The Pacers did it trading Sabonis for a young player (of course they may not have expected him to become a top 10 player, especially so quickly), Buddy Hield, Brogdon, LeVert and Craig to us to get a top 10 pick to get young players like Toppin, Mathurin, Jalen Smith...they also were trying to trade Myles Turner for awhile. They did a fast rebuild considering how good Haliburton is and keeping Turner, but Haliburton, Toppin, Mathurin, etc, are guys they will certainly have 5+ years out. The Grizzlies did it getting rid of Gasol 4-5 years back along with Conley, then later to build around JJJ and get a high pick in Morant and then Bane, etc, to build for 5+ years out.

Any time you are going to a COMPLETE rebuild and going for even 1 or 2 really high picks, even if only for 2-3 years and hope you start getting better then, because those teams that traded stars typically have other teams' picks and maybe for 5-7 years, like the Pelicans, Thunder, Utah, SA, etc, did, that is building for 5+ years out, because you will have the rights to those players for 8-9 years. Just because they try to add vets 3 years into it to add a vet or two after 3 high picks to be your future, doesn't mean you are not trying to build for 5+ years out...those rookies you got typically don't hit their peak for 5-8 years when they get into their 2nd contract. Most non huge market good teams have to do it unless they are superb at drafting like the Nuggets.

[bwgood77]

No, it's not a better team now, but like Redick said on his pod, you need stars and role players, not just stars. But we likely are a better team 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 years from now with a lot of cheap rookie contracts with a pretty nice young core.

Though even without the KD trade, I still would have made that no brainer CP3 and Shamet for Beal trade, Jae for Grayson Allen and Ayton for the best we could get...or the same Ayton deal and the 5 2nds for Jae.

I think Beal/Book/Bridges/Cam/Nurkic + Allen as 6th man, keep Payne, still get Royce O'Neale when available, etc would be good. Beal definitely could be secondary scorer and Bridges a solid 3rd guy that is highly valued around the league.

But yeah, we are probably better this year....and maybe next if KD stays healthy again.

in today's league, virtually nobody builds a team considering 5+ years from now, unless you are playing the forever tank game like Philly and OKC, and that doesn't always work. Even Houston wanted to accelerate their rebuild by bringing in FVV and Udoka.

And a Beal/Book/Bridge/Cam/Nurk lineup is most definitely not doing better than what we have. upside is much lower, and assuming Beal and Book would have been injured at the start of the season, there would have been no KD to carry us. Did we already forget how many games he singlehandedly kept us in when it was just him out there? Bridges and Cam weren't doing that, or are there people who still think Mikal is a legit 1st or even 2nd option on a good team?

This.

I also think KD is going to age pretty damn well, especially since he didn't gain a lot of mileage in between his GS days and Brooklyn, coming back from injury, etc.

With how perimeter oriented his game is (and the league has become), he's going to be an effective engine of any offense until he's 38/39. With his length, he'll be able to defend 4/5's pretty damn easily, whichever is the weaker one.

I can't believe some of y'all would rather roll with Bridges and Cam and future picks going into these playoffs with a behemoth like Denver (who we match up well against, and CAN beat IMO), old-ass GSW and Lakers, a dangerous Dallas, and young-ins like Minny and OKC.

You get KD 98/100 times and sleep well.

Again, it's not mainly rolling into these playoffs but the future, especially given KD's injury history. Luckily he's been healthy this first year and also lucky we were very lucky to get Beal for Paul's corpse and Shamet...no one expected us to get a deal like that. But I think everyone, when we made those deals expected us to be a lot better than we have been this year, instead of fighting to avoid the play in...especially if they knew KD would be healthy the whole year. Luckily we seem to be hitting our stride now. I know it's only been a few wins in a row, two against teams missing all stars, right after losing to OKC without Shai and SA. Then the Denver win without Murray, but we are at least winning these last 3 pretty decisively. I just hope we don't do our usual and just when you start to believe, we look like crap again, but I do feel different now. Do I see us getting better next year and the year after that relative to most teams in the west, even if KD can play until 38? No...and I did expect us to be a lot better this year..I think everyone did.

[bwgood77]

The good thing is, we are playing very well now, so if we can win a ring, it will have been worth it, and we can go for it again next year. It just may be real tough after that to not be in no man's land unless they trade Book which I'm not sure they will ever be willing to do unless he asks for it.

I think KD and Booker's futures are intertwined: either both stay, or both go. If KD's got a better option elsewhere, I'm sure he'd discuss it with Book before making any kind of request, and Book. I think the Suns would choose to work on a trade together rather than make Booker waste his prime trying to rebuild without draft picks. Basically, I think any KD trade would remove us from the championship conversation immediately, and Booker would want out.

... Are we playing well? I've just been smiling at the box scores. Haven't had a chance to really watch. Maybe you and I are finally in agreement at least that Booker is not suited to PG?

No, I do think Book can play PG...he has progressed into more of that Harden type player if need be. Everyone thinks of how great he was with Paul as PG, but there are not many Paul's. If we had some superstar guard like Haliburton or a couple others, fine, but I think Book and Beal work well as combo guards. Turnovers are kind of an issue, but that is more KD. Book and Beal average like 2.5 which is a lot lower than a lot of heavy ball handlers like Harden, Luka, etc.

[lilfishi22]

Basically, if we end up trading him after a first or second round exit, I don't think whatever return we get will have been better than what we gave up, and we would have been out the 23 pick in the process which is a guy who could already be a key piece.

From your responses, it seems to me that this is the essence of your view on the KD trade - that we can't get back the value we gave up for him. Obviously - for sure. I think we can get the picks back - maybe even a little more - but we're not getting young talent like Mikal and Cam. If we did, we wouldn't get as much (or any) value in picks. For sure, we spent assets to get where we are.

I essentially agree with you also on the idea that by not making the KD trade, we'd have had more time to try to build a contender. I don't necessarily disagree - I just didn't have any faith that that approach would work. Booker's good, but he's not Doncic, and I couldn't see us getting another player as good as CP3 was for us his first two seasons. All those draft picks would have been in the teens, I think. Our salary situation would have been just as unsustainable as it is currently. None of DA/Cam/Mikal were ever going to be good enough to be a "second star." So the only way they would ever be a real contender, it seemed to me, was to draft a superstar with a relatively low pick in 2024, 2025, and so on. Meanwhile, player's contracts come up for extension... it just seemed like a longer road to nowhere. NBA purgatory. I'm not pining for that.

I pine for the days when we had high draft picks on the horizon for days to come, and Devin Booker on his rookie contract, just waiting to bust out. With a front office as good as OKC's, we'd have been stacked no matter which draft we finally nailed. The lotto picks we missed on is too dang impressive a list: Sabonis, Jamal Murray, Fox, Lauri, Donovan Mitchell, Adebayo, Doncic, Shai, Trae Young and Hallburton were all available and projected within the range of our selections.

But you know, I was against trading DA for Sabonis when the deal was being discussed. So it's not like everything's always so obvious. I get that. But I just couldn't see us getting a guy as good as one of those listed above without sacrificing our core. KD's better than all but two guys on that list. So as I saw it, a move like that was inevitable. You simply can't turn back the clock.

... But you can turn the clock forward. By burning it all down.

We'll see whether this postseason gives us enough reason to believe this roster is worth investing another $300 million or whatever it would cost to make this team better next season. One thing we agree on is how large we should project KD's trade value to go down if we do that.

Booker to Brooklyn and KD to (presumably) the Knicks is the only thing that makes to me if we want to try to get back to the world of endless high picks on the horizon. Had we dealt Booker, Mikal and Cam instead - we'd probably have a few more high picks in our stash than would result from taking the route I'm advocating, I guess. But the situation wouldn't be very different - unless Brooklyn won't give us all our picks back, in which case - yeah, I guess it'd be pretty tough.

Fantastic post

[Slim Charless]

Basically, if we end up trading him after a first or second round exit, I don't think whatever return we get will have been better than what we gave up, and we would have been out the 23 pick in the process which is a guy who could already be a key piece.

From your responses, it seems to me that this is the essence of your view on the KD trade - that we can't get back the value we gave up for him. Obviously - for sure. I think we can get the picks back - maybe even a little more - but we're not getting young talent like Mikal and Cam. If we did, we wouldn't get as much (or any) value in picks. For sure, we spent assets to get where we are.

I essentially agree with you also on the idea that by not making the KD trade, we'd have had more time to try to build a contender. I don't necessarily disagree - I just didn't have any faith that that approach would work. Booker's good, but he's not Doncic, and I couldn't see us getting another player as good as CP3 was for us his first two seasons. All those draft picks would have been in the teens, I think. Our salary situation would have been just as unsustainable as it is currently. None of DA/Cam/Mikal were ever going to be good enough to be a "second star." So the only way they would ever be a real contender, it seemed to me, was to draft a superstar with a relatively low pick in 2024, 2025, and so on. Meanwhile, player's contracts come up for extension... it just seemed like a longer road to nowhere. NBA purgatory. I'm not pining for that.

I pine for the days when we had high draft picks on the horizon for days to come, and Devin Booker on his rookie contract, just waiting to bust out. With a front office as good as OKC's, we'd have been stacked no matter which draft we finally nailed. The lotto picks we missed on is too dang impressive a list: Sabonis, Jamal Murray, Fox, Lauri, Donovan Mitchell, Adebayo, Doncic, Shai, Trae Young and Hallburton were all available and projected within the range of our selections.

But you know, I was against trading DA for Sabonis when the deal was being discussed. So it's not like everything's always so obvious. I get that. But I just couldn't see us getting a guy as good as one of those listed above without sacrificing our core. KD's better than all but two guys on that list. So as I saw it, a move like that was inevitable. You simply can't turn back the clock.

... But you can turn the clock forward. By burning it all down.

We'll see whether this postseason gives us enough reason to believe this roster is worth investing another $300 million or whatever it would cost to make this team better next season. One thing we agree on is how large we should project KD's trade value to go down if we do that.

Booker to Brooklyn and KD to (presumably) the Knicks is the only thing that makes to me if we want to try to get back to the world of endless high picks on the horizon. Had we dealt Booker, Mikal and Cam instead - we'd probably have a few more high picks in our stash than would result from taking the route I'm advocating, I guess. But the situation wouldn't be very different - unless Brooklyn won't give us all our picks back, in which case - yeah, I guess it'd be pretty tough.

Fantastic post

Booker for our picks back is a slap in the face and a terrible idea. But what laughable is the fact that someone thinks the Nets would say no to this trade.

What a joke.

They'll jump at that opportunity and again we shouldn't give it to them. We lose 1 game-after a 4 game win streak and posters in here are acting like scared little girls. If we lose in the 1st cpl rounds then we trade KD and we'll be fine.

Booker should not be traded for anything less than a massive haul.

[Stix]

Not going to get anywhere with Beal as first option. (ex: Washington Wizards 2012-2023)

[bwgood77]

Book sure is streaky from 3 lately.

He has always been streaky from 3. Like 3 really good games, 4 or 5 pretty bad ones with maybe one good or decent game among the bad ones. His highest 3pt% is like 38.3% for a season but is career always stays around 35-36%...and he's right there again.

Whereas guys you wouldn't think would be as good at them are great. Like Kawhi, the last 3 years is at 40%, 41.6% and 41.7% this year. He is also at 57% from 2. These are insane #s. Even Booker, the midrange master, is having his best season from 2 this year at 55.5%. Chris Paul, our other mid range master from the last few years, had his best year of his career 2 years ago at 55.9%. KD is at 57% from 2. Last year he was around 60% but is usually around 56-57%. KD is 41.8% from 3, .1% better than Kawhi. The last two years Kawhi was better.

Beal is actually also close from 3 this year at 41%.

This is how impressive Kawhi is as a shooter....which you don't really think of him as first. Few people would probably guess he is better from 2 and 3 than those 3 guys.

And he usually steps up and is better and more clutch in the playoffs.

[bwgood77]

Not going to get anywhere with Beal as first option. (ex: Washington Wizards 2012-2023)

Not that this deserves a response, but Beal isn't the #1 option. Also, even if he was, the Wizards didn't have any players close to the caliber of KD and Book with them which you obviously know.

And was a strange post after a game where Beal shot 7/8 from 3, basically better than Booker ever has in his career, and had an 87% TS%, better than any game Book had in his career. I mean Book has had a ton of awesome games, higher scoring, and did go 8-16 the other day.

If you are pointing to this game as an example, there are a few reasons we lost. Everyone else was cold from 3. Even if Booker, KD and Beal shoot well from 3, we typically need at least one role player (Gordon, Allen, Royce or even Bol to also shoot well from 3), and the Pelicans went on fire from 3 after their cold start. Then also Zion went nuts with all his blocks and his all around great #s.

It obviously has nothing to do with Beal being the #1 option. We actually need to have him be more aggressive like this more often.

This is an obvious troll post once again (which you have been warned about), especially given the game he just had.

[lilfishi22]

From your responses, it seems to me that this is the essence of your view on the KD trade - that we can't get back the value we gave up for him. Obviously - for sure. I think we can get the picks back - maybe even a little more - but we're not getting young talent like Mikal and Cam. If we did, we wouldn't get as much (or any) value in picks. For sure, we spent assets to get where we are.

I essentially agree with you also on the idea that by not making the KD trade, we'd have had more time to try to build a contender. I don't necessarily disagree - I just didn't have any faith that that approach would work. Booker's good, but he's not Doncic, and I couldn't see us getting another player as good as CP3 was for us his first two seasons. All those draft picks would have been in the teens, I think. Our salary situation would have been just as unsustainable as it is currently. None of DA/Cam/Mikal were ever going to be good enough to be a "second star." So the only way they would ever be a real contender, it seemed to me, was to draft a superstar with a relatively low pick in 2024, 2025, and so on. Meanwhile, player's contracts come up for extension... it just seemed like a longer road to nowhere. NBA purgatory. I'm not pining for that.

I pine for the days when we had high draft picks on the horizon for days to come, and Devin Booker on his rookie contract, just waiting to bust out. With a front office as good as OKC's, we'd have been stacked no matter which draft we finally nailed. The lotto picks we missed on is too dang impressive a list: Sabonis, Jamal Murray, Fox, Lauri, Donovan Mitchell, Adebayo, Doncic, Shai, Trae Young and Hallburton were all available and projected within the range of our selections.

But you know, I was against trading DA for Sabonis when the deal was being discussed. So it's not like everything's always so obvious. I get that. But I just couldn't see us getting a guy as good as one of those listed above without sacrificing our core. KD's better than all but two guys on that list. So as I saw it, a move like that was inevitable. You simply can't turn back the clock.

... But you can turn the clock forward. By burning it all down.

We'll see whether this postseason gives us enough reason to believe this roster is worth investing another $300 million or whatever it would cost to make this team better next season. One thing we agree on is how large we should project KD's trade value to go down if we do that.

Booker to Brooklyn and KD to (presumably) the Knicks is the only thing that makes to me if we want to try to get back to the world of endless high picks on the horizon. Had we dealt Booker, Mikal and Cam instead - we'd probably have a few more high picks in our stash than would result from taking the route I'm advocating, I guess. But the situation wouldn't be very different - unless Brooklyn won't give us all our picks back, in which case - yeah, I guess it'd be pretty tough.

Fantastic post

Booker for our picks back is a slap in the face and a terrible idea. But what laughable is the fact that someone thinks the Nets would say no to this trade.

What a joke.

They'll jump at that opportunity and again we shouldn't give it to them. We lose 1 game-after a 4 game win streak and posters in here are acting like scared little girls. If we lose in the 1st cpl rounds then we trade KD and we'll be fine.

Booker should not be traded for anything less than a massive haul.

Booker for picks is the path of tearing this whole thing down, if we decide to go down that path. Not advocating for it and I don't believe ImNotMcDiSwear is either but if the team/Ish decides to pull the plug (ie rebuild, not a reset) than yes, you trade away your valued assets for future assets. It happens in the NBA, semi-regularly. Off the top of my head, we saw Portland do it just last offseason.

[Slim Charless]

Fantastic post

Booker for our picks back is a slap in the face and a terrible idea. But what laughable is the fact that someone thinks the Nets would say no to this trade.

What a joke.

They'll jump at that opportunity and again we shouldn't give it to them. We lose 1 game-after a 4 game win streak and posters in here are acting like scared little girls. If we lose in the 1st cpl rounds then we trade KD and we'll be fine.

Booker should not be traded for anything less than a massive haul.

Booker for picks is the path of tearing this whole thing down, if we decide to go down that path. Not advocating for it and I don't believe ImNotMcDiSwear is either but if the team/Ish decides to pull the plug (ie rebuild, not a reset) than yes, you trade away your valued assets for future assets. It happens in the NBA, semi-regularly. Off the top of my head, we saw Portland do it just last offseason.

I sound like a broken record here...but again Durant just got finished with debatabley his best season since the OKC years. We will get a good return for him as long as JJ hasn't lost his mind.

I doubt Ish will intercede to take the 1st offer if it comes down to us trading him. We'll get more than enough to continue on with Booker and Beal.

[Frank Lee]

Wishbea would be confirmed as a complete idiot, (rather than a perceived one) if he blew this squad up next yr…

[Frank Lee]

And we’d be ‘continuing’ mediocrity with Book and Beal as our 1 and 2.

[lilfishi22]

Booker for our picks back is a slap in the face and a terrible idea. But what laughable is the fact that someone thinks the Nets would say no to this trade.

What a joke.

They'll jump at that opportunity and again we shouldn't give it to them. We lose 1 game-after a 4 game win streak and posters in here are acting like scared little girls. If we lose in the 1st cpl rounds then we trade KD and we'll be fine.

Booker should not be traded for anything less than a massive haul.

Booker for picks is the path of tearing this whole thing down, if we decide to go down that path. Not advocating for it and I don't believe ImNotMcDiSwear is either but if the team/Ish decides to pull the plug (ie rebuild, not a reset) than yes, you trade away your valued assets for future assets. It happens in the NBA, semi-regularly. Off the top of my head, we saw Portland do it just last offseason.

I sound like a broken record here...but again Durant just got finished with debatabley his best season since the OKC years. We will get a good return for him as long as JJ hasn't lost his mind.

I doubt Ish will intercede to take the 1st offer if it comes down to us trading him. We'll get more than enough to continue on with Booker and Beal.

I don't think we're tearing it down either. I just agree with ImNotMcDiSwear that not making the KD trade doesn't mean we're in some magically better place nor that we would necessarily get back equal assets back for what we gave up for KD. However, I don't agree we're going down a burn it all down path. I've said it before, I don't believe Ish is in it purely for the short term.

[Slim Charless]

And we’d be ‘continuing’ mediocrity with Book and Beal as our 1 and 2.

No. We wouldn't.

You're not considering our take from a Durant trade Frank, we'll get a haul.

I think OKC is the team but let's use BW's idea of the Knicks. You don't think having Randle to help score down low-while being a decent passer too will help? Add into the equation someone like Josh Hart who is a gritty dirty work guy(averaging over 8 boards a game at 6'4!!!)....someone who can fill in the gaps here? Plus we can even sell high on Nurk for more picks-which FTR the record we should. That allows us to get Mitchell Robinson off of them as well as multiple picks.

So then you'd have:

Booker
Beal
Hart
Randle
Mitchell

Plus the picks we get from our Nurk trade and the ones NYC sends over. That'd be a good team that fits together well and we have picks to use and to live if need be.

I know ur "thing" is to be negative lol. It has been more or less since we traded Rubio. I assume even you can see the potential with that team.

Spoiler:

My OKC plan is better than BW's thing, but I've mentioned that enough already

[Saberestar]

The roster is set for the playoffs:

Beal/Gordon/Isaiah
Book/Okogie/Damion
Allen/O'Neale/Roddy
KD/Bol/Little
Nurkic/Eubanks/Thad