theBigLip wrote:Top 5 draft pick and $70M+ in cap space. I think your statement is just not accurate.
$70m in cap space in an era in which cap space is at its least useful. Could the Pistons turn that space into some draft assets? Probably, but the opportunities to do so for significant gain are not common. Free agents? There aren't many of significance, and the Pistons will be competing for them with teams that are much better positioned to succeed.
Top-five draft pick in what's looking like the weakest draft class since 2013.
I'm not expecting meaningful improvement unless it primarily comes from what's within the organization already.
I and many others have posted this consistently - this isn't a "bad free agent" year. Free agency has permanently changed. If you're talking about a bad free agent class you're not paying attention. What, you think no one is going to change teams this summer just because players are under contract? Please. There are some legit UFAs, but there will be a lot of trades.
This
is a bad free agent class. The fact that free agency is drastically less an avenue for meaningful team improvement than it was a decade ago doesn't mean that relativity has gone away.
Trades for useful rotation players generally require something of value to go in the other direction. What do the Pistons have of value that it would make sense to trade given where this team finds itself?
First of all, I posted that I'm very leery about taking on KATs contract. But how far have the Timberwolves ever been in the playoffs this last decade? If they get bumped again in the first round, are they really just going to run it back?
Run it back? Maybe, maybe not. Deliberately get significantly worse? I doubt it. Why would they?
And thank you for the informed opinion on the 2nd apron, which hasn't even taken effect yet. My opinion (apparently uniformed) is that 2nd apron is ok if you're winning championships. The Warriors paying huge luxury tax is a very recent example of that. But if you're getting bounced in the first round? It is not worth it and restricts the moves you can make.
Also, it may take a year for the punishment of the 2nd apron to be truly felt. So at this point we both just have opinions. [/b]
Teams spend a lot of money out of a desire to compete for championships.
Crymson wrote:Pelicans might not even make it through the play in (shame about Zion). I don't recall the Pelicans ever being big spenders. So keep Ingram and don't extend some of their great young players? Or are you predicting the Pelicans are just going to start spending into the luxury tax to maybe make it to the second round?
Trey Murphy is the only young Pelican of current significance who isn't on a long-term contract already. Murphy is certainly a strong three-and-D wing, but he's worthy of nowhere near a max salary at this point and won't be a free agent until 2025 anyway.
Even if the Pelicans' ownership isn't keen on spending into the tax, they can easily avoid it in the upcoming season without dumping one of the best players on the roster and getting worse in the short term for no reason.
This is all entirely aside from any considerations for the Pistons, namely the fact that they'd need to provide honest-to-goodness value in return to a team that wants to win now (which may not be realistically possible) and the questionable wisdom of doing so in exchange for a player who has only one season left on his contract, could easily leave 2025, just had his second-most-healthy season in the NBA with a whopping 64 games, hasn't had a genuinely healthy NBA season since he was a 19-year-old rookie, doesn't provide what the Pistons need on offense, and plays bad defense. I get that there are unlikely to be ideal options available, but there's not entirely ideal and then there's really not ideal.
Any suggestions of what to do, besides the overused and boring "Fire everyone. Trade everyone. Start from scratch."?
For what it's worth -- I'm noting this because you seem defensive -- you haven't really laid out what you think is viable. It's solely "We've got cap space and a top-five pick, and I want good players." Well, we all want good players. Unfortunately for the Pistons, so do all 29 other teams. They're all out for themselves, and they're unlikely to do anyone else any favors.
I'd imagine it's going to come down to acquiring the best available, which may not be much. I'd caution anyone to temper expectations and to hope that Gores doesn't make immediate improvement a directive to the new PoBO.