Pulse check: Tank

[LoveMyRaps]

If you want to make an omelet, you need to break a few eggs.

Look, the reality is we're already out of any race other than this. And we're winning this one, so.

[Harcore Fenton Mun]

If you want to make an omelet, you need to break a few eggs.

Look, the reality is we're already out of any race other than this. And we're winning this one, so.

*Omelette
ty.

[isyed]

Love it so far. Almost each game is close. Our floor setting players getting better. Would love if we could lock in Mitchell and Agbaji to bae and mle type 4 year of 5 year deals. Great 5th, 6th or 7th options.

Dick getting better and improving.

Expirings like Boucher playing really well.

We need to loose Atleast a few more before Scottie and iq get back. Once they do we will be top good to loose. Hopefully Bruce brown comes back soon and improves his value.

Let's get hurt again in march to have a perfect ending.

Sent from my SM-F946W using RealGM mobile app

[C_Money]

Love it but this should be the last year. Try to compete next season.

[Wise80]

I hate it, but it's necessary.

This team lacks high end talent. It needs to get both lucky and hit on next years pick. As fun as it is watching guys like Mogbo, Mitchell, and Shead play. They don't really seem like guys who are going to be more than change of pace guys (9th/10th man). Maybe Mogbo can be more, but he's got a long way to go.

Agbaji, Dick, Scottie, and next years pick. Those are the keepers.

IQ is the wild card. I'm not sure how his game fits with a top 10 team. Same with RJ. Either way, they're nice assets along with Jakob.

We're still this year, next year, and the year after before our young guys have enough experience and development to be a decent team. Long ways to go.

[Wise80]

Love it but this should be the last year. Try to compete next season.

I just don't see it. How are we going to compete next year? What are we adding other than a rookie who will hopefully be good, but will also need time to learn thru his mistakes.

[Scase]

Love it but this should be the last year. Try to compete next season.

I just don't see it. How are we going to compete next year? What are we adding other than a rookie who will hopefully be good, but will also need time to learn thru his mistakes.

He's saying that had we tanked earlier, we could have been starting to compete next year, instead of a couple years from now.

[billy_hoyle]

Let's not forget that the team is in this narrow path (heavily reliant on hitting big on this year's lotto pick to add to their existing franchise player and cadre of role players) because the faction that's adamant on becoming mediocre as quickly as possible got exactly what it wanted. Hope you all enjoyed that Bulls play-in loss.

Not trading Fred/trading for Jak in a shambles locker room trade deadline has cost us:
- a close 10% chance at Wemby or a high lotto pick
- the 2024 lotto pick (or those juicy future Wolves picks)
- a future Bucks 1st.
- if we don't trade Jak, could easily push us out of favourable draft position yet again.

This timeline is what you end up with when you make catastrophic, shortsighted decisions.

This is what team mediocre bought, and it's left the team with no shortcuts for long term improvements. Let's hope the FO has the patience this time around to not triple down on repeating the same mistakes.

We never get Wemby from where we were at record wise at the trade deadline (already 26 wins). Impossible.

We have Yak right now instead of a Edey. Id rather have the young guy, but the overall value isn't substantially different. We are NOT winning right now even with Yak, hasn't impacted the tank. We are getting alot of close developmental/entertaining losses because we have a competent center (basically what many were saying on here all summer).

The Bucks pick does have an impact, but we only have so many roster spots. After next year, where are we fitting these guys in, assuming we have a high lotto pick this year, and multiple first next? Do we sit Ochai and Dick and Mogbo and Ja'Kobe?

[beanbag]

This isn't tanking, this is a bad team decimated by injuries.

[sidsid]

Let's not forget that the team is in this narrow path (heavily reliant on hitting big on this year's lotto pick to add to their existing franchise player and cadre of role players) because the faction that's adamant on becoming mediocre as quickly as possible got exactly what it wanted. Hope you all enjoyed that Bulls play-in loss.

Not trading Fred/trading for Jak in a shambles locker room trade deadline has cost us:
- a close 10% chance at Wemby or a high lotto pick
- the 2024 lotto pick (or those juicy future Wolves picks)
- a future Bucks 1st.
- if we don't trade Jak, could easily push us out of favourable draft position yet again.

This timeline is what you end up with when you make catastrophic, shortsighted decisions.

This is what team mediocre bought, and it's left the team with no shortcuts for long term improvements. Let's hope the FO has the patience this time around to not triple down on repeating the same mistakes.

We never get Wemby from where we were at record wise at the trade deadline (already 26 wins). Impossible.

We have Yak right now instead of a Edey. Id rather have the young guy, but the overall value isn't substantially different. We are NOT winning right now even with Yak, hasn't impacted the tank. We are getting alot of close developmental/entertaining losses because we have a competent center (basically what many were saying on here all summer).

The Bucks pick does have an impact, but we only have so many roster spots. After next year, where are we fitting these guys in, assuming we have a high lotto pick this year, and multiple first next? Do we sit Ochai and Dick and Mogbo and Ja'Kobe?

I'm sorry Billy, but you don't have the time stone. The decision to tank at the deadline when we were in the 5th spot and tried to stay there gets you those odds. We don't know what the outcome would have been.

The feeling about the tank is great, but will only remain that way if we can ensure it. Moving veterans alone likely solves that for us. We could be feeling a little less dependent on it if we hadn't mortgaged the future over the last 2 years. But we're basically at the Siakam/Fred/Norm (all of our current comps being slightly better) stage and have an extra 2026 pick as the only added asset to it. Slim amount of assets for a team that lost or traded away it's entire starting lineup over the last 2 years.

[Badonkadonk]

Only thing I hate about it is for this level of badness to be possible, it meant another lost opportunity for IQ/RJ/Scottie to grow together. Brown also hasn't had a chance to rehabilitate his value. The pick is great obviously, at some point the losing is going to challenge the psyche of the team and I just hope they don't backslide to those 40pt losses we saw when Scottie/Yak got hurt last year and IQ/RJ lost time due to personal reasons/tragedies.

[SFour]

This tank/draft reminds me of the Tampa season....I have a feeling we'll end up with a player of Scottie Barnes caliber.....we aren't getting a Wemby but I don't think anybody is going to say no to allstar potential.

[Mr Funk]

Teammates who love playing with another and never give up, who are developing and showing clear improvement, while establishing a new culture with tremendous camaraderie and learning to win. It's the perfect tank. Who could ask for anything more.

But if they were actually pulling out games I think you would resent them for never giving up and resent their camaraderie. It's only because they're losing that most of you are happy. Poeltl plays well and tankers want him traded for maximum value, etc. They don't care that Poeltl is a part of this team, just that he represents a pathway to more value. The only value this team has to tankers is to provide them with a player they can apply even more hope to.

Think and make overly negative assumptions all you want, but you couldn't be further from the truth. I'm happy to see Grady and Ochai blossoming into rotational and starter level players, especially after all of the overly negative and casual takes on here regarding them being busts from last season. I'm fine if we retain Poeltl, as I would at least want a centre in line to take over in his absence, in addition to a first round pick, considering his high level of play lately. This is a historic draft loaded with at least five players who potentially could be generational talents. It's a golden opportunity for us to fast track this team's trajectory and become competitive much sooner than expected, as adding a potential generational talent is very exciting to an already young and competitive team. I want to win and win championships and not be relegated to a mediocre treadmill.

[billy_hoyle]

Let's not forget that the team is in this narrow path (heavily reliant on hitting big on this year's lotto pick to add to their existing franchise player and cadre of role players) because the faction that's adamant on becoming mediocre as quickly as possible got exactly what it wanted. Hope you all enjoyed that Bulls play-in loss.

Not trading Fred/trading for Jak in a shambles locker room trade deadline has cost us:
- a close 10% chance at Wemby or a high lotto pick
- the 2024 lotto pick (or those juicy future Wolves picks)
- a future Bucks 1st.
- if we don't trade Jak, could easily push us out of favourable draft position yet again.

This timeline is what you end up with when you make catastrophic, shortsighted decisions.

This is what team mediocre bought, and it's left the team with no shortcuts for long term improvements. Let's hope the FO has the patience this time around to not triple down on repeating the same mistakes.

We never get Wemby from where we were at record wise at the trade deadline (already 26 wins). Impossible.

We have Yak right now instead of a Edey. Id rather have the young guy, but the overall value isn't substantially different. We are NOT winning right now even with Yak, hasn't impacted the tank. We are getting alot of close developmental/entertaining losses because we have a competent center (basically what many were saying on here all summer).

The Bucks pick does have an impact, but we only have so many roster spots. After next year, where are we fitting these guys in, assuming we have a high lotto pick this year, and multiple first next? Do we sit Ochai and Dick and Mogbo and Ja'Kobe?

I'm sorry Billy, but you don't have the time stone. The decision to tank at the deadline when we were in the 5th spot and tried to stay there gets you those odds. We don't know what the outcome would have been.

The feeling about the tank is great, but will only remain that way if we can ensure it. Moving veterans alone likely solves that for us. We could be feeling a little less dependent on it if we hadn't mortgaged the future over the last 2 years. But we're basically at the Siakam/Fred/Norm (all of our current comps being slightly better) stage and have an extra 2026 pick as the only added asset to it. Slim amount of assets for a team that lost or traded away it's entire starting lineup over the last 2 years.

Actually, you don't need the time stone. We actually do know that the lottery ended up awarding the 2nd place odds (I.e. the team that ended with the second worst record obtained the lottery combination that eventually beget Wemby). Unless you think the lottery balls knew that the Spurs owned that combination, and that was some sort of impact to the random draw? Are you suggesting that the Raptors losing more would have impacted the lottery results? These things seem to be completely independent from my perspective, but I suppose you can never know the true butterfly effect of things.

[Raps in 4]

I haven't been this excited about Raptors basketball since 2019. It helps that all our losses are competitive too. We aren't building "losing culture". A top-5 pick this year could get us back to contender status pretty quickly. I trust Masai to find the best player in the draft.

[DelAbbot]

FIFY

Let's not forget that the team is in this narrow path (heavily reliant on hitting big on this year's lotto pick to add to their existing franchise player and cadre of role players) because Masai's adamant on becoming mediocre as quickly as possible got exactly what it wanted. Hope you all enjoyed that Bulls play-in loss.

Not trading Fred/trading for Jak in a shambles locker room trade deadline has cost us:
- a close 10% chance at Wemby or a high lotto pick
- the 2024 lotto pick (or those juicy future Wolves picks)
- a future Bucks 1st.
- if we don't trade Jak, could easily push us out of favourable draft position yet again.

This timeline is what you end up with when you make catastrophic, shortsighted decisions.

This is what team mediocre bought, and it's left the team with no shortcuts for long term improvements. Let's hope the FO has the patience this time around to not triple down on repeating the same mistakes.

[DelAbbot]

Can’t understand how one would want to see this team start winning meaningless games to find themselves middle of the pack

Lack of ability to plan long term? Need for immediate self gratification?

[ItsDanger]

The poll clearly shows there is a strong pro tank support on this board. Yet a small minority continue to disparage us who merely seek to build this roster into a true contender. Please join us in this virtuous tank.

[ATLTimekeeper]

Teammates who love playing with another and never give up, who are developing and showing clear improvement, while establishing a new culture with tremendous camaraderie and learning to win. It's the perfect tank. Who could ask for anything more.

But if they were actually pulling out games I think you would resent them for never giving up and resent their camaraderie. It's only because they're losing that most of you are happy. Poeltl plays well and tankers want him traded for maximum value, etc. They don't care that Poeltl is a part of this team, just that he represents a pathway to more value. The only value this team has to tankers is to provide them with a player they can apply even more hope to.

Think and make overly negative assumptions all you want, but you couldn't be further from the truth. I'm happy to see Grady and Ochai blossoming into rotational and starter level players, especially after all of the overly negative and casual takes on here regarding them being busts from last season. I'm fine if we retain Poeltl, as I would at least want a centre in line to take over in his absence, in addition to a first round pick, considering his high level of play lately. This is a historic draft loaded with at least five players who potentially could be generational talents. It's a golden opportunity for us to fast track this team's trajectory and become competitive much sooner than expected, as adding a potential generational talent is very exciting to an already young and competitive team. I want to win and win championships and not be relegated to a mediocre treadmill.

My negative assumption is that if these players won all their coinflip games this year and we were closer to 6-8 or 7-7 without Scottie and IQ, that fans that are supportive of the tank would resent that we were competitive and trying hard. I think a lot of the language tankers use indicates I'm right.

[SpiderMunn]

Im just taking what the defense is giving me