2024-25 Season Discussion and Speculation Part IV

[thamadkant]

KD is literally the Suns best player, the last 2 years. So can't sell him for cheap or discount.

[lilfishi22]

In hindsight, it looks like trading our '31 was as much about money as anything else. Dealing Nurk for expirings will save us... what, $120 million? Surely we didn't want to send away the '31 just to ditch one year on Nurk's contract, so we split it up - not just the asset, but also the transaction. Separating the UTA/CHO deals over time makes it much less obvious that we were in fact, trading our '31 primarily to shed salaries. In support of this proposition, consider this. While we were ostensibly trying to pay less than the '31 outright with Beal for Butler, we might have known all along that Beal wasn't interested in waiving the NTC - in which case, there never was a Butler deal. Had we dealt Durant to GSW, I'm guessing we would have kept those picks and still pulled the trigger on Nurk-to-CHO trade. In which case, the only thing we would have ended up doing with those three picks would be, again, just getting out of Nurk's contract.

You can say it was about getting under the second apron more than just the money, but potatoes potahtoes. Why get under the second apron if we're blowing it up? To save money and rebuild.

I look at it as cleaning the books so we could do more. We could've never done it with a single pick but with multiple picks, one already used, we could do more.

There's a good chance even without Butler, we would've made the same move for those 3 1sts.

[kennydorglas]

KD is literally the Suns best player, the last 2 years. So can't sell him for cheap or discount.

Specially when we traded Mikal (worth 4 1sts), Cam (worth 2 1sts) plus 4 1sts for him.
Worst deal of all time, no questions asked.
Not even the George one was this nuclear for the Clippers.

[Ghost of Kleine]

I don’t think another SG/undersized wing is changing our fortunes.

Yeah, I was thinking more about the possibility of him maybe replacing D Lee or something like that, giving us another ball handling wing with good size and 3 & D versatility that may not be an upgrade to our wing position.


But again could give us another low risk bench ballhandling guard wing option that could still defend and hit some threes perhaps?

Josh Richardson has played in just 8 games this season. 4 points and 1.5 boards. He has had multiple injuries and he isn’t an upgrade over anyone at this point of his career. Hard pass.

Not a big deal either way man. I was referring to him possibly replacing Damion Lee as a 3rd string stopgap SG. Because it's not like any move/ signing we make from the waived lists are going to have earth shattering consequences for us. I liked his ability to handle the ball, defend multiple positions and hit the three reasonably.


Maybe a 1 yr deal after all. And it's not like D Lee has been the pillar of health or played many minutes either. BOTH are fairly inconsequential to us at this point. Only Richardson for all his blemishes has more skillset versatility overall. And could cover more ranges for us in the short term?

Anyways, appreciate the feedback man. Are there any specific players you'd target from the buyout market that you feel could have a bigger impact for us in some capacity?

[lilfishi22]

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?s=46

Then wtf were you guys doing?

Sounds more like damage control than anything. We wanted Jimmy...but not enough to discuss the NTC with Beal to actually make it happen is what it sounds like to me.

[Saberestar]

Yeah, I was thinking more about the possibility of him maybe replacing D Lee or something like that, giving us another ball handling wing with good size and 3 & D versatility that may not be an upgrade to our wing position.


But again could give us another low risk bench ballhandling guard wing option that could still defend and hit some threes perhaps?

Josh Richardson has played in just 8 games this season. 4 points and 1.5 boards. He has had multiple injuries and he isn’t an upgrade over anyone at this point of his career. Hard pass.

Not a big deal either way man. I was referring to him possibly replacing Damion Lee as a 3rd string stopgap SG. Because it's not like any move/ signing we make from the waived lists are going to have earth shattering consequences for us. I liked his ability to handle the ball, defend multiple positions and hit the three reasonably.


Maybe a 1 yr deal after all. And it's not like D Lee has been the pillar of health or played many minutes either. BOTH are fairly inconsequential to us at this point. Only Richardson for all his blemishes has more skillset versatility overall. And could cover more ranges for us in the short term?

Anyways, appreciate the feedback man. Are there any specific players you'd target from the buyout market that you feel could have a bigger impact for us in some capacity?

Damion Lee is a great guy to have on the locker room and a good shooter, no need to waive him for a lateral move. Inconsequential like you said.

My targets would be Olynyk (Pelicans), Nance Jr (Atlanta), Theis (OKC) and PJ Tucker (Raptors). Not sure who will be available for real, but those names are mentioned as possible for the buyout market.

[lilfishi22]

Read on Twitter

Wow!

This was one trade I WISHED had gone through. They overpaid for a guy they'll need to overpay shortly

[lilfishi22]

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As I and some others have been saying, The flakers trade of AD for Luka was clearly tampering and collusion. The trade should be investigated and rescinded and the flakers should be penalized for the next couple of years. BUT or course the league itself helped orchestrate this and will make sure the flakers are always sustainable and propped up!

There's obviously something going on in the background that's beyond the two deal makers but one GM talking to another isn't against the rules, in fact, it's how trades gets made

[Ghost of Kleine]

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This is great! Gotta love AI sometimes...lol.

[Ghost of Kleine]

Read on Twitter

As I and some others have been saying, The flakers trade of AD for Luka was clearly tampering and collusion. The trade should be investigated and rescinded and the flakers should be penalized for the next couple of years. BUT or course the league itself helped orchestrate this and will make sure the flakers are always sustainable and propped up!

There's obviously something going on in the background that's beyond the two deal makers but one GM talking to another isn't against the rules, in fact, it's how trades gets made

Sure of course you're right about it not being at all unusual for GMs to get together and talk about trades even though they could just as easily do it over the phone or via video chat too.

What I'm speaking to with this is the cumulative substance of the relationship between the two that undoubtedly played a huge part in this whole absurdly lopsided trade going down wherein Nico Harrison didn't bother to even explore any other trade possibilities from the other 30+ NBA teams with obvious interest that very obviously could have made much better and bigger offers in contrast.

This speaks more to their friendship behind the scenes playing a significant role in Harrison favoring the lakers interests over doing his actual job of fielding the best possible return for their generational franchise star. The complete absurdity of the conditions in which the lakers got Luka for almost nothing if you consider the age factor and injury factor offset depreciation for Davis!

This tweet illustrates the premise of their potential collusion and possible tampering with this trades outcome. Limiting the Mavs potential trade return significantly. Implicit friendship biases being the root cause here!

[bwgood77]

I don't think there is collusion. I just think he got bamboozled, but at the same time lost patience with Luka and really wanted AD in particular.

[Ghost of Kleine]

Read on Twitter

Figures that the trade would be rescinded so the flakers could now still go after a bigger more starting caliber center for them.

[lilfishi22]

Read on Twitter

As I and some others have been saying, The flakers trade of AD for Luka was clearly tampering and collusion. The trade should be investigated and rescinded and the flakers should be penalized for the next couple of years. BUT or course the league itself helped orchestrate this and will make sure the flakers are always sustainable and propped up!

There's obviously something going on in the background that's beyond the two deal makers but one GM talking to another isn't against the rules, in fact, it's how trades gets made

Sure of course you're right about it not being at all unusual for GMs to get together and talk about trades even though they could just as easily do it over the phone or via video chat too.

What I'm speaking to with this is the cumulative substance of the relationship between the two that undoubtedly played a huge part in this whole absurdly lopsided trade going down wherein Nico Harrison didn't bother to even explore any other trade possibilities from the other 30+ NBA teams with obvious interest that very obviously could have made much better and bigger offers in contrast.

This speaks more to their friendship behind the scenes playing a significant role in Harrison favoring the lakers interests over doing his actual job of fielding the best possible return for their generational franchise star. The complete absurdity of the conditions in which the lakers got Luka for almost nothing if you consider the age factor and injury factor offset depreciation for Davis!

This tweet illustrates the premise of their potential collusion and possible tampering with this trades outcome. Limiting the Mavs potential trade return significantly. Implicit friendship biases being the root cause here!

They obviously have a pre-existing relationship but you could also say the same about many GM's. I don't think them being friends precludes them from doing a deal that is legitimate.

In my view, the Mavs clearly didn't get their money's worth because based on Dumont's trash talking of Luka post the trade, it appeared as though Nico had a directive to move Luka for whatever the cost and to bring back a win-now player. Pelinka knew Nico didn't go to anyone and had leverage which he used.

Nico has been a solid GM for the Mavs. In his 4 seasons with the team, he's gone to the WCF twice and the Finals once. He made a pretty gutsy move to bring a troublesome Kyrie to the team which could've blown up in his face and he drafted Lively who played a pretty big role on their Finals run. This is purely my opinion but I don't think his friendship with Pelinka necessarily was why he 1. traded Luka and 2. got a bad return for him. I think this is solely on Dumont.

[Ghost of Kleine]

I don't think there is collusion. I just think he got bamboozled, but at the same time lost patience with Luka and really wanted AD in particular.

Yeah, I know that you personally don't believe there was any collusion involved. But aside from being entitled to your opinion, I just don't know how anyone could look at all the circumstances, connections, statements made, contextual circumstances of how everything played out, etc and come to such a conclusion that there's nothing shady about this trade. Or there's no collusion? I mean it is normal practice to intentionally hide the trade availability of Luka from literally every other NBA franchise and only broker a deal with the lakers GM Rob Pelinka whom Harrison just happened to have a deep friendship with as well as the lakers.

How often has an NBA GM willingly withheld the availability of their franchises generational franchise player knowing if they only made it known that he was available, around 90% of the entire league would field legitimate interest resulting in a much more lucrative offer being tendered?

By Harrison's own admission, he stated that he really only spoke with the lakers about Luka in a trade. And didn't even try to speak to any other teams. And the rest of the league was blindsided by the trade. So considering how Harrison kept Lukas' trade availability secret to the entire rest of the league, and really only let Pelinka know and then brokered a very favorable deal for him and the lakers without any other team even getting an opportunity to submit any offers, how is this not collusion?

Harrison decieved the rest of the NBA GMS/ TEAMS that otherwise might have fielded competitive or greater offers than what they recieved from LA just to ensure that his good friend Pelinka ended up with Luka even on a low value outcome offer ( pennies on the dollar) by comparison to what the Mavs would've gotten had the information on Doncics' availability not been kept secret. Is there a difference in what happened here and the very implicit definition of collusion man?

[SunsRback4Good]

Read on Twitter

This is great! Gotta love AI sometimes...lol.

Are you sure that’s fake??? Looks somewhat real to me.

[sunskerr]

I don't think there is collusion. I just think he got bamboozled, but at the same time lost patience with Luka and really wanted AD in particular.

Agreed...it just happens. Although I don't think it was Pelinkas silver tongue so much as it was Nico bamboozling himself with fantasies of how his team would look with AD. Pelinkas skills came into play (once Nico had already traded Luka in his head) by negotiating the price downwards.

Similar thing happened to Ishbia when he ordered Jones to trade for KD. Happened to me when I traded Trae Young for an aging Harden and Butler.

Sometimes you just have to step back and breathe.

[Ghost of Kleine]

There's obviously something going on in the background that's beyond the two deal makers but one GM talking to another isn't against the rules, in fact, it's how trades gets made

Sure of course you're right about it not being at all unusual for GMs to get together and talk about trades even though they could just as easily do it over the phone or via video chat too.

What I'm speaking to with this is the cumulative substance of the relationship between the two that undoubtedly played a huge part in this whole absurdly lopsided trade going down wherein Nico Harrison didn't bother to even explore any other trade possibilities from the other 30+ NBA teams with obvious interest that very obviously could have made much better and bigger offers in contrast.

This speaks more to their friendship behind the scenes playing a significant role in Harrison favoring the lakers interests over doing his actual job of fielding the best possible return for their generational franchise star. The complete absurdity of the conditions in which the lakers got Luka for almost nothing if you consider the age factor and injury factor offset depreciation for Davis!

This tweet illustrates the premise of their potential collusion and possible tampering with this trades outcome. Limiting the Mavs potential trade return significantly. Implicit friendship biases being the root cause here!

They obviously have a pre-existing relationship but you could also say the same about many GM's. I don't think them being friends precludes them from doing a deal that is legitimate.

In my view, the Mavs clearly didn't get their money's worth because based on Dumont's trash talking of Luka post the trade, it appeared as though Nico had a directive to move Luka for whatever the cost and to bring back a win-now player. Pelinka knew Nico didn't go to anyone and had leverage which he used.

Nico has been a solid GM for the Mavs. In his 4 seasons with the team, he's gone to the WCF twice and the Finals once. He made a pretty gutsy move to bring a troublesome Kyrie to the team which could've blown up in his face and he drafted Lively who played a pretty big role on their Finals run. This is purely my opinion but I don't think his friendship with Pelinka necessarily was why he 1. traded Luka and 2. got a bad return for him. I think this is solely on Dumont.

I'm sorry man, but none of what you're saying adds up or makes legitimate sense. The fact that their friendship doesn't preclude them from making deals is completely irrelevant. The connections denote clear implicit favoritism well outside the duties of Harrison as a GM. Otherwise he wouldn't of intentionally withheld the information that the Mavs were looking to trade Luka from the entire rest of the league.

The legitimacy comes into question on the premise that Harrison knowingly withheld key information from 90% of the league suppressing legitimate interest from literally every other team out there that obviously could have fielded much better offers and Harrison instead caters to his BFFs' interests that resulted in the lakers being able to get Luka on a much reduced offer by not having to even bid against any other teams with clear interests and assets.

I mean it's only obvious to anyone that the lakers severely underpaid ( to their benefit) for a player of Lukas' value throughout the league. Now regardless of how imbicillic the Mvs owner may be, it's only common sense that when you're giving up your franchise player/ generational talent, you actually field more than just a singular low end offer.

Again, Lukas' availability was kept hidden to literally every other team/ GM until the trade was already completed by Harrison, who had those connections/ history with Pelinka. The premise of collusion comes from the context of Harrison intentionally keeping Lukas' availability in trade entirely secret allowing the lakers to be the sole bidders resulting in a very limited or suppressed value outcome significantly favoring the lakers interests. Again whom Harrison had history with and was/ is very good friends with.

And even their flimsy damage control excuses make no logical sense or logistical legitimacy either given the longstanding process of how trades are initiated through to completion. Everything that happened in this situation was secretive and the process very anomalous to the distinct benefits of the flakers themselves.

[Frank Lee]

Yer going nuts Ghost

[lilfishi22]

Sure of course you're right about it not being at all unusual for GMs to get together and talk about trades even though they could just as easily do it over the phone or via video chat too.

What I'm speaking to with this is the cumulative substance of the relationship between the two that undoubtedly played a huge part in this whole absurdly lopsided trade going down wherein Nico Harrison didn't bother to even explore any other trade possibilities from the other 30+ NBA teams with obvious interest that very obviously could have made much better and bigger offers in contrast.

This speaks more to their friendship behind the scenes playing a significant role in Harrison favoring the lakers interests over doing his actual job of fielding the best possible return for their generational franchise star. The complete absurdity of the conditions in which the lakers got Luka for almost nothing if you consider the age factor and injury factor offset depreciation for Davis!

This tweet illustrates the premise of their potential collusion and possible tampering with this trades outcome. Limiting the Mavs potential trade return significantly. Implicit friendship biases being the root cause here!

They obviously have a pre-existing relationship but you could also say the same about many GM's. I don't think them being friends precludes them from doing a deal that is legitimate.

In my view, the Mavs clearly didn't get their money's worth because based on Dumont's trash talking of Luka post the trade, it appeared as though Nico had a directive to move Luka for whatever the cost and to bring back a win-now player. Pelinka knew Nico didn't go to anyone and had leverage which he used.

Nico has been a solid GM for the Mavs. In his 4 seasons with the team, he's gone to the WCF twice and the Finals once. He made a pretty gutsy move to bring a troublesome Kyrie to the team which could've blown up in his face and he drafted Lively who played a pretty big role on their Finals run. This is purely my opinion but I don't think his friendship with Pelinka necessarily was why he 1. traded Luka and 2. got a bad return for him. I think this is solely on Dumont.

I'm sorry man, but none of what you're saying adds up or makes legitimate sense. The fact that their friendship doesn't preclude them from making deals is completely irrelevant. The connections denote clear implicit favoritism well outside the duties of Harrison as a GM. Otherwise he wouldn't of intentionally withheld the information that the Mavs were looking to trade Luka from the entire rest of the league.

The legitimacy comes into question on the premise that Harrison knowingly withheld key information from 90% of the league suppressing legitimate interest from literally every other team out there that obviously could have fielded much better offers and Harrison instead caters to his BFFs' interests that resulted in the lakers being able to get Luka on a much reduced offer by not having to even bid against any other teams with clear interests and assets.

I mean it's only obvious to anyone that the lakers severely underpaid ( to their benefit) for a player of Lukas' value throughout the league. Now regardless of how imbicillic the Mvs owner may be, it's only common sense that when you're giving up your franchise player/ generational talent, you actually field more than just a singular low end offer.

Again, Lukas' availability was kept hidden to literally every other team/ GM until the trade was already completed by Harrison, who had those connections/ history with Pelinka. The premise of collusion comes from the context of Harrison intentionally keeping Lukas' availability in trade entirely secret allowing the lakers to be the sole bidders resulting in a very limited or suppressed value outcome significantly favoring the lakers interests. Again whom Harrison had history with and was/ is very good friends with.

And even their flimsy damage control excuses make no logical sense or logistical legitimacy either given the longstanding process of how trades are initiated through to completion. Everything that happened in this situation was secretive and the process very anomalous to the distinct benefits of the flakers themselves.

lol having a friendship in the NBA does not preclude them from making a legitimate deal. Otherwise you cannot make a deal with probably half of the NBA because more than likely you become a GM via having made a lot of relationships and connections over time. A lot of GM's come up having been in high level positions (such as assistant GM) for other teams. Are we saying they cannot make a deal because of that? Are we going to say it's collusion if we deal with the Heat because James Jones played for Riley and clearly looks up to him as GM?

I don't doubt collusion happens in the NBA (just look at how many deals get done on the stroke of midnight when FA opens) but does that mean there is no other explanation than collusion that this trade was made?

Also there's no rule saying a GM has to make a public statement saying a player is available. Vast majority of the time, they don't, the information just come through the grapevines. If you know what you want and who to deal with to get a deal done, there's no need to advertise said player. Now, it's probably to their detriment a bidding war didn't happen but again, Nico/Dumont knew who they wanted and they may know Luka might make things difficult in getting AD if he and the rest of the NBA knew he was available.

Lakers absolutely underpaid, there's no question about it. If I'm Pelinka, I did my job. If I'm Nico, I still may have done my job if that's exactly what Dumont wanted. The fact that they are friends doesn't mean it can only be collusion

[Ghost of Kleine]

I don't think there is collusion. I just think he got bamboozled, but at the same time lost patience with Luka and really wanted AD in particular.

Agreed...it just happens. Although I don't think it was Pelinkas silver tongue so much as it was Nico bamboozling himself with fantasies of how his team would look with AD. Pelinkas skills came into play (once Nico had already traded Luka in his head) by negotiating the price downwards.

Similar thing happened to Ishbia when he ordered Jones to trade for KD. Happened to me when I traded Trae Young for an aging Harden and Butler.

Sometimes you just have to step back and breathe.

Are you sure man? Does it really "just happen" wherein only two teams involved ( where BOTH GMs just happen to be good friends) in the very trade for a franchise's generational player that becomes available in a trade and literally no other teams are even made aware that the generational player with substantial value is available so they can make their own bids?

And the entirety of the information around this franchise level player being available in trade is kept secret to literally everyone except that GMs good friend so that there's be no other bids coming in to create a bidding war that would clearly benefit the team trading that player so they could extract maximum value in return.

And as a result, that GMs' good friend and his team can them get that generational player on a very diminished/ suppressed offer by being the only offer tabled instead of taking multiple offers for the highest outcome value. When really was the last time a trade like this for a generational talent played out between only two teams involved with literally no other teams even being made aware of that players' availability? I honestly can't remember one.

And obviously only the Lakers are continually benefiting from these types of anomalous practices. Some here may not see it or ascribe to such possibilities. But many others actually do see the pattrrns/ connections involved and would agree with the perspective of collusion.

But to each their own I suppose.