Presti's Tree Reaches DC: The Official Will Dawkins Thread

[payitforward]

...I think people are still defending this move because they want to believe in the front office and the line of reasoning that they made the move was justifiable at the time....

No. I think they are defending the move because, nate to the contrary notwithstanding, KP explicitly said he was opting out. Explicitly. Committed to it.

As nate points out, we could have forced him to come through on that explicit commitment. In which case, he'd have had to spend a few months in Detroit before winding up on the Celtics. & we wouldn't have gotten anything whatever for him.

&, I suppose it's possible that, as nate maintains, Boston could have been forced to throw in a pick. We'll never know.

Except, of course, we DO know. Or, rather, we do know what we actually got in the deal -- because, the deal brought us more than Tyus. Way more.

It also brought us the #35 pick in the 2023 draft -- which we moved to the Bulls for two future R2 picks. & it also brought us Mike Muscala & Danilo Gallinari, whom we traded for Bagley, whom we then traded (along with a R2 pick & Johnny Davis, who was immediately waived) for Marcus Smart, Colby Jones, & the Grizzlies' 2025 R1 pick.

So, in all, even though Porzingis had committed himself to opting out, we nonetheless managed to turn him (along with a R2 pick) into Marcus Smart, Colby Jones, a 2025 R1 pick, & 2 R2 picks.

Now how does the deal look?

I agree with you but it just seems like a long winding
road to get here. A great deal of patience was
required.

My time-frame is probably longer than yours.

[Zonkerbl]

At his peak, Beal averaged 31 points per game on a 59.3 TS%, which was 2% above league average of 57.2%. That's elite production.

Beal's production was just good enough to justify a max contract. That was the problem - the whole point of the max contract scam is to force players like LeBron to accept half of (ok, *less than*) what they are worth. Giving someone a max contract who only barely deserves it is a losing play, moneyballwise.

Also you just jinxed the crap out of Porzingis. He is guaranteed to get injured at some point in the middle of the playoffs now.

[nate33]

At his peak, Beal averaged 31 points per game on a 59.3 TS%, which was 2% above league average of 57.2%. That's elite production.

Beal's production was just good enough to justify a max contract. That was the problem - the whole point of the max contract scam is to force players like LeBron to accept half of (ok, *less than*) what they are worth. Giving someone a max contract who only barely deserves it is a losing play, moneyballwise.

Agreed.

The worst situations are those guys who consider themselves "max players" but aren't really top 10-ish superstars. No GM wants to let those guys walk, but oftentimes, when you keep them, you put a ceiling on your team that is substantially below contender status. A good rule of thumb is to not pay these guys unless you already have the true top-10ish superstar on your roster. It's okay to give Jaylen Brown the max if you have Tatum, or to pay Bam the max if you have Jimmy Buckets, but don't pay Beal the max when your next best player is Rui freaking Hachimura.

The truly insane part was giving him the no-trade clause.

My point earlier was that I object to the revisionist history on Beal. That he was somehow a bad player and overrated. I don't think he was every really that overrated by DC fans or the league as a whole. He was a very good player - the type of guy who rightfully made a few All-Star games here and there. He had a couple of seasons doing a respectable job as a number 1 option scorer, but not a team-elevating job. He was never a top 10 player and nobody ever thought he was. He was a top 25-35 guy. His one All-NBA finish was mostly due to injuries to the competition (Harden, Mitchell, Kyrie and Durant all missed 30+ games). But there's no reason to hate him, except maybe at the very end when he started mailing it in defensively.

[Zonkerbl]

At his peak, Beal averaged 31 points per game on a 59.3 TS%, which was 2% above league average of 57.2%. That's elite production.

Beal's production was just good enough to justify a max contract. That was the problem - the whole point of the max contract scam is to force players like LeBron to accept half of (ok, *less than*) what they are worth. Giving someone a max contract who only barely deserves it is a losing play, moneyballwise.

Agreed.

The worst situations are those guys who consider themselves "max players" but aren't really top 10-ish superstars. No GM wants to let those guys walk, but oftentimes, when you keep them, you put a ceiling on your team that is substantially below contender status. A good rule of thumb is to not pay these guys unless you already have the true top-10ish superstar on your roster. It's okay to give Jaylen Brown the max if you have Tatum, or to pay Bam the max if you have Jimmy Buckets, but don't pay Beal the max when your next best player is Rui freaking Hachimura.

The truly insane part was giving him the no-trade clause.

My point earlier was that I object to the revisionist history on Beal. That he was somehow a bad player and overrated. I don't think he was every really that overrated by DC fans or the league as a whole. He was a very good player - the type of guy who rightfully made a few All-Star games here and there. He had a couple of seasons doing a respectable job as a number 1 option scorer, but not a team-elevating job. He was never a top 10 player and nobody ever thought he was. He was a top 25-35 guy. His one All-NBA finish was mostly due to injuries to the competition (Harden, Mitchell, Kyrie and Durant all missed 30+ games). But there's no reason to hate him, except maybe at the very end when he started mailing it in defensively.

Exactly, I hated the *contract.* I have no problem with Beal as a person or a player. It's not like he didn't deserve the contract they gave him, it was just a bad move by management. NBA basketball is a business and giving Beal a max contract out of loyalty/sentimentality was bad business.

[Kanyewest]

...I think people are still defending this move because they want to believe in the front office and the line of reasoning that they made the move was justifiable at the time....

No. I think they are defending the move because, nate to the contrary notwithstanding, KP explicitly said he was opting out. Explicitly. Committed to it.

As nate points out, we could have forced him to come through on that explicit commitment. In which case, he'd have had to spend a few months in Detroit before winding up on the Celtics. & we wouldn't have gotten anything whatever for him.

&, I suppose it's possible that, as nate maintains, Boston could have been forced to throw in a pick. We'll never know.

Except, of course, we DO know. Or, rather, we do know what we actually got in the deal -- because, the deal brought us more than Tyus. Way more.

It also brought us the #35 pick in the 2023 draft -- which we moved to the Bulls for two future R2 picks. & it also brought us Mike Muscala & Danilo Gallinari, whom we traded for Bagley, whom we then traded (along with a R2 pick & Johnny Davis, who was immediately waived) for Marcus Smart, Colby Jones, & the Grizzlies' 2025 R1 pick.

So, in all, even though Porzingis had committed himself to opting out, we nonetheless managed to turn him (along with a R2 pick) into Marcus Smart, Colby Jones, a 2025 R1 pick, & 2 R2 picks.

Now how does the deal look?

I feel that Nate was right though that it was better not to even resign KP given that the money saved could have been used to acquire more 2nd round picks. And having Jones netted the Wizards ultimately nothing.

Granted the Marcus Smart piece worked out badly for the Grizzlies but so much so that it netted the Wizards a first round pick in a separate deal but as for the KP trade, it looked underwhelming at the time and pointless now from my perspective.

Overall though, the Wizards are still making positive moves but we don't need to pretend that the Dawkins/Winger regime is perfect.

[nate33]

Except, of course, we DO know. Or, rather, we do know what we actually got in the deal -- because, the deal brought us more than Tyus. Way more.

It also brought us the #35 pick in the 2023 draft -- which we moved to the Bulls for two future R2 picks. & it also brought us Mike Muscala & Danilo Gallinari, whom we traded for Bagley, whom we then traded (along with a R2 pick & Johnny Davis, who was immediately waived) for Marcus Smart, Colby Jones, & the Grizzlies' 2025 R1 pick.

So, in all, even though Porzingis had committed himself to opting out, we nonetheless managed to turn him (along with a R2 pick) into Marcus Smart, Colby Jones, a 2025 R1 pick, & 2 R2 picks.

You are assigning positive value to the dead weight contracts of Muscala and Gallinari and thereby crediting that value in the ultimate acquisition of Smart and the 2025 FRP. This is deceptive. Muscala and Gallinari had negative value. They were useless players who still had to be paid. The only "value" we extracted from them is the fact that their contracts were shorter than an also-useless Bagley who had a longer term contract. The actual value wasn't in Gallo and Muscala, it was in ownership's willingness to pay Bagley an extra $12.5M the following season. The fact is, if we hadn't done the Porzingis trade, instead of having the expiring contracts of Muscala and Gallo to trade, we would have had raw cap room. We could have used that raw cap room to get even more in return than Bagley and two SRP's. If Detroit was willing to pay Bagley and 2 SRP's for expiring contracts, they would have paid even more for immediate cap relief (or some other team would have paid more).

[payitforward]

nate, it's always fun to debate with you, because you are so good at finding connective points to support the way you view a subject. What I do not want, & I'm sure you both understand & agree with me, is acrimony. We've all put in so much time in support of what was a dead-end franchise for decades that we should be enjoying ourselves now rather than regretting/debating dead issues.

You may be right that we would have won a stare-down with Porzingis about his opting out. How can I deny that possibility?

OTOH, had you been wrong (& again that possibility cannot be denied), the sequence of events could not have unfolded that turned into Smart, Jones, a R1 pick this year, & a future R2 pick (at the additional cost of a R2 pick from us). Thus, we can't simply reduce the original situation to "Porzingis for Tyus Jones."

I don't have to assign a positive value to the 2 veteran contracts to recognize that they brought us Bagley & the #35 pick in 2022. Nor to mention what Bagley & that pick brought us. Those are the events & that's how they unrolled. I.e. the resources for which we traded KP, plus 1 R2 pick, have turned into Smart, Jones, the #18 (maybe?) pick in the upcoming draft, & a pair of R2 picks.

You can still argue that we could have gotten Boston to throw in a R1 pick. So much the better! But, you can't deny that overall we came out with a bunch of benefits which are non-negligible & directly traceable to the KP trade & its terms.

Peace!

[doclinkin]

EDIT— which I now see has already been argued out.

Spoiler:

100% -- for the life of me, I cannot understand the insistence on reframing KP's departure as some kind of a "trade" -- a move engineered by us -- when he had clearly stated he was opting out of his contract *unless* we did the deal.

There. Was. No. Alternative.

We've talked about this before and this is BS.

Porzingis was not going to sign with freaking Detroit. We should have called his bluff and forced Boston to include a pick. They would have. The guy was roughly the 25th best player in the NBA by several metrics.

Heck, as it turned out, even getting nothing at all for Porzingis would have been better than what we got. Tyus Jones ultimately departed for nothing. All he did was cost us a couple of tanking losses while taking away the opportunity to develop Poole and Deni as primary ball handlers. We would have been better off with the cap space.

Actually, nate, your final point is a good one.

Actually no its not.

In the Zinger trade we also got salary cap filler of Gallinari and Mike Muscala.

Whichever wins Tyus Jones earned us, those two gave back in spades as our sometime starting Center/primary back-ups at that position. Those early crushing losses put us in position to earn the #2 pick.

Better still we traded Gallo and Muscala for Marvin Bagley III who played well for us in the same position. Along with the Bagley trade came a 2025 and 2026 second round pick.

As detailed above Bagley was traded in the Smart deal, along with a 2025 2nd round pick.

If I'm tracking it right, the other 2nd round pick was used in the sign & trade that landed us Jonas Valanciunas.
Jonas was traded for Cidy Sissoko, a 2028 Denver 2RP and the Kings 2029 2RP.

So this front office converted Kristaps Porzingis to
Marcus Smart.
This years 18th pick.
The Nuggets 2028 second
Kings 2029 second.
--And the losses that netted us Alex Sarr.

Spoiler:

Not a bad use of future assets for a player who made it publicly clear he was disappointed in the decision to trade Beal and was going to decline his option to look for a winning situation.

We can speculate Zinger would have never chosen to go to Detroit. We can imagine Boston would have blinked if we asked for more. We can talk about how we might have extolled different return for Gallo, Muscala, Bagley, Sissoko, etc. But the above is what did happen not what might have happened. Which to me all looks like a pretty good return on investment for a player who was one foot out the door.

ESPECIALLY given the initial deal that we had helped broker fell through when Brogdon failed the Clippers physical, so instead of us getting the Clips first round pick, we got the pupu platter of Jones, Muscala etc. If you read the reports of how it happened the deal was done literally in the last hour before Kristaps had to declare his decision on the option.

Nifty work for a front office who had been in place for like eleven minutes at that point. And pretty good jiu jistu to turn it all into a load of productive future assets. Including whatever we get for Smart, beyond his locker room benefit or play on court.

[nate33]

nate, it's always fun to debate with you, because you are so good at finding connective points to support the way you view a subject. What I do not want, & I'm sure you both understand & agree with me, is acrimony. We've all put in so much time in support of what was a dead-end franchise for decades that we should be enjoying ourselves now rather than regretting/debating dead issues.

You may be right that we would have won a stare-down with Porzingis about his opting out. How can I deny that possibility?

OTOH, had you been wrong (& again that possibility cannot be denied), the sequence of events could not have unfolded that turned into Smart, Jones, a R1 pick this year, & a future R2 pick (at the additional cost of a R2 pick from us). Thus, we can't simply reduce the original situation to "Porzingis for Tyus Jones."

I don't have to assign a positive value to the 2 veteran contracts to recognize that they brought us Bagley & the #35 pick in 2022. Nor to mention what Bagley & that pick brought us. Those are the events & that's how they unrolled. I.e. the resources for which we traded KP, plus 1 R2 pick, have turned into Smart, Jones, the #18 (maybe?) pick in the upcoming draft, & a pair of R2 picks.

You can still argue that we could have gotten Boston to throw in a R1 pick. So much the better! But, you can't deny that overall we came out with a bunch of benefits which are non-negligible & directly traceable to the KP trade & its terms.

Peace!

It's all good. I'm not trying to be antagonistic. But I think you saying that Gallo + Muscala equals "value" when they are in fact less valuable as a trade chip than the raw cap room we would have had in their place is deceptive.

[payitforward]

Could we have turned that "raw cap room" (plus a R2 pick) into more value than Smart, Jones, the Memphis R1 pick this year, & 2 future R2 picks?

If so, by what path?

[nate33]

Could we have turned that "raw cap room" (plus a R2 pick) into more value than Smart, Jones, the Memphis R1 pick this year, & 2 future R2 picks?

If so, by what path?

Certainly we could have done the exact same path as we did with Gallo and Muscala, only we would have given Detroit a large TPE instead of the dead weight contracts of Muscala and Gallo.

[payitforward]

Could we have turned that "raw cap room" (plus a R2 pick) into more value than Smart, Jones, the Memphis R1 pick this year, & 2 future R2 picks?

If so, by what path?

Certainly we could have done the exact same path as we did with Gallo and Muscala, only we would have given Detroit a large TPE instead of the dead weight contracts of Muscala and Gallo.

Fair enough. Hence, when you wrote...

...Gallo + Muscala ...are in fact less valuable as a trade chip than the raw cap room we would have had in their place...

...you were exaggerating slightly -- you have us getting the same results but with a TPE rather than the G & M contracts.

Except (hah!) I remind you that

a. we also got the #35 pick in 2024 as part of the Gallo/Muscala <> Bagley trade. Which we moved for two R2 picks in later years. Plus...

b. using the TPE would have prevented us using it for some other purpose (tho this might be irrelevant if the tpe has expired).

[nate33]

Could we have turned that "raw cap room" (plus a R2 pick) into more value than Smart, Jones, the Memphis R1 pick this year, & 2 future R2 picks?

If so, by what path?

Certainly we could have done the exact same path as we did with Gallo and Muscala, only we would have given Detroit a large TPE instead of the dead weight contracts of Muscala and Gallo.

Fair enough. Hence, when you wrote...

...Gallo + Muscala ...are in fact less valuable as a trade chip than the raw cap room we would have had in their place...

...you were exaggerating slightly -- you have us getting the same results but with a TPE rather than the G & M contracts.

Except (hah!) I remind you that

a. we also got the #35 pick in 2024 as part of the Gallo/Muscala <> Bagley trade. Which we moved for two R2 picks in later years. Plus...

b. using the TPE would have prevented us using it for some other purpose (tho this might be irrelevant if the tpe has expired).

I don't understand (a.). We would still be getting that #35 pick in a hypothetical Bagley trade where we send out a TPE (in place of Gallo + Muscala) and get back Bagley.

There is another reasonable scenario that I failed to mention.

If we let Porzingis walk, and he had no choice but to go to Detroit, we could have then called up Detroit and asked them to turn the Porzingis free agency signing into a Porzingis S&T whereby we trade Porzingis and they give us a $30M TPE and a top 55 protected SRP. Teams usually do this out of courtesy, because it costs them nothing. (Maybe we give them a little extra cash to pay for that top 55 protected pick.)

Now we would be shopping around a $30M TPE instead of the $12M in expiring contracts of Muscala and Gallo. A $30M TPE is WAY more valuable than Muscala + Gallo.

[nate33]

I'm tired of discussing this. Suffice to say, we got jack squat in the Porzingis departure and I think there were scenarios where we could have done better. You disagree. Let's just end it there.

[AFM]

2nerdsfighting.jpeg

[doclinkin]

Odd to me to see how hard people work to downplay the work this front office has done in deconstructing the team and digging the foundation for a full rebuild. Seems to me everything they have done has been with significant foresight and forward planning. They articulated a plan early and have not deviated from it.

The Plan: Be terrible early, trade assets for future picks, tank heavy and hard to get out from the encumbered lottery pick, capitalize on back to back strong draft classes. In every trade bring back young assets with upside or future picks. Stockpile as many picks as possible by trading cap space for future selections. Fill the top of the cap with large contract vets, with juice of extra picks, then ship them when they are expiring and recoup more picks. At every point try to improve the draft position of those picks, or with swaps to improve the draft position of our own picks. Spend 2nd round picks freely to climb the draft ladder, especially to snatch a guy your scouts like. Draft young, draft long, draft IQ, draft character, draft for upside more than box score numbers, so they can take their time developing while we are meant to suck. Lose to get lucky. Stockpile %'s ruthlessly.

This they did. In one thread you will hear detractors hate on the Deni trade, saying we still could have lost with him on the roster, and still traded him for better value (even if he would have split minutes with the 6 other forwards we had).
We hear how we should have traded Kuzma instead -- who was critical to our early tanking effort, and is stinking it up in Milwaukee.
Then we hear from the same posters how Deni was worth a 15 game swing in the West. Which would have put as at 8th this year. In the East, with a weaker schedule.

Not every move they make is going to be your favorite. You can second guess any front office. But the moves they did make are consistent with their focus. Will said it in his end of year presser, until the lotto picks are no longer encumbered they are still in the deconstruction phase.

If we luck out on May 12. If we keep our top 8 pick next year. Then the plan will have worked. Or Step One of it anyway.

I'm curious about the moves they make AFTER that. Once they are focussed on trying to win. To make the playoffs then go on a run. We haven't seen what skill they have in building a contender. But as far as fixating on the draft and squeezing every bit of juice out of that, they have definitely done what they said they were going to do. Even when it hurts.

[doclinkin]

Talk all you want about what they mighta coulda done, but what they actually did do was:

Turn Porzingis into Smart, Colby, pick #18 in this draft and two 2nd rounders.
(And lose enough to earn Sarr behind Gallo and Muscala).
Turn Gafford into Kyshawn and Richaun Holmes (who gave us equal or better production to Gafford).
Land Valanciunas in a sign and trade for a SRP, then ship him for 2 SRPs.
Turn Kuzma into Middleton AJ Johnson, and a possible pick swap when the Bucks are likely to lose Giannis, and Portland has their entire roster up for raises and renewal.
Turn Beal and the worst contract in the league into a potential gold mine of picks and swaps. Plus Jordan Poole, a highly productive tank commander, if that's not an oxymoron.
Claim Jared Butler and his heart condition off the scrap heap and develop him in our minor league team til we were able to turn him into a 1st round pick from Philadelphia.
Develop castoff Justin Champagnie into a highly productive role player in that same farm team system.

And yeah we shipped Deni in order to lose. While picking up a rookie who played all 82 games this year, more minutes than any other rookie, who shows signs of being a truly solid future player, in a year that had to be the hardest year of his life, both from a professional and a personal standpoint with the fatal illness of his father as a possible distraction. Plus two 2nd round picks, and one distant 1st.

As missteps:

1. When Deni becomes an all-star or all NBA player, or wins a championship with Portland, it will suck.
2. Tyus Jones chose to take less money than the S&T we had set up for him, since he wanted to be the starting PG on team that was built to run deep into the postseason. He wasn't.
3. Porzingis is a really nice player and we should have got more, despite the fact that the deal we did have (Clippers 1st rounder + +) fell apart in the final hour because Brogdon didn't pass the physical. So we pivoted and got the pieces that resulted in Sarr, Smart, the Grizz FRP, and two seconds.
4. When we were the suckers who traded for Brogdon he was (predictably) injured and therefore we got nothing in value for him in trade. So yeah, we got even less than we shouldacoulda in the Deni deal.

All but #1 are pretty much nitpickery. The Deni swap was a gamble. It hinges mostly on how well we do the next 1-2 drafts, and if Bub turns out to have a really good career for us. But if we gambled and lost, okay, it was a swing and miss, and at least it follows a plan. Nice that we actually have one of those. Plans.

[Northwest Roddy]

Amen!

[payitforward]

...I feel that Nate was right though that it was better not to even resign KP given that the money saved could have been used to acquire more 2nd round picks. And having Jones netted the Wizards ultimately nothing....

?? Colby Jones is 22, he's quite a promising player & has performed well for us so far. Just the kind of kid we need.

Granted the Marcus Smart piece worked out badly for the Grizzlies but so much so that it netted the Wizards a first round pick in a separate deal but as for the KP trade, it looked underwhelming at the time and pointless now from my perspective.

...we don't need to pretend that the Dawkins/Winger regime is perfect.

For sure not! Nobody is perfect. But they've been extraordinarily good so far, that's for sure! TBH I've been in shock at how much they've been able to get done in 21 months.

1. The Beal trade was a triumph. Pure & simple.
2. Moving CP3 for players & picks was a triumph -- what did GS go on to get for him? Zero. Nothing.
3. We've added 9 guys 23 or under in a series of draft picks & other clever moves. Pretty much all of them give evidence of a lot of promise.*
4. We've acquired a boatload of draft capital that will net us many many more young players going forward.

*
1. Justin Champagnie is a very very good young NBA player who has put up outstanding numbers & continues to grow.
2. AJ Johnson has a ton of promise -- he's everything you could ask for in a prospect his age.
3. Bilal Coulibaly has an interstellar upside & is already growing rapidly as a player.
4. Colby Jones has been absolutely terrific so far. He looks like a guy who will have a long, productive NBA career.
5. Jaylen Martin seems to have a ton of talent and just turned 21.
6. Sarr, Kyshawn & Carrington all look like they're going to be productive players for a long time in this league.
7. Vukcevic can score the ball for sure. For the rest we'll have to see.

On top of all that, Smart, Middleton & Holmes all look like helpful mentors for a young team.

Overall, the biggest thing so far is that Winger & Dawkins had definitively put the past behind us! Hallelujah!!

[Kanyewest]

...I feel that Nate was right though that it was better not to even resign KP given that the money saved could have been used to acquire more 2nd round picks. And having Jones netted the Wizards ultimately nothing....

?? Colby Jones is 22, he's quite a promising player & has performed well for us so far. Just the kind of kid we need.

Granted the Marcus Smart piece worked out badly for the Grizzlies but so much so that it netted the Wizards a first round pick in a separate deal but as for the KP trade, it looked underwhelming at the time and pointless now from my perspective.

...we don't need to pretend that the Dawkins/Winger regime is perfect.

For sure not! Nobody is perfect. But they've been extraordinarily good so far, that's for sure! TBH I've been in shock at how much they've been able to get done in 21 months.

1. The Beal trade was a triumph. Pure & simple.
2. Moving CP3 for players & picks was a triumph -- what did GS go on to get for him? Zero. Nothing.
3. We've added 9 guys 23 or under in a series of draft picks & other clever moves. Pretty much all of them give evidence of a lot of promise.*
4. We've acquired a boatload of draft capital that will net us many many more young players going forward.

*
1. Justin Champagnie is a very very good young NBA player who has put up outstanding numbers & continues to grow.
2. AJ Johnson has a ton of promise -- he's everything you could ask for in a prospect his age.
3. Bilal Coulibaly has an interstellar upside & is already growing rapidly as a player.
4. Colby Jones has been absolutely terrific so far. He looks like a guy who will have a long, productive NBA career.
5. Jaylen Martin seems to have a ton of talent and just turned 21.
6. Sarr, Kyshawn & Carrington all look like they're going to be productive players for a long time in this league.
7. Vukcevic can score the ball for sure. For the rest we'll have to see.

On top of all that, Smart, Middleton & Holmes all look like helpful mentors for a young team.

Overall, the biggest thing so far is that Winger & Dawkins had definitively put the past behind us! Hallelujah!!

Tyus Jones