How is this not a super Mid plan? what's the pitch on our direction

[tsherkin]

I also think people act like the likelihood of getting a Wemby or LeBron or even Flagg in the draft is high.

That as well.

The #1 pick has come through with a player of that quality only so many times in the past quarter century, less frequently than in the past, and even the rest of the draft has become a bit more of a crapshoot than it used to be... and even then, it was a dicey proposition.

[ConSarnit]

Counter: if we’re relying on another Kawhi like deal to save us we’re going to be waiting for a while.

Of course we're going to be waiting for a while before we have a chance at another title. Like 36% of the league doesn't even have ONE, and most of the titles in the past 45 years have been won by Boston, Chicago, LA, San Antonio and Golden State.

Our plan now has to be "get better, accumulate assets, and see what happens." That's it. No big, deeply-projected anything. Just try not to suck ass for a while and breathe in some seasons over .500 for a while, maybe some playoff appearances, possibly a playoff series victory or two.

I think some are forgetting exactly how much luck goes into developing a team which can authentically contend for a title, let alone actually win one. We need to take a step out of the crapper before we can worry about anything else. And then trades and draft and who knows what'll happen?

I also think people act like the likelihood of getting a Wemby or LeBron or even Flagg in the draft is high. Even if you tank you’re not guaranteed to get a guy like that. Even less so now with the flattened odds. And there are many drafts that do not produce players on that level at all even if you get the number one pick. With the way stars are forever asking out these days there’s probably a higher percentage chance of us trading for a star if we accumulate the assets needed than drafting a top 5-10 player.

When has any star ever wanted to come here?

We’ve had 2 years where we could have been accumulating assets for a big trade but we are decidedly mid-pack when it comes to asset bases. How are we competing with the likes of OKC, HOU or SAS when it comes to trading for a star? We don’t have a geographical advantage and we don’t have an asset advantage. If a star hits the trade market we are nowhere near the favorites to land them. If we are setting ourselves up for a big trade we have not done a good job given the current trade landscape of the league. Prices have gone way up.

Is it possible we could trade for a star? Maybe. Have we put ourselves anywhere near pole position? Absolutely not.

[ConSarnit]

I also think people act like the likelihood of getting a Wemby or LeBron or even Flagg in the draft is high.

That as well.

The #1 pick has come through with a player of that quality only so many times in the past quarter century, less frequently than in the past, and even the rest of the draft has become a bit more of a crapshoot than it used to be... and even then, it was a dicey proposition.

The likelihood of getting one of those guys is low. It’s all just math. Every other option is even lower. The odds of trading for a true #1 have to be lower than 14%. The odds of signing one have to be close to 0%. Going for that 14% chance does also not preclude you from making a big trade.

At its most basic level our chance for getting a star is most likely from (in order):

-the draft
-trade
-free agency

That’s my tanking argument. None are good options and all require luck. There’s no easy path.

[Raps in 4]

Counter: if we’re relying on another Kawhi like deal to save us we’re going to be waiting for a while.

Of course we're going to be waiting for a while before we have a chance at another title. Like 36% of the league doesn't even have ONE, and most of the titles in the past 45 years have been won by Boston, Chicago, LA, San Antonio and Golden State.

Our plan now has to be "get better, accumulate assets, and see what happens." That's it. No big, deeply-projected anything. Just try not to suck ass for a while and breathe in some seasons over .500 for a while, maybe some playoff appearances, possibly a playoff series victory or two.

I think some are forgetting exactly how much luck goes into developing a team which can authentically contend for a title, let alone actually win one. We need to take a step out of the crapper before we can worry about anything else. And then trades and draft and who knows what'll happen?

I also think people act like the likelihood of getting a Wemby or LeBron or even Flagg in the draft is high. Even if you tank you’re not guaranteed to get a guy like that. Even less so now with the flattened odds. And there are many drafts that do not produce players on that level at all even if you get the number one pick. With the way stars are forever asking out these days there’s probably a higher percentage chance of us trading for a star if we accumulate the assets needed than drafting a top 5-10 player.

You don't need a Wemby or a LeBron. You don't even need the first pick (the draft is rigged anyway). The draft is used to accumulate assets and increase the odds of finding a superstar. NBA talent can be found anywhere in the draft (obviously, the higher you pick, the more likely you are to get the player you want), so the more picks you have, the higher your odds of finding valuable players. And even if you don't find your superstar, just having a war chest of picks and prospects gives you the capital needed to swing a trade for a superstar.

Right now, the Raptors don't have a solid asset base. I hope Masai sees potential in this core that we don't. Maybe he thinks Scottie can still become an elite scorer or maybe he believes JaKobe or Dick have that potential. If so, I hope he's right.

[tsherkin]

The likelihood of getting one of those guys is low.

Of course. And if such a player IS in the draft and you DON'T get him, your championship odds drop commensurately further.

That’s my tanking argument. None are good options and all require luck. There’s no easy path.

There is no easy path. Tanking, outside of an isolated 1-year tank, is a weak strategy in general because it means you're perpetually losing and you have to fight to SHED assets in order to tank well enough to get whatever chance the draft permits. You're generally better off not doing it otherwise, especially since the draft odds were flattened and the play-in implemented.

Acquiring picks in trade is good. Acquiring assets in general is good, especially on cheaper contracts. Stockpiling picks is a thing we've seen from teams which have become successful. But protracted tanks, not so much.

In any case, we aren't gonna do that. I suspect that is clear at this point. So the focus has to become, what are we doing to accumulate assets? We are going to be better this year, barring catastrophic injuries all across the roster, so how do we go about moving pieces to improve our asset base and set ourselves up for progressive improvement?

[tsherkin]

Right now, the Raptors don't have a solid asset base. I hope Masai sees potential in this core that we don't.

I dunno, we'll have to see.

We have a good deal of youth. Maybe we don't have a lot of perennial-star-upside kind of players, but it'll be interesting to see what comes of Dick, Shead, Walter, Mogbo and so forth. Maybe we move some of them for picks. Maybe we package and trade down/up in the draft. There are various options dangling right now which Masai might exploit.

[ConSarnit]

The likelihood of getting one of those guys is low.

Of course. And if such a player IS in the draft and you DON'T get him, your championship odds drop commensurately further.

That’s my tanking argument. None are good options and all require luck. There’s no easy path.

There is no easy path. Tanking, outside of an isolated 1-year tank, is a weak strategy in general because it means you're perpetually losing and you have to fight to SHED assets in order to tank well enough to get whatever chance the draft permits. You're generally better off not doing it otherwise, especially since the draft odds were flattened and the play-in implemented.

Acquiring picks in trade is good. Acquiring assets in general is good, especially on cheaper contracts. Stockpiling picks is a thing we've seen from teams which have become successful. But protracted tanks, not so much.

In any case, we aren't gonna do that. I suspect that is clear at this point. So the focus has to become, what are we doing to accumulate assets? We are going to be better this year, barring catastrophic injuries all across the roster, so how do we go about moving pieces to improve our asset base and set ourselves up for progressive improvement?

In recent history (not to re-litigate) the moves would have been selling off some of OG/Siakam/FVV when it was clear the team was going nowhere. Instead we doubled down with the Poeltl trade. But we don’t get a redo there.

Our best chance for the future would be using our development system to develop our young players such that their value exceeds where we originally drafted them. Add some of those guys to our future draft assets and we can try and close the gap on teams with large asset caches. I think this is probably the most reasonable strategy for the near term.

[JB7]

The likelihood of getting one of those guys is low.

Of course. And if such a player IS in the draft and you DON'T get him, your championship odds drop commensurately further.

That’s my tanking argument. None are good options and all require luck. There’s no easy path.

There is no easy path. Tanking, outside of an isolated 1-year tank, is a weak strategy in general because it means you're perpetually losing and you have to fight to SHED assets in order to tank well enough to get whatever chance the draft permits. You're generally better off not doing it otherwise, especially since the draft odds were flattened and the play-in implemented.

Acquiring picks in trade is good. Acquiring assets in general is good, especially on cheaper contracts. Stockpiling picks is a thing we've seen from teams which have become successful. But protracted tanks, not so much.

In any case, we aren't gonna do that. I suspect that is clear at this point. So the focus has to become, what are we doing to accumulate assets? We are going to be better this year, barring catastrophic injuries all across the roster, so how do we go about moving pieces to improve our asset base and set ourselves up for progressive improvement?

Stockpiling picks also has its problems, because teams can only roster 15. So teams stockpiling picks are usually forced to cut good players, or trade multiple picks at a discount. And that is not even getting into the issue of expansion in the future. OKC's depth will be decimated through the expansion draft.

[tsherkin]

In recent history (not to re-litigate) the moves would have been selling off some of OG/Siakam/FVV when it was clear the team was going nowhere. Instead we doubled down with the Poeltl trade. But we don’t get a redo there.

No, we don't, so belaboring the point isn't really worthwhile. We had some management confusion over which path to take, undoubtedly, and it didn't work out. But now we have fresh opportunities.

Our best chance for the future would be using our development system to develop our young players such that their value exceeds where we originally drafted them. Add some of those guys to our future draft assets and we can try and close the gap on teams with large asset caches. I think this is probably the most reasonable strategy for the near term.

Maybe. Undercutting our success potential to develop young guys with questionable ceilings doesn't sound to me like the right path, though.

Stockpiling picks also has its problems, because teams can only roster 15.

Any strategy has problems, though. Literally any strategy has shortcomings and issues of one sort or another. We need assets. It's that simple. Doing any ONE thing won't solve the problem. And some stuff is locked behind doors of opportunity/luck anyway, so we're cut off from certain avenues.

So we just need to be open to what's available, and strive to do the best possible within each opportunity window. This is one of the crappiest parts of the off-season, because we're stuck in this circular land of all the same stuff we've all been processing all year and nothing new happening. It's frustrating, for sure. But we just have to be patient and see what Masai does next, and hope that it builds us forward.

We're probably going to do reasonably well in the draft, that's been a strength. We likely won't blow any minds, but we've had some pretty good success before. And we should have humble goals and expectations. To borrow the cliche phrase, "Rome wasn't built in a day."

[Dalek]

Neutral opinion from NBA analysts.

Watch on YouTube

Watch from 1 hr 3 min onwards for their take on the east. Charlotte, Toronto, Miami, Chicago are in the second last tier in the East.

Zach Lowe "Toronto is an an interesting position."
Wosny Lambry "What's so interesting about it?"
ZL "They have all these players you heard of."
Wosny "They have a lot of rotation guys."
ZL "They pivoted from a young team of guys who are now playing in the playoffs to another not so young team of Barnes, Barrett, Quickley and Ingram whjo in all fairness we haven't seen. They traded for Poeltl. Then the young guys they don't have a lot of shooting.

They are really expensive for a team that's not been very good...they are trying to do this middle build thing and lightning strikes and a Kawhi deal emerges."

Both say they are maybe above Charlotte but don't really like the direction because the Hornets at least have Melo. At one earlier point in the broadcast they talked about how no one cares about Ingram. Casual NBA fans couldn't name what team he is on.

They saw six strong teams: Cleveland, Boston, NY, Indy, Detroit, Orlando and they leaned towards Atlanta and Miami at seven and eight with Toronto in that talking themselves into the playoffs with others position.

[tsherkin]

[quote="Dalek"
Both say they are maybe above Charlotte but don't really like the direction because the Hornets at least have Melo.[/quote]

Which tells you much about the quality of that analysis in general, lol.

[Raps in 4]

Neutral opinion from NBA analysts.

Watch on YouTube

Watch from 1 hr 3 min onwards for their take on the east. Charlotte, Toronto, Miami, Chicago are in the second last tier in the East.

Zach Lowe "Toronto is an an interesting position."
Wosny Lambry "What's so interesting about it?"
ZL "They have all these players you heard of."
Wosny "They have a lot of rotation guys."
ZL "They pivoted from a young team of guys who are now playing in the playoffs to another not so young team of Barnes, Barrett, Quickley and Ingram whjo in all fairness we haven't seen. They traded for Poeltl. Then the young guys they don't have a lot of shooting.

They are really expensive for a team that's not been very good...they are trying to do this middle build thing and lightning strikes and a Kawhi deal emerges."

Both say they are maybe above Charlotte but don't really like the direction because the Hornets at least have Melo. At one earlier point in the broadcast they talked about how no one cares about Ingram. Casual NBA fans couldn't name what team he is on.

They saw six strong teams: Cleveland, Boston, NY, Indy, Detroit, Orlando and they leaned towards Atlanta and Miami at seven and eight with Toronto in that talking themselves into the playoffs with others position.

Lmao, that other guy doesn't know a single player on our team. He has not watched one Raptors game since 2019 I bet.

Lowe thinking Charlotte will finish ahead of us, Chicago, and Philly shows a deep lack of basketball knowledge as well. He's always been a bit of a hack, so this is nothing surprising.

I don't think our team is in a good situation at all, for what it's worth. But those two are completely clueless. NBA talking heads make RealGM posters look like basketball intellectuals.

[ConSarnit]

In recent history (not to re-litigate) the moves would have been selling off some of OG/Siakam/FVV when it was clear the team was going nowhere. Instead we doubled down with the Poeltl trade. But we don’t get a redo there.

No, we don't, so belaboring the point isn't really worthwhile. We had some management confusion over which path to take, undoubtedly, and it didn't work out. But now we have fresh opportunities.

Our best chance for the future would be using our development system to develop our young players such that their value exceeds where we originally drafted them. Add some of those guys to our future draft assets and we can try and close the gap on teams with large asset caches. I think this is probably the most reasonable strategy for the near term.

Maybe. Undercutting our success potential to develop young guys with questionable ceilings doesn't sound to me like the right path, though.

Stockpiling picks also has its problems, because teams can only roster 15.

Any strategy has problems, though. Literally any strategy has shortcomings and issues of one sort or another. We need assets. It's that simple. Doing any ONE thing won't solve the problem. And some stuff is locked behind doors of opportunity/luck anyway, so we're cut off from certain avenues.

So we just need to be open to what's available, and strive to do the best possible within each opportunity window. This is one of the crappiest parts of the off-season, because we're stuck in this circular land of all the same stuff we've all been processing all year and nothing new happening. It's frustrating, for sure. But we just have to be patient and see what Masai does next, and hope that it builds us forward.

We're probably going to do reasonably well in the draft, that's been a strength. We likely won't blow any minds, but we've had some pretty good success before. And we should have humble goals and expectations. To borrow the cliche phrase, "Rome wasn't built in a day."

If we’re not developing our own guys what is our path? We don’t have the assets to compete on the trade market otherwise. If we’re not closing that gap we’re not getting star and if we don’t get a star we’re milling around play-in territory for the foreseeable future.

What do you mean by success potential? This is a 45 win team. If we don’t hit with our young guys (either as players we keep or trade) we’re not going anywhere. If you think the young guys have questionable ceilings then what do our established guys have? We have 2 low-end all-stars and that’s it.

What are our paths here? We’ve clearly forgone the high draft pick route. We’ve foregone the stockpiling picks route. We don’t have a #1 in waiting. The keys guys are currently holding “meh” value.

Are you happy to be sitting in that 45 win zone? Just trying to gauge what you view success as (I have no issue with someone wanting a low level playoff team it’s just not the path I would choose).

[ConSarnit]

Neutral opinion from NBA analysts.

Watch on YouTube

Watch from 1 hr 3 min onwards for their take on the east. Charlotte, Toronto, Miami, Chicago are in the second last tier in the East.

Zach Lowe "Toronto is an an interesting position."
Wosny Lambry "What's so interesting about it?"
ZL "They have all these players you heard of."
Wosny "They have a lot of rotation guys."
ZL "They pivoted from a young team of guys who are now playing in the playoffs to another not so young team of Barnes, Barrett, Quickley and Ingram whjo in all fairness we haven't seen. They traded for Poeltl. Then the young guys they don't have a lot of shooting.

They are really expensive for a team that's not been very good...they are trying to do this middle build thing and lightning strikes and a Kawhi deal emerges."

Both say they are maybe above Charlotte but don't really like the direction because the Hornets at least have Melo. At one earlier point in the broadcast they talked about how no one cares about Ingram. Casual NBA fans couldn't name what team he is on.

They saw six strong teams: Cleveland, Boston, NY, Indy, Detroit, Orlando and they leaned towards Atlanta and Miami at seven and eight with Toronto in that talking themselves into the playoffs with others position.

Lmao, that other guy doesn't know a single player on our team. He has not watched one Raptors game since 2019 I bet.

Lowe thinking Charlotte will finish ahead of us, Chicago, and Philly shows a deep lack of basketball knowledge as well. He's always been a bit of a hack, so this is nothing surprising.

I don't think our team is in a good situation at all, for what it's worth. But those two are completely clueless. NBA talking heads make RealGM posters look like basketball intellectuals.

This is the problem with the board. Guess what? We are in the same tier as the Bulls and Hornets. We haven’t won a single playoff game since 2022. Until we prove we are competent again this is why we are getting lumped in with those teams. If we were the Seattle Raptors no one on this board would be high on this team at all.

[ConSarnit]

[quote="Dalek"
Both say they are maybe above Charlotte but don't really like the direction because the Hornets at least have Melo.

Which tells you much about the quality of that analysis in general, lol.[/quote]

We haven’t made the playoffs in 3 seasons and the guys that led us to those playoffs are no longer here.

We haven’t been that far off from the dregs of the league when you view it from an outside perspective.

[Raps in 4]

Neutral opinion from NBA analysts.

Watch on YouTube

Watch from 1 hr 3 min onwards for their take on the east. Charlotte, Toronto, Miami, Chicago are in the second last tier in the East.

Zach Lowe "Toronto is an an interesting position."
Wosny Lambry "What's so interesting about it?"
ZL "They have all these players you heard of."
Wosny "They have a lot of rotation guys."
ZL "They pivoted from a young team of guys who are now playing in the playoffs to another not so young team of Barnes, Barrett, Quickley and Ingram whjo in all fairness we haven't seen. They traded for Poeltl. Then the young guys they don't have a lot of shooting.

They are really expensive for a team that's not been very good...they are trying to do this middle build thing and lightning strikes and a Kawhi deal emerges."

Both say they are maybe above Charlotte but don't really like the direction because the Hornets at least have Melo. At one earlier point in the broadcast they talked about how no one cares about Ingram. Casual NBA fans couldn't name what team he is on.

They saw six strong teams: Cleveland, Boston, NY, Indy, Detroit, Orlando and they leaned towards Atlanta and Miami at seven and eight with Toronto in that talking themselves into the playoffs with others position.

Lmao, that other guy doesn't know a single player on our team. He has not watched one Raptors game since 2019 I bet.

Lowe thinking Charlotte will finish ahead of us, Chicago, and Philly shows a deep lack of basketball knowledge as well. He's always been a bit of a hack, so this is nothing surprising.

I don't think our team is in a good situation at all, for what it's worth. But those two are completely clueless. NBA talking heads make RealGM posters look like basketball intellectuals.

This is the problem with the board. Guess what? We are in the same tier as the Bulls and Hornets. We haven’t won a single playoff game since 2022. Until we prove we are competent again this is why we are getting lumped in with those teams. If we were the Seattle Raptors no one on this board would be high on this team at all.

The Raptors sat Scottie, IQ, RJ, Yak, and BI for a combined 135 games this season (Scottie was the only player who played 65 games from that group), and still finished 11 games ahead of Charlotte.

The Raptors are a treadmill team, but the Raptors are also a much better team than Charlotte. It doesn't take a genius to see that.

[tsherkin]

We haven’t made the playoffs in 3 seasons and the guys that led us to those playoffs are no longer here.

We haven’t been that far off from the dregs of the league when you view it from an outside perspective.

Yeah. Heath and tanking. The minute we stop tanking, things are going to materially change. And that's even without factoring Ingram into the equation. We were quite bad this season, but again, contextually? Expectation should be notable improvement from anyone sane.

If we’re not developing our own guys what is our path? We don’t have the assets to compete on the trade market otherwise. If we’re not closing that gap we’re not getting star and if we don’t get a star we’re milling around play-in territory for the foreseeable future.

We will see as we move forward, won't we? We need to establish what we have before anything else. Where we stand with Ingram, with health, etc.

What do you mean by success potential? This is a 45 win team. If we don’t hit with our young guys (either as players we keep or trade) we’re not going anywhere. If you think the young guys have questionable ceilings then what do our established guys have? We have 2 low-end all-stars and that’s it.

I am well aware of what we have. My point was maybe that we move them instead of developing them. Or some of them. Who knows? We need to see what we have first. Anything else is premature.

What are our paths here? We’ve clearly forgone the high draft pick route. We’ve foregone the stockpiling picks route. We don’t have a #1 in waiting. The keys guys are currently holding “meh” value.

Are you happy to be sitting in that 45 win zone? Just trying to gauge what you view success as (I have no issue with someone wanting a low level playoff team it’s just not the path I would choose).

Yes, a low-level playoff team would count to me as success for now. It isn't reasonable to expect to bounce into title contention any time soon, it isn't a sane notion.

[Anticon]

I also think people act like the likelihood of getting a Wemby or LeBron or even Flagg in the draft is high.

That as well.

The #1 pick has come through with a player of that quality only so many times in the past quarter century, less frequently than in the past, and even the rest of the draft has become a bit more of a crapshoot than it used to be... and even then, it was a dicey proposition.

To me it's less about getting a generational player but instead players like the Thompson twins. Or when we got OG in the 20s. We don't a single guy that anyone has a really confident take on as likely to be an effective playoff performer. Some of that comes from luck but also the bad decisions to trade down and out of the draft.

Last off season was a great start but came 1-3 years too late. And now they're forced to go back into trying to compete instead of still being in draft and development mode, which we still need 1-2 years of.

[djsunyc]

I also think people act like the likelihood of getting a Wemby or LeBron or even Flagg in the draft is high.

That as well.

The #1 pick has come through with a player of that quality only so many times in the past quarter century, less frequently than in the past, and even the rest of the draft has become a bit more of a crapshoot than it used to be... and even then, it was a dicey proposition.

To me it's less about getting a generational player but instead players like the Thompson twins. Or when we got OG in the 20s. We don't a single guy that anyone has a really confident take on as likely to be an effective playoff performer. Some of that comes from luck but also the bad decisions to trade down and out of the draft.

Last off season was a great start but came 1-3 years too late. And now they're forced to go back into trying to compete instead of still being in draft and development mode, which we still need 1-2 years of.

the team drafted and are trying to develop shead, jakobe, dick, mogbo, #9 and #39. that's 6 folks on the roster. that's also not including ochai. so 7 guys on rookie contracts, 5 or 6 of which will get consistent rotation minutes. we have all our future #1's. so i don't agree with your last statement.

[tsherkin]

To me it's less about getting a generational player but instead players like the Thompson twins. Or when we got OG in the 20s. We don't a single guy that anyone has a really confident take on as likely to be an effective playoff performer. Some of that comes from luck but also the bad decisions to trade down and out of the draft.

We aren't winning without that kind of player. Now, maybe we do the asset accumulation thing and parlay those into said player, that's quite possible and a viable angle, for sure. And I agree, we can hit on lower-level players to help build up our asset pool (and our team quality) along the way, but the end goal has to be That Guy (TM), without a doubt.