Official Trade Thread Part XLVII

[tontoz]

Houston and Detroit had several years in the toilet before becoming respectable. Houston had a lot more to work with since they got 4 first round picks for trading Harden.

A lot depends on lottery luck and hitting on picks.

[trast66]

When does this FO office of Dawkins, Schlenk,and Winger get held accountable for wins.? Can’t come soon enough for me cause that will mark the beginning of the end for DSW as the losing will continue. Moving deck chairs around for cap space and/or for pieces that remain unproven in terms of real difference makers is growing tiresome. Ted blew it again, Washington will not create what happened in OKC. What happened in OKC is unique to OKC. Washington will have to forge their own way and I am afraid this group is not equipped to make it happen. If Ted had gotten it right, we would already have seen linear progress. Instead, we swirl and, with this group, will continue to swirl in the cesspool of poor to mediocre NBA play.

2028-2029 will be first season with expectations of a playoff run. If not, then the FO may lose job.

[thebigE]

Houston and Detroit had several years in the toilet before becoming respectable. Houston had a lot more to work with since they got 4 first round picks for trading Harden.

A lot depends on lottery luck and hitting on picks.

Hitting on picks and what you do to ensure the likelihood you do. Therein lies the key. Draft Lottery Luck and more importantly Draft Lottery Luck in the right year? Forget it. Not in Washington.

[payitforward]

So where do you think Dawkins will be at the end of this so called rebuild and when? And what will you accept at that point as success? I would hope no less than a World championship if you are willing to wait....

World championship?
You mean a title of course. & you are right that's what to hope for. But the metric of success, to me at least, is being a serious contender for a chip. If you don't get there you've failed. Once you do get there, well... then you run into other successful organizations. You hope to win; you have a solid chance to win. That for sure. Without that, no success.

At some point accountability in terms of wins must be part of the evaluation. I don’t see any progress on that front and I expected to see more by now. ...

Not only could this definitely NOT be expected, it wasn't and isn't even part of the plan! Dawkins said specifically that the first phase would be "deconstruction." The Wizards were a completely useless team. No talent. No chance to trade for talent. No chance to sign FA talent. Taking apart the entire thing was what came first.

& we're not really entirely through with that, IMO. Close but not there. Nor will we win - or intend to win - many games next season. At least I sure hope not! If we do, we lose our R1 pick in what's thought likely to be an extremely rich draft.

This 5 year thing is something the media tries to pass along as reasonable to expect....

How long it takes to get where you're going is a function of where you are when you start your journey. If you thought there was a way to turn the Wiz mess into wins in 2 years, feel free to suggest how you would have gone about it. TBH, I doubt you can.

[TGW]

So where do you think Dawkins will be at the end of this so called rebuild and when? And what will you accept at that point as success? I would hope no less than a World
championship if you are willing to wait. At some point accountability in terms of wins must be part of the evaluation. I don’t see any progress on that front and I expected to see more by now.
This 5 year thing is something the media tries to pass along as reasonable to expect. If you want to buy that, have at it. I don’t necessarily agree.
My standards are higher than that. Greatness comes in all forms and knows no bounds of time. My bet is DSW ain’t great.

How long did Grunfail have the job? Was it 14 years without a 50 win season or a trip to the ECF?

Yes, but Grunfeld certainly shouldn’t be the bar or standard as I am sure you know.

Thank you. You can assess Dawkins' performance without bringing up Grunfeld. We all know he was a mediocre-at-best GM.

[thebigE]

So where do you think Dawkins will be at the end of this so called rebuild and when? And what will you accept at that point as success? I would hope no less than a World championship if you are willing to wait....

World championship?
You mean a title of course. & you are right that's what to hope for. But the metric of success, to me at least, is being a serious contender for a chip. If you don't get there you've failed. Once you do get there, well... then you run into other successful organizations. You hope to win; you have a solid chance to win. That for sure. Without that, no success.

At some point accountability in terms of wins must be part of the evaluation. I don’t see any progress on that front and I expected to see more by now. ...

Not only could this definitely NOT be expected, it wasn't and isn't even part of the plan! Dawkins said specifically that the first phase would be "deconstruction." The Wizards were a completely useless team. No talent. No chance to trade for talent. No chance to sign FA talent. Taking apart the entire thing was what came first.

& we're not really entirely through with that, IMO. Close but not there. Nor will we win - or intend to win - many games next season. At least I sure hope not! If we do, we lose our R1 pick in what's thought likely to be an extremely rich draft.

This 5 year thing is something the media tries to pass along as reasonable to expect....

How long it takes to get where you're going is a function of where you are when you start your journey. If you thought there was a way to turn the Wiz mess into wins in 2 years, feel free to suggest how you would have gone about it. TBH, I doubt you can.

You’re right I don’t have the answers, but I am not paid to have the answers. DSW are. You are right DSW didn’t promise they would deliver a championship in 2 years. I am just not sure we should all be accepting that every move is ok and building towards something under the guise we need to give it time. At some point time gets away from you very quickly. My question is what is that point when time begins to slip away. Hard to say.

I am sure there have been franchises in the past that turned it around faster than expected despite the obstacles, and my bet is those franchises had a FO that will, for most part, go down as difference makers. I expect greatness. I am not convinced we have it and I’ve seen nothing to prove definitively otherwise. I hope I am wrong. Go get it , or as some believe add to it, tomorrow night DSW!

[DCZards]

You’re right I don’t have the answers, but I am not paid to have the answers. DSW are. You are right DSW didn’t promise they would deliver a championship in 2 years. I am just not sure we should all be accepting that every move is ok and building towards something under the guise we need to give it time. At some point time gets away from you very quickly. My question is what is that point when time begins to slip away. Hard to say.

I am sure there have been franchises in the past that turned it around faster than expected despite the obstacles, and my bet is those franchises had a FO that will, for most part, go down as difference makers. I expect greatness. I am not convinced we have it and I’ve seen nothing to prove definitively otherwise. I hope I am wrong. Go get it , or as some believe add to it, tomorrow night DSW!

I don’t have a timeline but I do know we need to give this new regime more than the two years that it has had thus far.

This FO has been drafting and developing young talent, accumulating draft picks, and freeing up cap space. Those are good, smart moves that suggest there’s a long term vision to build a winner.

Like it or not, patience is required when the bball team you root for is doing a total rebuild.

[gesa2]

I think when we retrospectively grade people on their work in an environment where chance has a large effect on the outcome we overfit the idea of greatness on the lucky

[The Consiglieri]

I'm just amused as hell that after 42 years of dog---- being run exactly the same way every decade, nearly every season, we change it up for two seasons, lol, do it the right way for once, and we've got some people losing their minds in frustration. It's so beyond absurd I don't even know where to begin. It's like some of you miss bouncing back between 25 and 40 win seasons 90% of the time since Jimmy Carter, literally never being relevant in the NBA ever, since Kramer vs Kramer came out AND BEFORE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK CAME OUT.

It's just so absurd it's barely worth responding to.

They are doing a tear down rebuild, full stop, and they are doing it properly, for really, only the 2nd time in the last 45 years (which only lasted really from '10-'13 the previous time before they gave up and went with quick fixes), and so far, no lottery luck whatsoever, and they're still doing it right....I don't know about other people, but when the idiot GM's did their dumb--- dance with Beal for four years after Wall went down in the shower, some of us, certainly me, knew that we needed to trade Beal immediately at peak value for whatever class between '19, '20, '21 and '22 was best within that winter deadline of '19 to '21 to summer '22 window: the second Wall went down they had to decide when and how to move Beal for the giant pick package, and they needed to have scouted out probably the '20-'22 classes and figure out which picks to prioritize. Instead they made the worst decision possible, pretending they could contend, and that Brad actually did want to stay, and rendered his value a net negative, from a giant pile of goodies that was possible in the 12, 18, 24, 36 months preceding summer '23. The second those terrible decisions were made, in '19, '20, '21, and '22, the writing was on the wall that the rebuild, instead of potentially being finished by '22-'24, would instead be finished, AT THE EARLIEST, by the '26-'27 season. The reality that some here don't understand that, is utterly confounding to me. They made the twin horror show decisions to both torpedo Beal's value to the lowest humanly possible in the window between '19-'23, before selling him at the absolute worst time humanly possible, but also, they managed to be stupid enough to start their tank during the run up to the worst top of a draft class since possibly 2000. All of this guaranteed we'd have to be insanely lucky in the lottery in '25 and '26, to contend by '25-'26, moderately lucky to contend by '26-'27, and not lucky at all, would guarantee we'd contend at the earliest, by only '27-'28.

Like, this was obvious three freaking years ago. And people still don't get this?!?!?! Literally nothing this new FO could do could fix the giant chicxulub sized crater Sheppard and EG left w/o tanking through the following four seasons at minimum, and that's if we had lottery luck in '25 AND '26. We're only beginning tank year 3 here folks, if you can't handle a reality that was obvious as hell three years ago, four years ago, five years, six years ago, you should probably get off the ride and follow another sport until '28 or '29. Seriously.

If you've got a problem with that, I honestly have no idea what to tell you beyond you have zero idea how to become a relevant team if you're not in LA or a team the NBA rigs lotteries for.

Do what I do, enjoy the Commanders, enjoy the miracle short cut the Capitals had with back to back to back great mix of classes, FA signings and trades, get ready for WC '26, enjoy this CWC where a New Zealand school teacher equalized for Aukland City against the pride of Argentina Boca Juniors yesterday etc. There is a lot of stuff to watch, this was always, always going to be ugly and likely take 3-5 years to fix. We didn't have the built in short cuts OKC, and Houston and another team or two had by taking advantage of monstrously stupid teams like the Clippers, or Sacramento or whatever....we were the stupid team, and these guys had to desperately find a way to find mini potential short cuts instead of(in the form of pick swaps and distant firsts).....

[payitforward]

You’re right I don’t have the answers, but I am not paid to have the answers. DSW are....

Nah. No one can have the answers in advance of their efforts! Do your work well, & there will be results. We'll make judgments based on results.

I am just not sure we should all be accepting that every move is ok and building towards something under the guise we need to give it time....

You're right -- of course. But, what you can acquire to improve yourself quickly is a function of what you have to give in return, & we had basically no talent to work with other than Deni. KP was opting out, Beal was a drag sail, & there was nothing else of value on our roster -- neither to keep nor to trade.

You can make your own judgment, but I thought the '23 off season moves were excellent. We got WAY more for Brad than I thought we would, for example. As to the '24 off season, you can argue with trading Deni, & obviously people have, but I understood the need to start over & I understood the interest in Bub.

...time gets away from you very quickly. My question is what is that point when time begins to slip away. Hard to say....

Holy moly! What do you imagine they could have done w/ the mess they inherited? To get positive results in less than two years?

...I am sure there have been franchises in the past that turned it around faster than expected despite the obstacles, and my bet is those franchises had a FO that will, for most part, go down as difference makers. I expect greatness. I am not convinced we have it and I’ve seen nothing to prove definitively otherwise. I hope I am wrong. Go get it , or as some believe add to it, tomorrow night DSW!

I can't think of any 2-3 year rebuilds from having nothing to serious success.

My main metric is motion -- & we are definitely in motion. We are busily rebuilding this franchise from the ground up, which it obviously needed! If we weren't doing that, I'd be worried.

For the rest, I fear your patience & mine will be required! -- &, no doubt, tested as well.

[thebigE]

You’re right I don’t have the answers, but I am not paid to have the answers. DSW are....

Nah. No one can have the answers in advance of their efforts! Do your work well, & there will be results. We'll make judgments based on results.

I am just not sure we should all be accepting that every move is ok and building towards something under the guise we need to give it time....

You're right -- of course. But, what you can acquire to improve yourself quickly is a function of what you have to give in return, & we had basically no talent to work with other than Deni. KP was opting out, Beal was a drag sail, & there was nothing else of value on our roster -- neither to keep nor to trade.

You can make your own judgment, but I thought the '23 off season moves were excellent. We got WAY more for Brad than I thought we would, for example. As to the '24 off season, you can argue with trading Deni, & obviously people have, but I understood the need to start over & I understood the interest in Bub.

...time gets away from you very quickly. My question is what is that point when time begins to slip away. Hard to say....

Holy moly! What do you imagine they could have done w/ the mess they inherited? To get positive results in less than two years?

...I am sure there have been franchises in the past that turned it around faster than expected despite the obstacles, and my bet is those franchises had a FO that will, for most part, go down as difference makers. I expect greatness. I am not convinced we have it and I’ve seen nothing to prove definitively otherwise. I hope I am wrong. Go get it , or as some believe add to it, tomorrow night DSW!

I can't think of any 2-3 year rebuilds from having nothing to serious success.

My main metric is motion -- & we are definitely in motion. We are busily rebuilding this franchise from the ground up, which it obviously needed! If we weren't doing that, I'd be worried.

For the rest, I fear your patience & mine will be required! -- &, no doubt, tested as well.

I think the rope given is too long, but I would hope that if we don’t see significant improvement in season 4 of this regime it will be called out for what it is and necessary changes will be made. Problem is where are you then?

[Silvie Lysandra]

It's like some of you miss bouncing back between 25 and 40 win seasons 90% of the time since Jimmy Carter, literally never being relevant in the NBA ever, since Kramer vs Kramer came out AND BEFORE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK CAME OUT.

It's pretty clear they DO miss that, because as much as fans say they're okay with rebuilds, they're not. Going 34-48 or whatever means you're "relevant". You can cope. You can talk yourself into thinking your 38-44 win team might be something with a little luck, with the right MLE signing, etc etc. Winger and Dawkins are embracing the suck at all costs, and people don't like embracing the suck, so they set up ridiculous expectations to justify not embracing the suck anymore.

The suck may not work - you can certainly dream of being Indiana or Miami that never truly tanked and built Finals level teams out of late lottery picks. But notice that those teams always lost to the teams that tanked for their stars and churned through talent until they found their guys.

[The Consiglieri]

I know and it's so mind numbingly insane to me.

Literally the only pieces of hope in DC the last 30 years:

The Ovy Caps

The Strasburg Nats

The Jayden Daniels Commanders

The Wall/Beal/Porter/Gortat Wizards

The only local teams to accomplish anything the last 30 years were all a product of tanking, all of it, and were all largely a product of YEARS UPON YEARS of suffering and rebuilding via tear downs.

How the ---- Wizards fans have no patience for this is beyond me, and I say this as someone totally incensed at what they did with the draft capital for this class. The only guys I didn't want in the top 6 were Tre and Kon, so they take Tre (lol, probably because Kon was gone).

Literally every single big I wanted was peeled off in the six or seven picks before slot 18 as we refused to try and move up (admittedly probably didn't have the pieces to get it done, 2nd's only move you so far up).

I absolutely loathed what we did with these first rounders.

But there's still hope, both guys are young as hell, as I predicted (I've seen no history whatsoever that guys around here people liked like Clayton, Clifford, Wolf etc would be targets, these guys draft 18-19 year olds, 1 20 year old), both guys have potential, they just aren't who I wanted, but there's some reasoning behind it, and evidence to justify it, it's just not what I wanted or would have done, but that's just me....and this was the cards they were dealt when they stupidly had Bub and other good players on the floor for the last play of the game of the season. Why in ---- they were actually trying to win that game, or any game the last month of the season was literally the only thing I've found much fault with (well, not trading Kuzma for two firsts, and trading Deni too early and for too little) during this rebuild, it cost us Bailey, a player ranked #2 in the class going into the 2024-2025 college season, that's how much that dumb--- final month of the season and this stupid ----ing lottery cost us (at minimum anyway). But who knows, maybe Tre figures it out, it all depends upon what's in-between his ears, and in his chest. We'll see.

But yeah, the lack of patience for the rebuild is hilarious. Like seriously, it's been 45 years of dog ----, never ending dog ---- for the diehards born in the fifties, sixties and seventies, for me, watching since the mid eighties, basically 40 years of never ending ---- sandwiches. If you were a. redskins fan as a kid in the 70s and 80s, you can understand the analogy. The Wizards/Boulez have basically been the equivalent of the 80's Buccaneers, '80's Cardinals, '60's and 70's Saints etc, for 45 freaking years. It's insane. Literally no hope ever, period. How many teams have had it close to that bad. Charlotte. Anyone else? Even the Clippers have had their moment lol. But not us, we are like the anti-Jim Harbaugh's. Why Not Us! He likes to shout. We all know why, we're cursed.

But at least these guys are smart enough to engage the only way to beat such a curse, to face it head on and just suck, and take advantage of idiot teams like the Suns, teams that are in denial, like our management has been for most of our history.

[Tyrone Messby]

I don’t mind the tanking at all. We’ve needed to do it for years but this draft lotto was a kick in the lotto balls and then tonight was…underwhelming. There is no #1 on this team and I think that’s was is so depressing after being convinced we’d land one of Flagg, Harper , or Ace. I’ll forever hate the Jazz after they handled the tanking and then taking Ace who clearly didn’t want to go there. Just annoying punks

[The Consiglieri]

And by any metric, we were far worse than them this past season, we just ran off a ridiculous stretch to end the season. After starting 9-47, we finished it 9-17, it was monstrously idiotic, and a humorous illustration of just how important Kuzma was for tanking lol. Meanwhile in that same stretch, Utah went full quiet, 3-23 to end the season. I don't mind them tanking, what I mind is the league's horse ---- punishment of tanking. Wtf is Utah supposed to do? Nobody on this planet wants to move their beyond outdoorsmen and women, and Mormons (I actually like Salt Lake and have been there close to a dozen times at this point, but it is not in the top 20 of cities that domestically born NBA players are longing for), should they just accept their fate of no FA's ever having any interest in the place or should they tank? Seems obvious to me, and yet the NBA says no no no. It's just ridiculous bull----, and if this league was remotely fair or on the up and up, we'd have the 2nd pick and Harper, or more likely the first pick and Flagg, simply because we were absolutely the worst, period.

So frustrating. The league is thoroughly rigged horse ----, and it doesn't even really involve whether it was rigged for Dallas (hard to believe it wasn't wasn't though), the league is titled, quite obviously, and you have to be monstrously lucky AND smart to thrive in spite of that (see OKC). We aren't lucky and have never been smart (I do think we're smart now, I understand to some extent why TGW and some others disagree). The frustrating thing for me, is knowing that unless we pull Dybantsa, Boozer, or Peterson next year (maybe Ament is a possibility), we're probably totally ----ed until at least '28 which is just obscene at this point. Like, how long do we have to suffer this same ol ----. It's basically us, and Charlotte and the Clippers who left the losers room a good decade ago. Atlanta peers through the window, admittedly, but really, it's just us and Charlotte in there, seemingly in perpetuity. Even the offing Kings and Cavs and yes the Clippers climbed out in the past 25 years but not us, never, not us.

So I keep waiting, and hoping, to almost quote Buddy Holly, maybe we'll land someone next year. But I also wonder if the SoWiz thing next year is slotting in 5th pre lottery than beating the reverse odds and giving the Knicks our pick. That is the next horrible thing to happen right? Other than multiple torn achilles getting off the airplane to Bilal, Sarr, Bub, and Tre (I'm picturing them tumbling down the movable stairs lol now).....

[Silvie Lysandra]

And by any metric, we were far worse than them this past season, we just ran off a ridiculous stretch to end the season. After starting 9-47, we finished it 9-17, it was monstrously idiotic, and a humorous illustration of just how important Kuzma was for tanking lol.

When you start 9-47, then 9-17 shouldn't destroy your tank. Don't blame the kids for trying to compete, or Keefe for letting them, blame the NBA for buying into this idea that tanking is the worst thing ever and nerfing it so that the 70th game of the season is slightly more interesting for casual fans.
For whatever reason, the league wants a couple of teams to be perennial bottom-feeders; they're comfy with the Wizards in that role. The same thing happened to the Redskins/Commanders which is why it took Snyder being a rapist to get rid of him.

Winger and Dawkins might fail, just because the luck aspect of building a franchise is brutal. But they've done it the right way. Process (ahem) over outcome. We're singing a very different tune about this rebuild if we were adding Flagg or Harper to this team.

With that said, I like Tre Johnson. High floor, decent ceiling (think a Klay Thompson), and I like the *idea* of what they're doing (length/size, shooting, skills).

[penbeast0]

.... Even the offing Kings and Cavs and yes the Clippers climbed out in the past 25 years but not us, never, not us.

So I keep waiting, and hoping, to almost quote Buddy Holly, maybe we'll land someone next year. But I also wonder if the SoWiz thing next year is slotting in 5th pre lottery than beating the reverse odds and giving the Knicks our pick. That is the next horrible thing to happen right? Other than multiple torn achilles getting off the airplane to Bilal, Sarr, Bub, and Tre (I'm picturing them tumbling down the movable stairs lol now).....

Actually, 45 years. The 80s and 90s weren't good either.

[The Consiglieri]

.... Even the offing Kings and Cavs and yes the Clippers climbed out in the past 25 years but not us, never, not us.

So I keep waiting, and hoping, to almost quote Buddy Holly, maybe we'll land someone next year. But I also wonder if the SoWiz thing next year is slotting in 5th pre lottery than beating the reverse odds and giving the Knicks our pick. That is the next horrible thing to happen right? Other than multiple torn achilles getting off the airplane to Bilal, Sarr, Bub, and Tre (I'm picturing them tumbling down the movable stairs lol now).....

Actually, 45 years. The 80s and 90s weren't good either.

Oh, I remember, nothing like taking Mugsy Bogues in 1987 and Tom Hammonds in 1989 inside the top 12. Literally zero value whatsoever, beyond Mugsy Marketing with Manute (which I'm 1000% sure was their reasoning lol, truly mom and pop level GM work there).

Yeah, the 80s was basically getting eviscerated by the Isaiah Thomas as an 8 seed, and that was in the good years lol.

[The Consiglieri]

And by any metric, we were far worse than them this past season, we just ran off a ridiculous stretch to end the season. After starting 9-47, we finished it 9-17, it was monstrously idiotic, and a humorous illustration of just how important Kuzma was for tanking lol.

When you start 9-47, then 9-17 shouldn't destroy your tank. Don't blame the kids for trying to compete, or Keefe for letting them, blame the NBA for buying into this idea that tanking is the worst thing ever and nerfing it so that the 70th game of the season is slightly more interesting for casual fans.
For whatever reason, the league wants a couple of teams to be perennial bottom-feeders; they're comfy with the Wizards in that role. The same thing happened to the Redskins/Commanders which is why it took Snyder being a rapist to get rid of him.

Winger and Dawkins might fail, just because the luck aspect of building a franchise is brutal. But they've done it the right way. Process (ahem) over outcome. We're singing a very different tune about this rebuild if we were adding Flagg or Harper to this team.

With that said, I like Tre Johnson. High floor, decent ceiling (think a Klay Thompson), and I like the *idea* of what they're doing (length/size, shooting, skills).

I 1000% blame the league for the idiotic lottery system and have said as much. Tanking is 1000% legitimate, especially in a ridiculous rigged league like this one where flagship cities and teams essentially dictate everything in free agency and piles of teams have no chance whatsoever of ever, ever drawing a top end free agent, unlike baseball, hockey or football. Basketball is flat out ridiculous bull---- and the fact that they have a lottery is so patently absurd it beggars belief and absolutely invites conspiracy theories left and right.

I also blame the FO because I would have simply tanked and dared the league to ---- me over down the stretch. And I sure as hell would have sat my best players when any result was on the line. Sounds like the leagues approach actually has teeth, but I'm sure there are ways you can test it, plus I'd 1000% push Ted to join up with the hopeless, totally ----ed cities like Charlotte, Orlando, Milwaukee after Giannis leaves, Salt Lake etc to force the league to abandon this horse ----. It's absolutely 1000% set up to benefit Boston, NY, LA , Texas teams etc, and screw over the little guys. It's time to get rid of it.

[penbeast0]

Make the top pick (or the highest lottery odds) go to the best record to fail to make the playoffs and prohibit trading picks more than 1 year ahead. The rebuilding teams give lower rated and drafted players a chance to shine and develop to the point where they can get a star and teams have an incentive to win even in a rebuilding year.