From Fairy Tale to Growing Pains

[magani]

Everything went well last year. The honeymoon is over now. What looked like shrewd moves last year by BC; the Bargs pick, Garbo signing, TJ trade, Mauricio signing, etc. all seem not so great in retrospect. I haven't seen a 'In BC we Trust' post forever' or 'BC is a God'. What;s happened? We are officially in 'growing pains' mode and this current collection of players has some serious flaws individually and collectively. I'm not sure what to think anymore. Some of the feelgood stories like Jose and moon were afterthoughts and not really in BCs 'plans'.

[5DOM]

still much much better than the team from 2 year ago (when BC wasnt here)

[yucatan87]

The higher the expectations, the greater the disappointment.

[Trilogy]

The higher the expectations, the greater the disappointment.

QFT.

[Indiana Jones]

bottom line: we were not a playoff team before colangelo arrived. last year we were and this year we will be again. we're not a bad ball team.

[Nia]

The higher the expectations, the greater the disappointment.

[The_Hater]

The higher the expectations, the greater the disappointment.

Bingo.

Thing is, considering everything that has gone on between TJ and Bargs and Garbo, this team has still been pretty good this season.

[Live Free]

we just gotta win ball games, win winnable games and win underdog games. thats whats lackin from last year..

[Southward1]

we're a better team this year than last year. i don't see the problem, nobody expected them to be championship contenders. Just a solid playoff team 45-50 wins, which they will get.

[magani]

It's bad timing on my part to start this thread after a loss. But, I've really felt this way for some time now. I don't want us settling for being a mediocre treadmill team. All the threads this week pointed in that direction. We're middle of the pack in both defence and offence. We're near the bottom in FT attempts. We're one of the slowest paced teams. Yes, we have a good 3FG% but we don't attempt enough. We're not a good rebounding team and especially in giving up offensive boards. These are all critical for contending teams much less ones that have championship aspirations. We beat the crappy teams (except tonight), but lose often against the elite. Those are the teams in the playoffs and we'll be lucky to not get bounced. Like I said, the honeymoon is over. I did preach patience and still do, but there are some serious decisions at the end of this year with 'core' players outside of Bosh. TJ, Jose, and Bargs all have some question marks whether they'll even be part of our core logterm. You can't build a team that way.

[Trilogy]

-= original quote snipped =-



Bingo.

Thing is, considering everything that has gone on between TJ and Bargs and Garbo, this team has still been pretty good this season.

Yea, at the end of the day when you step back and really look at things, we've been doing fairly well.

It's a bit of a tough pill to swallow as fan because you want your team to be really good, but we're just not there yet.

[reck0n3r]

we're a better team this year than last year. i don't see the problem, nobody expected them to be championship contenders. Just a solid playoff team 45-50 wins, which they will get.

On the contrary, I think we were actually playing better last year than we are this season. I know our record at the same point i nthe schedule is favoursome to this years incarnation of the team, but keep in mind that the 2nd half of last season we had the 2nd or 3rd best record in the entire NBA.

We have by no means continued that same string of great play.

I personally think we've taken a step back.

[The_Hater]

It's bad timing on my part to start this thread after a loss. But, I've really felt this way for some time now. I don't want us settling for being a mediocre treadmill team. All the threads this week pointed in that direction. We're middle of the pack in both defence and offence. We're near the bottom in FT attempts. We're one of the slowest paced teams. Yes, we have a good 3FG% but we don't attempt enough. We're not a good rebounding team and especially in giving up offensive boards. These are all critical for contending teams much less ones that have championship aspirations. We beat the crappy teams (except tonight), but lose often against the elite. Those are the teams in the playoffs and we'll be lucky to not get bounced. Like I said, the honeymoon is over. I did preach patience and still do, but there are some serious decisions at the end of this year with 'core' players outside of Bosh. TJ, Jose, and Bargs all have some question marks whether they'll even be part of our core logterm. You can't build a team that way.

Isn't that because we're a good, but not elite team ourselves? Were you somehow expecting us to contend this season?

We're 1 1/2 seasons into rebuilding, we've shown tons of improvement over that time and it seems that you're already calling it a failure before BC can finish the job. Even though we currently have 2 of last seasons starters sitting on the DL and have played a brutal schedule.

You seem pretty level headed so all of this isn't really being completely fair on your part, is it?

[asif9t9]

I'd still rather be a guaranteed playoff team than a guaranteed lottery team.

[Silk Wilkes]

I'd still rather be a guaranteed playoff team than a guaranteed lottery team.

Depends on the draft class. In '03 I would've taken a top-5 pick over making it to the playoffs and being eliminated in the first round. Likewise for '96. Of course it all depends on the GM cause you could end up with Darko.

[magani]

-= original quote snipped =-



Isn't that because we're a good, but not elite team ourselves? Were you somehow expecting us to contend this season?

We're 1 1/2 seasons into rebuilding, we've shown tons of improvement over that time and it seems that you're already calling it a failure before BC can finish the job. Even though we currently have 2 of last seasons starters sitting on the DL and have played a brutal schedule.

You seem pretty level headed so all of this isn't really being completely fair on your part, is it?

I'm not characterizing what's going on as a failure by any means. It's not really about wins and losses either. It's the uncertainty around our core players and whether they really will be part of our core and even good enough to propell us beyond a treadmill team. It's about going in the right direction and as Larry Brown used to say, "playing the right way". As another poster said already, we have plateaud and I don't see us getting appreciably better even with TJ or Garbo back. Most of all, Bargnani's regression isn't helping and I think is putting a wrench in getting too excited with what's going on.

[The_Hater]

-= original quote snipped =-



I'm not characterizing what's going on as a failure by any means. It's not really about wins and losses either. It's the uncertainty around our core players and whether they really will be part of our core and even good enough to propell us beyond a treadmill team. It's about going in the right direction and as Larry Brown used to say, "playing the right way". As another poster said already, we have plateaud and I don't see us getting appreciably better even with TJ or Garbo back. Most of all, Bargnani's regression isn't helping and I think is putting a wrench in getting too excited with what's going on.

Fair enough.

Two things? How can you say we have plateaued when TJ isn't even playing and Bargs clearly isn't playing very well? Are you assuing that everyone is done improving? I certainly don't see that.

But I never thought that this was the core that was going to contend anyways. Just because this is our current roster doesn't mean that BC is done building. He knows better than anyone that there are still pieces that need to be added.

As I've described in the past, I think that BC took over a team that didn't have very many assets. So right now he's been in the asset building stage. Add players that can play and stay away from bad contracts. And while he hasn't been perfect but has been pretty successful with that so far. He's added a lot of good players without having to give up anything.

Now he had his hands tied last summer with limited cap space and no draft pick but this summer he should be poised to make some major moves to try and get to the next level and one of the keys to being able to do that is to have these tradeable assets (see: Boston - summer of 2007).

So just look as his track record. This isn't a guy that sits idle and hopes that his current group develops. He spent years in Phoenix making tons of major moves trying to get to the next level and clearly wasn't afraid to pull the trigger on a blockbuster move. This isn't a 'stand pat' guy. I think a lot of people are getting (quite unfairly) impatient with what's going on. Let BC finish his job and give him the time to do it.

[PopAGat]

Okay. Tell me how many wins we had last year at this point. Then you can tell me how much of a 'dissapointment' we are.

[emfive]

[quote="The_Hater"][/quote]

And that he is not the stand pat type makes all this a most exciting exercise, all the while having a team that remains fairly competitive.

[magani]

Hater,

I appreciate the depth of your argument. Do I think they're done improving individually? Not really. Bosh is playing unbelievable right now and if he can sustain a similar level game in and game out, then that goes a long way to masking our other deficiencies. Caldy is playing at a high level and is the type that should get better with familiarity to his teammates and a system. Can Moon play any better at 27? I don't know. For the others it seems it's what you see is what you get.

I would argue that BC envisioned bargs as a huge piece of our 'core' right up there as the 1B to Bosh's 1A. He may have to rethink that long and hard now. I'm a Bargs supporter and have preached patience with him. Is it just a confidence thing with him or is he just mentally and b-ball IQ just not a match for the NBA? It's not every day you get a chance at a number one overall pick.

I agree he's putting together some assets for future trade and roster flexibility. However, they were on the cheap for the most aprt and sometimes you get what you paid for. TJ is a huge injury risk and almost untradeable now and perhaps always. Garbo will never be the same. Rasho is a good expiring next year. Parker is 32 and expiring next year. Delfino/Kapono are decent assets but mainly bench guys. We don't have a lot of first team depth we can dangle. It's sad but Bosh may have to be our main trading chip if the core around him can't be strengthened.

I do think that BC won't stand pat but I'm uncomfortable with changing the 'core' too often and then having to start from a position of letting them build for 3-4 years before being real championship contenders. Boston is kind of an anomally because guys like KG aren't available often. I'm guessing BC thought a 'core' of Bosh Bargs and TJ was a good starting point. Otherwise he wouldn't have traded for TJ in the first place or drafted Bargs. Now 2/3 of that group is a huge question mark. BC was getting a lot of credit last year and he should alos take some blame for the current state we are in now. I just don't want to settle into a treadmill team.