Bruteque wrote:That's essentially what Riersen pointed out in the original post I responded to, and the relevant point I wanted to discuss. Being risk averse and wanting the Bulls to "go for it" with "it" being championship level talent are two positions which aren't very compatible right now.
If you ask the fans whether they want high risk moves, you will probably get different answers from different fans, but if you ask them what their talent aim is, I doubt that you are going to get too many who say that they are aiming for 1.5 rounds of playoffs. What I am trying to point out here is that, given the Bulls' current situation, being risk averse is the rough equivalent of aiming for 1.5 rounds of playoffs.
Personally, I have no affinity to high risk or low risk. It's all about the aim. It's a matter of which path maximizes your chance of reaching your aim. If the Bulls were already drowning in good contracts ready to pounce on a championship, then I will want to deal exclusively in assets with firmly established value, too, because that would minmize their chances of dropping below championship level talent, and that is the aim.
This is getting more at the heart of it. I think very much along the same ideas of total talent I talked about.
I think the people unhappy with our current actions believe not only is our talent equivalent of something like 1.5 rounds of playoffs as you say (2 would be fair too) but that the moves we have made, with understanding of our hesitancy to go deep in lux tax, present very little direction to aim much higher.
To aim much higher you either need to spend a lot, spend like the top teams, or you need to rebalance the money you are allowed to spend, so you get more for your money's worth. I think all would agree that Boozer is not worth his money and that's an easy one, that probably can only be handled by amnesty. But I think its safe to say the 'high risk' crowd also believes that even despite Boozer what we are getting for our lux tax knocking price is no longer good enough.
So even more tough choices need to be made. Whether about Deng, about Gibson, or about Noah. And that if total talent isn't high enough, then simply trading established talent for talent, isn't going to get your far. But trading established talent for potential future talent, means going younger. And going younger means to start as soon as possible, so that the future talent matures as quickly as possible, while Derrick Rose is still going to be a superstar in his prime. In other words, why not start now.
Now that Asik and Korver are gone, the longshot wishful thinking about this season is deflated, and people really aren't interested in lasting an extra 2 games in the 2nd round, if we could instead begin to start to solve bigger problems that are still going to be there after this season.
I think the same type of choices need to be made, whether now or at the end of the upcoming season. Disagreement might largely just be about when to start making those choices. Some think why not wait a year, and others see little reason to wait. But there is also that suspicious concern that waiting means just not making those choices at all. In other words, the team got a little worse, and we'll just stay a little worse going forward, while perhaps shifting even talent around here or there, and maintaining the same reduced total talent.
How do you get back talent that went to Houston or Atlanta if you are now paying the same amount without it as you paid when you had it a year ago - and you aren't allowed to get it back by just spending more. Risk is the only way.
