The Ghost of Mistakes Past - Hindsight is 20-20

[MasterIchiro]

I'd like to open up a thread to talk about would've, could've, should've opportunities squandered in the past. This is a thread to discuss team decisions regarding draftees, trade acquisitions, missed targets, free agent signings and rejections, close calls, everything from trading Kobe Bryant to drafting Shawn May.

Instead of polluting the MKG thread, I'd like to start with a lamentation about passing on Bradley Beal.

The latest from the wire:

Bradley Beal recently passed John Wall as the Washington Wizards' leading scorer, and the rookie guard has been on a major tear over the past eight games, averaging almost 21 points on 49.2 percent shooting.

Beal scored a career-high 29 points on four three-pointers and grabbed 11 rebounds in the Wizards' loss to the New York Knicks Friday. After having early struggles this season, Beal has been a significant contributor and his confidence has followed upward.

“It’s really just showing,” Beal said. “You can see how calm I am and I’m really just starting to be relaxed. I’m not pressuring myself and my teammates do a great job of setting me up to be able to make plays. Coach and my teammates as well, do a great job setting me up and putting me in position to make those plays. My confidence is sky high, ever since January on.”

- See more at: http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/22 ... w0eQO.dpuf

Beal's numbers since January?

Jan: .508 3pt%
Feb: .481 FG%
March: .476% and .571 3pt%

[HornetJail]

Tyson Chandler is DPOY

/thread

[debo23]

Putting Higgins in charge, every HC hire since inception, and the BS TV contracts so nobody can watch the games. Then, basically every draft pick we've made outside of Kemba and Emeka was the wrong choice...with 2005 and 2008 as the major flops. From there, trading adam morrison, signing tyrus, and every other transaction we made while Larry Brown was here. And most recently, taking MKG over Drummond or Beal. The FO harps on drafting talent and trading for need, then to say "Drummond would be too similar in the roster to Biz" as the rationale for passing on him makes no sense. If we had 3 centers with the number 1 pick and Dwight Howard was in the draft, would we pass because we don't need a center? Charlotte needs a superstar to become relevant, sadly it's looking like that will never happen. I have a feeling next year is the last year of this regime if things don't turn around, if that happens then hopefully Jordan sells this team to someone like Mikhail.

[thesneakysneak]

^^^ what he said

[AttitudeAjusta]

Trades/Transactions
-should have kept Tyson Chandler
-should have kept Danny Green
-should have kept Shannon Brown
-I wish we would have kept Adam Morrison and at least gave him a chance to regain health because his numbers weren't bad at all for a rookie on an expansion team.
-should have kept Derrick Brown as our SF. He is young, liked being here and was STEADILY improving
-Should have kept Dante Cunningham from the Portland trade. He is a solid, decent player that we could use right now.
-Should have gotten something for Augustin. Trade him to a team he likes for a bag of peanuts is better.
-should have at least TRIED Jeremy Tyler instead of trading him for CASH considerations??? We needed and still need a center. He is 7 ft tall, young, and hasn't been given almost any minutes on any team. We could have at least TRIED considering that we don't need cash as much as we need talent.
Front Office/Personnel
-Hiring Higgins at all for anything other than a player coach is probably one of the worst decisions we've ever made hands down.
-should have kept Charles Oakley as player coach for our bigs.
-not spotting such talent and letting talent just go is unacceptable
Draft
-drafting Sean May. He was clearly not in any shape to be playing any sport professionally. Sean May. dude seriously, wtf???
-should have drafted Drummond. I'm still not that sold on Beal just because of a couple of good games. MKG had a few of those too.
-should have drafted Faried instead of Biz

[SWedd523]

... we already know every move the franchise has missed. Leave it to Bobcats fans, though, to be the only ones actively wallowing in their mistakes.


Some folks need to go outside and enjoy the sunshine

[thesneakysneak]

[catch20two]

-should have at least TRIED Jeremy Tyler instead of trading him for CASH considerations??? We needed and still need a center. He is 7 ft tall, young, and hasn't been given almost any minutes on any team. We could have at least TRIED considering that we don't need cash as much as we need

I was kind of upset as well when they traded away Jeremy Tyler for cash considerations because I thought he was a steal that late in the draft and a piece we could've used.

[fatlever]

here is an exercise for the board. try to rank the top 10 worst decisions by the front office. when ranking try to consider what was known at the time, such as dont say we should have drafted player x when that player was on nobody's radar for our pick.

off the top of my head some i would add:

- declining offer to trade #5 and #13 to move up to #3 or #4 (which would have allowed us the opportunity to select chris paul instead of felton/may)

- drafting morrison over gay and roy

- drafting may over granger

- drafting augustin over lopez

- trading rights to #8 to warriors for richardson, costing us likely noah as well as a lot of cap space and allowing warriors to clear a bad contract

- hiring sam vincent

- trading protected #1 for tyrus, and then compounding mistake by resigning him to 5/40 contract

- trading herrmann and brezec (and his expiring deal) for nazr (and his bad contract)

- trading chandler for DUST chip

- trading for diop

- resigning carroll to 6 year contract which was way more than he would have received on open market

- including dudley in trade for diaw/bell

[Liver_Pooty]

Tyrus' insane contract.

[fatlever]

top 5 on my list would be

1. declining trade that would have netted us paul
2. trade for tyrus/resigning tyrus
3. trade for richardson that cost us noah and capspace
4. augustin over lopez
5. trade for diop

[thruthefire]

Morrison for sure is No. 1 on my list. Very few guys in NBA history have busted as hard as he did.

[doc.end]

- drafting may

fixed

[fatlever]

Morrison for sure is No. 1 on my list. Very few guys in NBA history have busted as hard as he did.

only reason i dont have that one as high is because that draft was just awful at the top. tyrus, foye, sheldon all were busts in the top of that draft along with ammo. bargs, roy and gay would have teased us enough in their 1st 4 years to cause us to sign them to big deals only to be stuck with an awful contract now.

[MasterIchiro]

My top 5

1) Trading Kobe Bryant. He was just a punk little high schooler. Should have called his bluff.
2) Not trading up to draft Chris Paul and ending up with Felton and May. Huge busts for their draft slots. The UNC thing was a marketing ploy that failed catastrophically.
3) Trading Tyson Chandler for nothing.
4) Passing on Drummond/Beal for MKG. It's still early but I'm being haunted by "The Ghost of Mistakes Past".
5) Higgins. Does he have compromising photos of MJ or something?

[Felton for Pres]

Chandler for nothing has to be up there at the top for me.

The Wallace trade was epically bad too. Let us not forget that abomination.

[catch20two]

Not hiring a clearly interested Jerry Sloan for the head coaching job over Mike Dunlap.

[Roll Tide 09]

Not hiring a clearly interested Jerry Sloan for the head coaching job over Mike Dunlap.

This ^^^^^ and that should be the end of this thread! Giving up 43 points to a bad Kings team????? Hey MJ, I want my shot at coaching now!!!!!

[daidalos]

when ranking try to consider what was known at the time

1. drafting augustin over lopez

2. hiring sam vincent

3. declining offer to trade #5 and #13 to move up to #3 or #4 (which would have allowed us the opportunity to select chris paul instead of felton/may)

4. not hiring a clearly interested Jerry Sloan for the head coaching job over Mike Dunlap

5. trading for diop

6. trading protected #1 for tyrus, and then compounding mistake by resigning him to 5/40 contract

7. including dudley in trade for diaw/bell

8. resigning carroll to 6 year contract which was way more than he would have received on open market

9. drafting may over anybody

10. hiring paul silas

[Bassman]

here is an exercise for the board. try to rank the top 10 worst decisions by the front office. when ranking try to consider what was known at the time, such as dont say we should have drafted player x when that player was on nobody's radar for our pick.

off the top of my head some i would add:

- declining offer to trade #5 and #13 to move up to #3 or #4 (which would have allowed us the opportunity to select chris paul instead of felton/may)

- drafting morrison over gay and roy

- drafting may over granger

- drafting augustin over lopez

- trading rights to #8 to warriors for richardson, costing us likely noah as well as a lot of cap space and allowing warriors to clear a bad contract

- hiring sam vincent

- trading protected #1 for tyrus, and then compounding mistake by resigning him to 5/40 contract

- trading herrmann and brezec (and his expiring deal) for nazr (and his bad contract)

- trading chandler for DUST chip

- trading for diop

- resigning carroll to 6 year contract which was way more than he would have received on open market

- including dudley in trade for diaw/bell

Fats, love your list, as I think it covers many of the worst offending bungles by this pathetic organization. I would rank the trade of Chandler for the DUST chip a bit higher than you plaed it. I would also include the trade to get an additional pick, then using it to draft Ajinca.

The fact that we do these types of lists is another evidence of how bad this team and organization is. What is it about us that makes us keep following such a horrible team? We must enjoy suffering...