Will I get to see CJ Wilcox this year in a Clipper Uniform?

[Ranma]

What's with that tweet? I thought we had a D-League affiliate?

Not any more. The Fort Wayne Mad Antz were purchased by the Indiana Pacers.

[Quake Griffin]

I'm with Ranma ITT.

Doc is in a position where he's calling very important shots for our Clipper team. As our functioning GM his responsibility has grown from just coaching this core to a championship to punching the right buttons to make the right investments for this team moving forward.

When he drafts players, doesnt develop them, and doesnt feature them in any capacity, he's not doing his job hitting the right buttons or making the right investments for the team. Not only does it kill us in terms of implementing young legs into our team, it drains every bit of value away from our team because rookies who don't play hold almost no trade value.

What's the wrench that could be in our argument?
Q's argument that teams at the back of the draft are lucky and these players that don't play just aren't good enough.

2013? The pick after Reggie Bullock is a starter in this league and holds SOME value for the Thunder…key word…SOME…Rudy Gobert has top 5 Center in this league potential…Allen Crabbe is now a contributor for the Portland TrailBlazers and is going to be awesome stretching the floor.

2014? After CJ WIlcox….Kyle Anderson….KJ McDaniels…

2015? We don't even have a pick.


Sure. The Bulls got lucky with Jimmy Butler. Sure the Warriors got lucky with Draymond. Those guys turned out to be awesome players for where they were drafted. But are the Warriors really "lucky" to have drafted Festus? Are the Thunder really lucky to have drafted Roberson and Perry Jones? Absolutely not and a player of that level is just fine imo for our typical draft slot. We don't have to create Jimmy Butlers and Draymonds at the end of the draft but we should find contributors that are either going to be a part of our puzzle or can be dealt for a piece to the puzzle.

You can see that teams like the Warriors, Thunder, Bulls and Spurs put a lot of value into drafting and developing these finds. You can tell the Clippers do not. We just want to hope the next savvy vet signs for the MLE. Yea, some teams have gotten lucky but they've gotten lucky because they've committed to the process…we don't get lucky because we're not interested.




ninja edit:
nvm that we've been asking for a long athletic wing for years and in 3 drafts, we have 6'7" with no length, 6'5" and no draft pick.

[Ranma]

What's the hold up, Doc? Let me guess: too much on your plate? Geez, this is long overdue. I'm not saying we rush the process without setting up a proper developmental system, but rather we should have someone else in charge to get this done right and as soon as possible. Doc's response of basically saying, "Well, we could have one if we want to...we're not sure if we want to." is jibberish from a laggard. Stop wasting time and get on this already, Glenn!

Now we're among the Lateful 8 of NBA organizations without an affiliated D-League team in the works. Notice how all the winning teams in contention for an NBA title already have their own. The Clippers, Blazers, Bucks, Hawks, Nuggets, Wizards, Pelicans, and Timberwolves are the remaining holdouts.

[tweet]https://twitter.com/JeffZillgitt/status/662738842844172288[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/DanWoikeSports/status/662739520551424000[/tweet]

[Ranma]

I'm weary of this latest move. What if the Suns (or another team) asks Doc to give up a draft pick, again? Jamal Crawford's trade value is very unimpressive. Nobody's going to want him now unless a pick is offered.

If he does it again - three years in a row - Doc will officially be called a lost GM.

The Stepien Rule prevents us from dealing our first-round pick in the upcoming 2016 NBA Draft since we owe a 2017 top-14-protected pick to the Bucks for dumping Jared Dudley onto their hands. Of course, Doc can always trade the player selected after he's drafted, but the pick itself cannot be traded, which is good or probably more frustrating, depending on who Doc actually drafts, because the potential pool of talent and athletes available looks promising even late in the first round for the 2016 class. Also, this doesn't prevent Doc from trading future draft picks, but as of right now, he can't do that for any picks that come sooner than 2019.

Plus, even I don't think Doc is stupid enough to dump the expiring contract of Jamal Crawford by including a first-rounder to do so. It would be utterly irresponsible and even more egregious since the Clippers didn't exercise the team option to buy him out for the 2015-16 season in the first place.

[Wammy Giveaway]

I wouldn't be surprised if the Clippers were the last team to get a D-League affiliate. Or worse: not have one at all.

Doc thinks championships can only be won with veterans. He could basically turn the Clippers into a veterans house, or the equivalent of a "No-Homers Club":

[mkwest]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMBWc57EHP8[/youtube]
Wilcox: 22 points (8/14 FG, 3/7 3P, 3/3 FT), 6 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, -16 in 39 minutes
Dawson: 12 points (5/15 FG, 2/4 FT) 4 rebounds, 2 turnovers, -10 in 26 minutes

[mkwest]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6KnRpoTCMs[/youtube]
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HG70ouNbqqg[/youtube]

Averages through 3 games...
CJ Wilcox: 23.3 ppg (52.2% FG, 100% FT, 45.2% 3PT), 4.3 Rebounds, 4.0 Assists, 1.3 Steals, 1.3 Turnovers, 0.7 Blocks in 33.7 Minutes.

Through 2 games...
Branden Dawson: 8.0 ppg (33.3% FG, 28.6% 3PT), 4.5 Rebounds, 2.0 Turnovers in 23 minutes.

[Kapono's Sweatband]

It's frustrating that other win-now teams have integrated the second year players drafted around CJ (Capela, Hairston and Kyle Anderson) but we have to sit and watch Doc trot out Crawford game after game because wants to hide behind the safety of a "veteran". Watching CJ play he is the perfect fit for a "pace and space" offense and actually has athletic and defensive upside! He drafted him to be a shooter and he is nailing nearly five a game in the D-League while we watch Crawford ball stop and chuck. I know it's a small sample size and lesser competition but shooting is shooting, giving Austin the opportunity as a young buck has paid off so far and I am certain that it would work out similarly with CJ. San Antonio he would be utilising him as a Gary Neal type and wouldn't waste time/resources on a guy like Crawford...

I love the spacing, quickness and athleticism of a second unit:

Rivers (B+ shooter; A defender)
Wilcox (A shooter; B defender)
Johnson (B+ shooter; A defender)
Pierce (A shooter; B- defender)
Smith (C+ shooter; A defender)

[nickhx2]

kind of amazing that for a team that desperately needs every bit of shooting it can get, wilcox isn't being sniffed at. he definitely can't be a worse defender than jamal, either.

[Quake Griffin]

kind of amazing that for a team that desperately needs every bit of shooting it can get, wilcox isn't being sniffed at. he definitely can't be a worse defender than jamal, either.

Every time I doubt myself on this thread, I think about the bolded and say, "naaahhh….kid deserves a shot."

[nickhx2]

kind of amazing that for a team that desperately needs every bit of shooting it can get, wilcox isn't being sniffed at. he definitely can't be a worse defender than jamal, either.

Every time I doubt myself on this thread, I think about the bolded and say, "naaahhh….kid deserves a shot."

lmao this is almost literally what i think too. i go

1. why isn't he playing? we need shooting
2. oh, he probably isn't great on defense


3. oh yeah, we have jamal crawford there anyway

[QRich3]

lol sometimes I just wish Doc starts doing all the sh*t you guys claim for him to, just so you see how many leaps of faith you're making with your 'adjustments'. CJ Wilcox would be a less experienced, nervous, incapable of passing or handling the ball version of Crawford at best. The little we've seen of him, either on garbage time or in college, he projected to be an even worse defender than Crawford, and a considerably worse offensive player. You guys being so confident he's gonna solve anything is just laughable. It's like you're sure Linsanity is about to happen with every one of our bench players and are calling Doc a moron for not letting it happen. In the end, when/if Doc plays them, they're gonna look like the fringe NBA players that they are.

Bullock looked A LOT better than Wilcox has ever showed flashes of, he was a better shooter, an extremely better defender and looked a lot more poised and knowing what he was doing out there. I was sure he'd develop into a proper 3&D player in this league and cursed Doc for trading him away. Well guess what, he's played for two more teams now, teams that had more playing time available for him, and he's still not a rotation player. I was wrong cause I'm just a fan that doesn't see him practice every day, and so are you lot about Wilcox.

[Quake Griffin]

good.
at least ill know he sucks and isn't worthy of playing time instead of having to guess and wonder if he isn't.

btw, where'd you get nervous from?
Wilcox has NEVER looked nervous on a basketball court to me and especially not like Reggie Bullock did.

[nickhx2]

the team desperately needs shooting and spacing which no one off the bench truly gives us. i don't see the need to get jumpy over fans wanting to test him out. like, i don't get it. you seem to think lance sucks bad enough that he's deserving of his 0 to 2 mpg when he's not starting. there's a lot of minutes out there for doc to try other players with, so why would it be so wrong to give someone else a shot who actually brings something that lance (or anyone else on the bench) can't?

fwiw i thought the times i saw him in preseason he looked pretty smooth as a shooter and quite willing to get the ball in the air. that isn't nervous to me.

[QRich3]

The thing is it's not Doc's job to convince you guys, if he sees it clear enough in practice that Wilcox is not gonna help, I don't see why does he need to prove anything to anyone.

If what you're looking for is spacing, I don't see how playing him over Crawford or Pierce is gonna help, at least until he gets enough burn to be comfortable on the floor, if he's ever even worth it. If what you're looking for is wing defense, I don't think Wilcox is gonna be your answer.

The nervous thing was about him being a rookie. Even most all time greats were a net negative in their first year, coaches don't have a tendency to trust veterans just because they're stubborn, it takes a certain amount of time to get used to the league, and until you do, you're gonna cost the team some immediate performance. On the one hand you guys want Doc to fix things right now, and on the other you want him to play a 2nd year guy who's a long shot to even be in the rotation of a bad team.

[BlzMwt]

im on both sides with this

1. i agree that there are likely underlying reasons that us as fans don't get to see, other than jamal making poor decisions and the rest of the bench not living up to its potential. It leads most of us to wonder why someone who is playing really well in the d-league can't translate to some bench production, be another shooter, possibly average on D

But we really don't know how Wilcox is in practice. Other than brief minutes on the court, d-league footage, summer league footage, what do we really know about him other than he was drafted as a "shooter".

2. Contrary to that though, there are plenty of players who never get run and then suddenly switches teams or a new coach gets brought in and all of a sudden a player flourishes. I'm not saying that Wilcox could be anything close to what Evan Fournier is doing in Orlando right now but there are plenty of instances where it was entirely a coach holding a player back.

[Quake Griffin]

Yea Q.

Wilcox is certainly going to get used to the league at this rate.

[nickhx2]

The thing is it's not Doc's job to convince you guys, if he sees it clear enough in practice that Wilcox is not gonna help, I don't see why does he need to prove anything to anyone.

If what you're looking for is spacing, I don't see how playing him over Crawford or Pierce is gonna help, at least until he gets enough burn to be comfortable on the floor, if he's ever even worth it. If what you're looking for is wing defense, I don't think Wilcox is gonna be your answer.

The nervous thing was about him being a rookie. Even most all time greats were a net negative in their first year, coaches don't have a tendency to trust veterans just because they're stubborn, it takes a certain amount of time to get used to the league, and until you do, you're gonna cost the team some immediate performance. On the one hand you guys want Doc to fix things right now, and on the other you want him to play a 2nd year guy who's a long shot to even be in the rotation of a bad team.

Well let's start with the premise that doc knows that wilcox won't help. Given doc's "trust" in crawford and his general distrust of rookies and people not named crawford, do you really feel he is 100% beyond reproach there? That's kind of the thing i wonder when we enter into discussions about rotations. Like, if i thought doc was a superstar with a knack for getting the right guys out in the right moments then i literally would have zero to say. To me it boils down to this:

- i think he has mismanaged player rotations a lot this year with crawford being a point of emphasis.
- in the past we have seen him misplay dudley (through injury) among others
- as such i don't necessarily think he cannot be at fault when it comes to wilcox (or any other guy who can help)

So, when he doesn't play wilcox, i don't see it as "oh doc knows more than us so for sure he's right." AND YOU MIGHT VERY WELL BE RIGHT ON THIS!! But I can't help but think about this current rotation business and his general disdain for rookies and wonder if he is not blind there in some way. I don't think that is unfair at all for us to wonder. Doc's not a perfect coach so i have to wonder.


Onto wilcox himself. I don't think he's any kind of defensive guy nor will he be a stopper. But i also don't see him shooting us out of games either, and from everything i've seen he does a lot of jj-like stuff where he gets himself open for catch and shoot opportunities or he works off of curls or screens, things that are great for our system and things that others don't really do. So to me i can see that helping spacing immediately regardless of comfort, but i can understand disagreeing on that.

To be fair, maybe the team doesn't feel it needs spacing and ultimately feels it would rather have a ballhandler/shot-creator in crawford. I don't see why that should have to be the case because if you stagger blake/cp3 enough and actually play prigioni, then the need for crawford to be there is lessened quite a bit imo and that would allow us to insert a legit floor spacer. But that are just my thoughts, unlikely to ever be realized.

On the one hand you guys want Doc to fix things right now, and on the other you want him to play a 2nd year guy who's a long shot to even be in the rotation of a bad team.

I don't think this is directed at me necessarily, but personally I would literally be ok with the 8th seed if doc was actually trying off the wall things or getting in random dudes to see if they could ball. Win now is completely meaningless to me and progress is everything. What i want to see at the end of the season is a team that can beat GS/spurs/cleveland, and if it takes short-term losses then i do not give jack monkey squat. I want to see our championship equity progressed (to borrow the term from zach lowe) even if it means losing now.

[QRich3]

do you really feel he is 100% beyond reproach there?

Thing is, I never said anything like that. I can point out flaws in the way you criticize Doc and not be thinking he's perfect at everything. I never disagreed with you that Crawford is not being used correctly. I wanted us to cut him in the summer, and I'm always suggesting trading him for anyone with a pulse. But that's one thing and another is to just make Doc the culprit for everything bad that happens in your life. Collapses like today against the Raps have nothing to do with the way he manages rotations, you can't act like getting rid of Crawford would fix everything and the players themselves are not at fault. You can't fault the problems of the team in not playing a guy who'll be out of the league in a year. Doc's doing a lot of things wrong, but he's far from holding the team back. That was my point all along.

I don't think this is directed at me necessarily, but personally I would literally be ok with the 8th seed if doc was actually trying off the wall things or getting in random dudes to see if they could ball. Win now is completely meaningless to me and progress is everything. What i want to see at the end of the season is a team that can beat GS/spurs/cleveland, and if it takes short-term losses then i do not give jack monkey squat. I want to see our championship equity progressed (to borrow the term from zach lowe) even if it means losing now.

Would you? 8th seed is pretty much throwing the season away at a likely 1st or 2nd round exit, even if by some miracle Wilcox is the new Klay Thompson and Dawson a smaller Ben Wallace. Paul is 30 years old and our window is closing bit by bit with every year that goes by. Throwing years away at the smallest random possibility that you're gonna find the next gem everyone's looking for is not a very efficient way to approach building a contender.

[nickhx2]

do you really feel he is 100% beyond reproach there?

Thing is, I never said anything like that. I can point out flaws in the way you criticize Doc and not be thinking he's perfect at everything. I never disagreed with you that Crawford is not being used correctly. I wanted us to cut him in the summer, and I'm always suggesting trading him for anyone with a pulse. But that's one thing and another is to just make Doc the culprit for everything bad that happens in your life. Collapses like today against the Raps have nothing to do with the way he manages rotations, you can't act like getting rid of Crawford would fix everything and the players themselves are not at fault. You can't fault the problems of the team in not playing a guy who'll be out of the league in a year. Doc's doing a lot of things wrong, but he's far from holding the team back. That was my point all along.

I don't think this is directed at me necessarily, but personally I would literally be ok with the 8th seed if doc was actually trying off the wall things or getting in random dudes to see if they could ball. Win now is completely meaningless to me and progress is everything. What i want to see at the end of the season is a team that can beat GS/spurs/cleveland, and if it takes short-term losses then i do not give jack monkey squat. I want to see our championship equity progressed (to borrow the term from zach lowe) even if it means losing now.

Would you? 8th seed is pretty much throwing the season away at a likely 1st or 2nd round exit, even if by some miracle Wilcox is the new Klay Thompson and Dawson a smaller Ben Wallace. Paul is 30 years old and our window is closing bit by bit with every year that goes by. Throwing years away at the smallest random possibility that you're gonna find the next gem everyone's looking for is not a very efficient way to approach building a contender.

There are definitely flaws in my arguments. It's easier for me to generalize a bit than to go over everything with a fine toothed comb these days, but the crux that i'll always stand by is that the coach's current rotation management is one of our core issues. Overreactions and hot takes might make it seem like i think removing crawford would fix everything, but i think it would definitely fix more than one. Going further i personally feel like it is the biggest issue and the one most likely to prevent us from advancing against certain teams in the playoffs. That definitely does not mean there aren't other big things we need to solve. Dudes definitely need to play better as well. So i think for the record that should be pretty straight now.

That's an interesting take on what i said about the 8th seed, and i didn't mean for it to be finding a klay thompson/ben wallace gem, though sure that might happen once in a blue moon.

What i more mean to say is if doc was spending more time experimenting with different lineups to see if he could come up with different effective units or tactics, in addition to seeing if he had any rotation players in wilcox/aldrich (doubt dawson is ready) i'd be all for it. How will we ever know if, and just throwing names out there, prigioni/wilcox/lance/smith/jordan wouldn't be effective if he didn't try it? Basically it's more about finding effective lineups than praying a hidden gem can save you, though sure that's a bonus.

Here's the other thing. If you think the 8th seed is throwing the season away because you have to play GS and lose, then it doesn't matter which round you play them, because you will lose in the first, second, or third round. And while i think teams do get better and gain some confidence/championship equity by advancing in the playoffs, i think that's far easier to do in the regular season. As an example, does GS ever become as effective with small-ball if they hadn't practiced with those lineups all season long last year? Or if they stumble onto it in the playoffs would they be as effective? I'd say they wouldn't.

So why not see if you can be creative and come up with something now? Your playoff life is forfeit anyway the way it is now because you eventually meet GS. But if you can find that roster progress in the regular season it might not be so.