Afam wrote:Green89 wrote:Afam wrote:The pick should be in the 3 to 5 range. 6th at worst. Only team worse than the Nets are the Philadelphia Sixers, and New Orleans Pelicans.
That's funny because there are currently 12 teams with a worse record right now.
Those teams are going to start playing better eventually. Teams like Mavericks, Magic, Wizards etc
The Nets should start playing better as well. Keep in mind that they're getting these wins right now without PGs on the floor at times.
Their 1st (Lin/strained hamstring), 2nd (Greivis Vasquez/waived this week, needs more surgery), 3rd (Whitehead/concussion protocol) string PGs are all out. They're playing with a PG-by-committee of guys playing out of position who aren't PGs, and a recently signed undrafted rookie and undersized PG from the D-League picked up this week and only in his 2nd NBA game.
So the fact that they're able to get wins, cupcake schedule or not, with so many injuries at PG, should be surprising. They were playing at times with no PG on the court and still getting the win (hence all the turnovers and stalled offense or bad decision-making you see at times -- having no PG on the court will do that, even though the Nets won).
You say that those other teams will be playing better as the season progresses. But the Nets will also be playing better later on, presumably, once they get their starting and backup PGs back from injury and won't have to rely as much on PG-by-committee of guys playing out of position and learning the role. And that's before considering that one of those PGs out is one of the team's bigger acquisitions in the off-season and playing well in generating offense before he went down.
Now, the Nets aren't going to win the championship or even likely make the playoffs, but they won't be a lock for a top 5 pick. They can easily be outside of a top 5 pick range, especially if/when other teams start tanking (though it wouldn't surprise me if they finished in the top 5 pick range either, just that it's not a lock).
And the way things are going, I don't really expect Brook Lopez to be traded this season (though I wouldn't be surprised if it did happened). He's fitting into the modern offense with his new 3pters and adds an additional dimension down low. You don't trade a guy that your player development coach is transforming into a better modern asset (this is the same coach who helped add a 3pter to Horford). You wait till the end of the transformation at the end of the season to see what you have and evaluate then, since you'd likely get better value even if you don't want to keep him after this season. It would be foolish to trade him right now and get less value back before he can develop his 3pt shooting into a modern center and get you more value in the summer, or you can keep him if you decide you like what you have at the end of the transformation.