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[SWedd523]

What was the point in watching Charlotte basketball this year (or last)? About 15 games in it was obvious this team sucked and wasn't going to do anything. Should teams that don't blatantly tank yet continue to suck every year be relegated to the G League or is bad management and coaching excused?

I don't understand how you can compare a team that intentionally filled a roster full of D league players specifically to lose games with a 36 win ten seed team with one All Star and a soon to be hall of famer in the starting lineup and one season removed from a 48 win season.

Both teams sucked, one just did it on accident.

I understand that take, but it's not for me. They got to share in the revenue of other teams that were at least trying to give fans something worth watching. Revenue sharing shouldn't be a safety net so teams can quit on the league for a few seasons in a row hoping to hit the jackpot in the draft.

So what's your take on when Charlotte was hemorrhaging money for years as a franchise nobody cared about with bad branding, management, players, and media deal yet still broke relatively even with ~$20mil annually on revenue sharing?

[-Ian-]

I'd suggest the NBA create a limit that a team can get a top 3 pick in a certain timeframe. Something like once every 3 years. That way, teams aren't so incentized to do a long term tank like Philly or Phoenix is doing now. It'd keep the majority teams competitive. Obviously, if there was a big time prospect, more teams might try to tank.

Co-sign. It would prevent what happened when the Cavs got the 1st pick twice in 3 years.

[BeesWax]

The Sixers deserve much more credit than to act as if all they did was tank into top players. They scouted and chose the right players, developed their skills or increased their market value to trade them, and cut their losses early on with the ones that weren’t what they were looking for. I wish Cho was smart enough to do such.

I bet if Cho was told he could cut every player in the roster three years in a row he probably could have found one rotation worthy player just like PHI did.

Where does this cut every player on the roster three years in a row thing come from? They let guys they acquired on bad deals to gain assets go and spent a lot of time trying to find undrafted players who could step up and play. They groomed their team from within and now have a winner. They built a team the smart way in the cap era vs us who have done a terrible job of building in a cap based system.

[Snidely FC]

According to Kevin Arnovitz, in his article, "Pythons and Power Points: How the Sixers Cracked the Culture Code," PHI has a robust culture led by Brett Brown who coached internationally for many years and furthered by a diverse but open group of players. Brown co-opted Gregg Popovich's approach in SA, requiring each Sixer to give a power point presentation based on a personal interest or home country:

COFFEE, TATTOOS, A 4-FOOT SNAKE. Then there was this: "Are we living in a simulation?" JJ Redick's first slide posed the following to his teammates: "Are we living in base reality? Questions and moralities surrounding the Simulation Theory and the Quantum Mechanical Laws that explain our very existence."

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/23216496/nba-how-philadelphia-76ers-formed-culture-built-win

[yosemiteben]

The Sixers deserve much more credit than to act as if all they did was tank into top players. They scouted and chose the right players, developed their skills or increased their market value to trade them, and cut their losses early on with the ones that weren’t what they were looking for. I wish Cho was smart enough to do such.

I bet if Cho was told he could cut every player in the roster three years in a row he probably could have found one rotation worthy player just like PHI did.

Where does this cut every player on the roster three years in a row thing come from?

There was not a single player on PHI's roster that Hinkie could not cut if he didn't want to. They were signing guys just to hit the salary floor. His only job was to find cheap talent, which he did with Covington. He had 45 roster spots (minus draft spots, so say 40 roster spots) to play with over three seasons, and he came out of that with Covington, Holmes, and McConnell.

[BeesWax]

I bet if Cho was told he could cut every player in the roster three years in a row he probably could have found one rotation worthy player just like PHI did.

Where does this cut every player on the roster three years in a row thing come from?

There was not a single player on PHI's roster that Hinkie could not cut if he didn't want to. They were signing guys just to hit the salary floor. His only job was to find cheap talent, which he did with Covington. He had 45 roster spots (minus draft spots, so say 40 roster spots) to play with over three seasons, and he came out of that with Covington, Holmes, and McConnell.

So they did a better job on managing their roster flexibility by not overpaying players to maintain a mediocre treadmill team. They cleared off their cap and built through the draft and young players and once they found a core worth building around they have supplemented with vets to help them win now. Sounds like a very sound strategy. Let your young players grow and develop then once you know what you have find vets that help fill holes and cover their weaknesses. In a cap system where rookies deals are so low this seems like a very good building and sustaining strategy.

[catch20two]

There was not a single player on PHI's roster that Hinkie could not cut if he didn't want to. They were signing guys just to hit the salary floor. His only job was to find cheap talent, which he did with Covington. He had 45 roster spots (minus draft spots, so say 40 roster spots) to play with over three seasons, and he came out of that with Covington, Holmes, and McConnell.

Lol you say that as if it was a bad thing. That’s what allowed them to keep cap flexibility and move on from players that weren’t a part of their long term future. Cho should’ve taken notes so we wouldn’t stuck with all of these bad contracts that’ll be difficult to trade.

[SWedd523]

Count me as Mr. 3rd who fails to see any sort of fault with that strategy. Why maintain flexibility when you can give Marvin Wililams $13 million a year?

[Benjamin Linus]

As much as I wanted us to keep our rebuild going, you know with our luck (and ability to draft) we would have taken Exum and Okafor in 2014 and 2015. Our process would have gone so wrong even Hinkie would have been second-guessing it.

[catch20two]

As much as I wanted us to keep our rebuild going, you know with our luck (and ability to draft) we would have taken Exum and Okafor in 2014 and 2015. Our process would have gone so wrong even Hinkie would have been second-guessing it.

Right. Because I remember a lot of people on this board being super high on Exum while I was like ehhh and then he had that UNC connection to MJ. Then I also remember a lot of our own posters thinking that Okafor was better than KAT while I argued against that notion all the while wanting to pair Russell with Kemba in the backcourt myself.

[JDR720]

Random Fact:

kemba and nic are both in the top 100 all-time in threes made.

Nic at 78 and Kemba at 97

https://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/fg3_career.html

[HornetJail]

Random Fact:

kemba and nic are both in the top 100 all-time in threes made.

Nic at 78 and Kemba at 97

https://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/fg3_career.html

Batum being just 24 threes behind CP3 on that board is just weird to me. sure he used to be a better 3-point shooter than he is now, but it was on less volume.

I can definitely see Kemba getting to top 25 all-time at his current pace. A lot of current players will make up that top 25. Kemba at his current pace of the last two seasons (3 makes per game) will get way up there if he is able to have some longevity and last into his 30s.

[yosemiteben]

There was not a single player on PHI's roster that Hinkie could not cut if he didn't want to. They were signing guys just to hit the salary floor. His only job was to find cheap talent, which he did with Covington. He had 45 roster spots (minus draft spots, so say 40 roster spots) to play with over three seasons, and he came out of that with Covington, Holmes, and McConnell.

Lol you say that as if it was a bad thing. That’s what allowed them to keep cap flexibility and move on from players that weren’t a part of their long term future. Cho should’ve taken notes so we wouldn’t stuck with all of these bad contracts that’ll be difficult to trade.

I'm critical of the strategy for a few reasons - I don't want my franchise to keep a zombie roster for three / four years because I actually like supporting players and there's no point in doing that if the franchise itself doesn't care about the players. Hinkie treated players like meaningless cogs to be leveraged, and I just don't buy that as an enviable approach to a franchise. I get the argument that it was a necessary evil, and I get that I'm taking a minority position, but I just hate everything about that mentality.

There is a massive difference between giving out big contracts to vets and trying to maximize available roster spots to plug in new sources of talent, so I don't really get that strawman.

[yosemiteben]

So they did a better job on managing their roster flexibility by not overpaying players to maintain a mediocre treadmill team.

Lots of teams do this though, it doesn't take abandoning any semblance of competitiveness to do it.

Chopping your post because the rest I think is a totally defensible strategy that I just would never support a franchise doing. Difference in philosophy.

[catch20two]

There was not a single player on PHI's roster that Hinkie could not cut if he didn't want to. They were signing guys just to hit the salary floor. His only job was to find cheap talent, which he did with Covington. He had 45 roster spots (minus draft spots, so say 40 roster spots) to play with over three seasons, and he came out of that with Covington, Holmes, and McConnell.

Lol you say that as if it was a bad thing. That’s what allowed them to keep cap flexibility and move on from players that weren’t a part of their long term future. Cho should’ve taken notes so we wouldn’t stuck with all of these bad contracts that’ll be difficult to trade.

I'm critical of the strategy for a few reasons - I don't want my franchise to keep a zombie roster for three / four years because I actually like supporting players and there's no point in doing that if the franchise itself doesn't care about the players. Hinkie treated players like meaningless cogs to be leveraged, and I just don't buy that as an enviable approach to a franchise. I get the argument that it was a necessary evil, and I get that I'm taking a minority position, but I just hate everything about that mentality.

There is a massive difference between giving out big contracts to vets and trying to maximize available roster spots to plug in new sources of talent, so I don't really get that strawman.

Your way of thinking is exactly why we’re stuck with all of these guys under contract that likely won’t return anything of value so we might as well keep them. Can’t mix business with emotions.

Hinkie didn’t use those players as meaningless cogs if they could prove their worth (i.e. Robert Covington). The privilege is theirs to have the opportunity to play and showcase their skills in the NBA when they otherwise probably wouldn’t so if anything they should be appreciative.

[yosemiteben]

So with all those roster spots and all those opportunities he could only find one guy that could contribute, and he's to be applauded for that strategy?

[BeesWax]

So with all those roster spots and all those opportunities he could only find one guy that could contribute, and he's to be applauded for that strategy?

How many second round picks and discarded or undrafted guys do you expect to work out? He found three in Covington, Holmes and McConnell and then drafted Embiid, Simmons and Saric building a good young foundation. He did all this while holding enough flexibility for them to sign Redick and trade for Belli and Ilyasova because of this strategy. He worked the system to perfection by stock piling low cost players and then had kept the flexibility to make moves when they were ready and now they are. They looked for guys who would fight and claw even when overmatched talent wise and kept them to go with their picks and now they have a winner. This seems much smarter than what we have tried to do.

[catch20two]

Yosemite, you act as if the way we did things worked lol. Just in case you didn’t get the memo Cho and Clifford failed. Everything they did that you defended while I debated against it didn’t work lol.

[yosemiteben]

Yosemite, you act as if the way we did things worked lol.

I'm saying as a fan I would never be ok with my team wasting three seasons so they could get out from under contracts and hope for lottery luck.

To me, wasting seasons = not attempting to put together a team that will play NBA caliber basketball

[yosemiteben]

So with all those roster spots and all those opportunities he could only find one guy that could contribute, and he's to be applauded for that strategy?

How many second round picks and discarded or undrafted guys do you expect to work out?

Honestly given that he had three full seasons to experiment and mine for talent and tons of cap space to do it so he could cut and cycle through guys and still be way under the cap, I would expect finding more than one rotation worthy player.

I get your points, but it still feels underwhelming to me. This idea that he found players that would fight and claw is totally bogus to me though, since those guys aren't good enough to play.