Around the NBA (2020-21 season)

[THE J0KER]

We finally get the official decisions about the 2020-21 key dates, so we can start now a new thread for the upcoming season.



Here is some interesting Q&A about the upcoming NBA season:

Q: When does the 2020-21 season begin and end?
Dec. 22 is the start date. The end of the 2020-21 season will be released at a future date.

Q: How many games will each team play in 2020-21?
Each team will play 72 games, which is 10 games fewer than in a typical, 82-game NBA season.

Q: When will free agency open for the 2020-21 season?
Negotiations with free agents will be allowed to begin at 6 p.m. ET on Nov. 20, with signings permitted starting at 12:01 p.m. ET on Nov. 22. That is a quicker window than usual for free agency in the NBA, which typically has about a week spanning the start of talks and the beginning of signings.

Q: When is the 2020 NBA Draft?
The 2020 NBA Draft is being held on Nov. 18 (7 p.m. ET, ESPN).

Q: How is the salary cap affected for 2020-21?
The salary cap and tax level will remain unchanged. The cap was $109.14 million this past season, with the tax level at $132,627,000. In subsequent seasons of the CBA, the salary cap and tax level will increase by a minimum of 3% and a maximum of 10% over the prior season. Teams’ tax payments will be reduced in proportion to any basketball-related income decreases.

Q: How will the 2020-21 season affect baskeball-related income (BRI)?
A new system will be used to ensure the parties’ agreed-upon split of basketball-related income (BRI). In the event player compensation were to exceed the players’ designated share in any season, necessary salary reductions beyond the standard 10% escrow would be spread across that season and potentially the following two seasons, subject to a maximum salary reduction in any season of 20%.

Q: Will fans be in attendance for games in 2020-21? Where will games be played in 2020-21?
Details on team-by-team game schedules and fan attendance for 2020-21 will be released at a future date.

[THE J0KER]

Season's schedule key dates released.

Read on Twitter

[skywalker33]

Per NBA's memo to teams this morning: Monte Morris' contract becomes fully guaranteed for this season on Nov. 20.

For Keita Bates-Diop, that date is Nov. 23

[TunaFish]

Chris Paul to the Suns, big move by Phoenix. Rubio is probably going to be moved elsewhere by the Thunder but who knows.

[skywalker33]

Chris Paul to the Suns, big move by Phoenix. Rubio is probably going to be moved elsewhere by the Thunder but who knows.

OKC now has 17 1st round picks between 2020-2026

[TunaFish]

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[TunaFish]

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[THE J0KER]

Western Conference so far:

Already Improved significantly - Portland, Phoenix, Lakers

Expected significant improvement - Golden State, Minnesota, Dallas, Clippers

"Don't worry, be happy..." - Denver, Utah

Waiting for young talents to show-up - New Orleans, Memphis

Imploded, without playoff chances - Houston, Oklahoma, San Antonio, Sacramento

[NuggetsWY]

Western Conference so far:

Already Improved significantly - Portland, Phoenix, Lakers

I agree, Portland has improved and since I'm a Covington fan and he seems like a good fit there, I'll agree it was significant.
I'm not too worried about Phoenix, but agree they've improved quite a bit.
I'm not convinced the Lakers have improved - Schroeder is a nice pickup, but he's a PG and LeBron has filled that role. Losing Green will hurt against teams with big and/or solid scoring forwards.

Expected significant improvement - Golden State, Minnesota, Dallas, Clippers

Golden State improves mostly because they get back Thomson & Curry. Other than that, they need more for sure.
Minnesota can't help but improve. "Expected significant improvement"? I just don't see it.
Dallas? Hmm, still waiting.
Clippers? New coach means new system. Not sure they can acquire a significant new player and they just might lose one or two of their significant players from last year. Only improvement I can see is if George & Kahwi can play more games. Then again, they might surprise me.

"Don't worry, be happy..." - Denver, Utah

Denver - improvements? Porter, we hope. Bol, maybe. Does Bates-Diop help out? Hopefully. Re-sign Grant - needed. Backup center questions! Backup PF questions! Should be better, but ...
Utah - if Conley & Clarkson play more games, they should improve. They might make some other changes, probably need to, but in my opinion they probably won't make major changes.

Waiting for young talents to show-up - New Orleans, Memphis

Agreed

Imploded, without playoff chances - Houston, Oklahoma, San Antonio, Sacramento

Agreed

[THE J0KER]

Dam'n... at the end of the day Josh Richardson was so cheap, pity we don't try it. Reminds me on 2019 TJ Warren case. Dallas make great move, and they have space to improve more.

Minnesota improves as well with #1 Edwards and Rubio, while GSW improvement in #2 center is currently overshadowed by Klay injury.

[THE J0KER]

With Klay Thompson already out for the season Nuggets are TOP3 contenders in the West right now, just behind LA teams. But if Mavs find 3rd star and KP stays healthy, our TOP3 status can be in danger. On the East Bucks and Nets seems stronger than Nuggets right now if post-injury Durant is still at least TOP10 player, but Celtics and Heat are very close, and both franchises have a long history of more successful offseasons than Nuggets when it comes to FA signings and trades.

Denver is in a great position, despite notable role on the West already in the past two seasons team is still ridiculously young, with only Barton currently being older than 26!? But if we want NBA TOP5 contender status already in 2021 we need to fix that 2nd guard starter spot. 2015-16, 2016-17, 2017-18 Gary Harris would be a perfect fit because we more need elite defense from that missing guard than offense, but in the past two seasons, Harris offense totally collapsed and his TS% dropped from almost 60%TS% to about 52%TS%, and Barton is arguably bad fit for Denver system, so his good personal stats last season are inflated by the fact that he has a bad impact on Murray and Porter production.

[skywalker33]

Dam'n... at the end of the day Josh Richardson was so cheap, pity we don't try it. Reminds me on 2019 TJ Warren case. Dallas make great move, and they have space to improve more.

Minnesota improves as well with #1 Edwards and Rubio, while GSW improvement in #2 center is currently overshadowed by Klay injury.

Quick to point out others, yet you don't see within. While our draft is looking to extend our future, it doesn't detract from our present, this is a team that just went to the WCF so these other teams are already playing catch-up. Praise other moves all you want but you don't know what or how those moves will affect their team, good or bad. Chemistry and "team" concepts are over-rated in your world, aren't they? Debbie Downer has nothing on you.

[THE J0KER]

Dam'n... at the end of the day Josh Richardson was so cheap, pity we don't try it. Reminds me on 2019 TJ Warren case. Dallas make great move, and they have space to improve more.

Minnesota improves as well with #1 Edwards and Rubio, while GSW improvement in #2 center is currently overshadowed by Klay injury.

Quick to point out others, yet you don't see within. While our draft is looking to extend our future, it doesn't detract from our present, this is a team that just went to the WCF so these other teams are already playing catch-up. Praise other moves all you want but you don't know what or how those moves will affect their team, good or bad. Chemistry and "team" concepts are over-rated in your world, aren't they? Debbie Downer has nothing on you.

So you think we don't need improvement because we reached the conference final this season? In the 2019 conference finals played Toronto and Milwaukee, Golden State and Portland. Any of these teams don't have a notable roster improvement last summer, and all four fall to repeat success in 2020. Did you note how big was the impact of our only "win now" trade move 2019FRP for Grant?

[NuggetsWY]

Dam'n... at the end of the day Josh Richardson was so cheap, pity we don't try it. Reminds me on 2019 TJ Warren case. Dallas make great move, and they have space to improve more.

Minnesota improves as well with #1 Edwards and Rubio, while GSW improvement in #2 center is currently overshadowed by Klay injury.

Quick to point out others, yet you don't see within. While our draft is looking to extend our future, it doesn't detract from our present, this is a team that just went to the WCF so these other teams are already playing catch-up. Praise other moves all you want but you don't know what or how those moves will affect their team, good or bad. Chemistry and "team" concepts are over-rated in your world, aren't they? Debbie Downer has nothing on you.

So you think we don't need improvement because we reached the conference final this season? In the 2019 conference finals played Toronto and Milwaukee, Golden State and Portland. Any of these teams don't have a notable roster improvement last summer, and all four fall to repeat success in 2020. Did you note how big was the impact of our only "win now" trade move 2019FRP for Grant?

If we make just one "win now" move similar to adding Grant last year, I'll be happy. Our core has added some more experience and is definitely improving each year. Porter can hopefully make a bigger difference - but then his contributions must exceed Barton's contributions of last year and we need to return Millsap or replace his contributions - hopefully improving that slot either way (maybe with Grant starting and Millsap off the bench). Then, adding Bol and Dozier's potential contributions as we saw in the bubble and we're good.

#1 Power Forward - starter & backup
#2 Backup center
#3 Rotation of SF & SG

[The Rebel]

Dam'n... at the end of the day Josh Richardson was so cheap, pity we don't try it. Reminds me on 2019 TJ Warren case. Dallas make great move, and they have space to improve more.

Minnesota improves as well with #1 Edwards and Rubio, while GSW improvement in #2 center is currently overshadowed by Klay injury.

Quick to point out others, yet you don't see within. While our draft is looking to extend our future, it doesn't detract from our present, this is a team that just went to the WCF so these other teams are already playing catch-up. Praise other moves all you want but you don't know what or how those moves will affect their team, good or bad. Chemistry and "team" concepts are over-rated in your world, aren't they? Debbie Downer has nothing on you.

So you think we don't need improvement because we reached the conference final this season? In the 2019 conference finals played Toronto and Milwaukee, Golden State and Portland. Any of these teams don't have a notable roster improvement last summer, and all four fall to repeat success in 2020. Did you note how big was the impact of our only "win now" trade move 2019FRP for Grant?

Toronto lost 1 of the best players in the game to free agency. The Warriors lost 1 of the best players in the game and had major injury issues, the Blazers had their own share of major injury issues and managed to get worse while cutting payroll. Hell even the Bucks lost a starter and managed to get less talented. As of right now we have not lost anybody and have added 2 1st round picks and will have Barton back next season.

Grant had a lot of impact in Lakers series and some mild impact in the Clippers series, he was bad in the Jazz series, and was marginally effective during the regular season. He was also traded for very late into the offseason last year, after free agency and just before the start of training camp. We have not even hit free agency yet, that starts in about 7.5 hours.

[The Rebel]

Quick to point out others, yet you don't see within. While our draft is looking to extend our future, it doesn't detract from our present, this is a team that just went to the WCF so these other teams are already playing catch-up. Praise other moves all you want but you don't know what or how those moves will affect their team, good or bad. Chemistry and "team" concepts are over-rated in your world, aren't they? Debbie Downer has nothing on you.

So you think we don't need improvement because we reached the conference final this season? In the 2019 conference finals played Toronto and Milwaukee, Golden State and Portland. Any of these teams don't have a notable roster improvement last summer, and all four fall to repeat success in 2020. Did you note how big was the impact of our only "win now" trade move 2019FRP for Grant?

If we make just one "win now" move similar to adding Grant last year, I'll be happy. Our core has added some more experience and is definitely improving each year. Porter can hopefully make a bigger difference - but then his contributions must exceed Barton's contributions of last year and we need to return Millsap or replace his contributions - hopefully improving that slot either way (maybe with Grant starting and Millsap off the bench). Then, adding Bol and Dozier's potential contributions as we saw in the bubble and we're good.

#1 Power Forward - starter & backup
#2 Backup center
#3 Rotation of SF & SG

If you bring back Millsap and do not trade Morris than where are Bol and Dozier's minutes going to come from?

If we are bringing back Grant and can sign a good veteran SG/SF and a good backup C than I am perfectly fine with going with what we have, although I would prefer to trade Barton and Morris while bringing in another young SG/SF and a bench scorer. Role players usually end up getting overpaid and disappointing when they sign free agent contracts. I trust the young guys on the roster to grow and develop like so many other young guys have grown and developed on this team, that is where the biggest improvement on this team will come from.

[THE J0KER]

Quick to point out others, yet you don't see within. While our draft is looking to extend our future, it doesn't detract from our present, this is a team that just went to the WCF so these other teams are already playing catch-up. Praise other moves all you want but you don't know what or how those moves will affect their team, good or bad. Chemistry and "team" concepts are over-rated in your world, aren't they? Debbie Downer has nothing on you.

So you think we don't need improvement because we reached the conference final this season? In the 2019 conference finals played Toronto and Milwaukee, Golden State and Portland. Any of these teams don't have a notable roster improvement last summer, and all four fall to repeat success in 2020. Did you note how big was the impact of our only "win now" trade move 2019FRP for Grant?

Toronto lost 1 of the best players in the game to free agency. The Warriors lost 1 of the best players in the game and had major injury issues, the Blazers had their own share of major injury issues and managed to get worse while cutting payroll. Hell even the Bucks lost a starter and managed to get less talented. As of right now we have not lost anybody and have added 2 1st round picks and will have Barton back next season.

Grant had a lot of impact in Lakers series and some mild impact in the Clippers series, he was bad in the Jazz series, and was marginally effective during the regular season. He was also traded for very late into the offseason last year, after free agency and just before the start of training camp. We have not even hit free agency yet, that starts in about 7.5 hours.

It is more what 2020 finalist added last summer than what 2019 finalists lost. Lakers add AD, Miami added Butler, Boston adds Kemba, and Clippers (added Kawhi and George) as better seeded than Nuggets will very probably be 4th finalist if no corona/bubble factor after 3-1 lead, because 2 out of last 3 games they would play in LA.

[The Rebel]

So you think we don't need improvement because we reached the conference final this season? In the 2019 conference finals played Toronto and Milwaukee, Golden State and Portland. Any of these teams don't have a notable roster improvement last summer, and all four fall to repeat success in 2020. Did you note how big was the impact of our only "win now" trade move 2019FRP for Grant?

Toronto lost 1 of the best players in the game to free agency. The Warriors lost 1 of the best players in the game and had major injury issues, the Blazers had their own share of major injury issues and managed to get worse while cutting payroll. Hell even the Bucks lost a starter and managed to get less talented. As of right now we have not lost anybody and have added 2 1st round picks and will have Barton back next season.

Grant had a lot of impact in Lakers series and some mild impact in the Clippers series, he was bad in the Jazz series, and was marginally effective during the regular season. He was also traded for very late into the offseason last year, after free agency and just before the start of training camp. We have not even hit free agency yet, that starts in about 7.5 hours.

It is more what 2020 finalist added last summer than what 2019 finalists lost. Lakers add AD, Miami added Butler, Boston adds Kemba, and Clippers (added Kawhi and George) as better seeded than Nuggets will very probably be 4th finalist if no corona/bubble factor after 3-1 lead, because 2 out of last 3 games they would play in LA.

Every team in the 2019 conference finals got worse either through injury, trades, or losing free agents ignoring that and just saying that it was because the other teams got better is refusing to look at half of the equation. Also go look at those rosters for those finals teams, most of them depended heavily on old role players that made huge differences in their runs, we didn't.

We will get better through the growth of our young guys. Name 1 team outside of the Heat that have a 2nd year guy with near the upside that Bol has? Can you name 1 prospect on another playoff team that has the upside of MPJ? Outside of Barton everybody on this team is 26 or younger, most guys do not even hit their prime until they are 27, so our entire roster should still be improving and we have 2 guys with lottery pick upside that the front office has been very open about saying they have earned their minutes and need them to continue to improve.

We have an allstar PG, arguably the best perimeter defender in the league at SG, a very high ceiling guy who has proven to be able to score against the best teams in the league at SF, and a superstar C. The 1 need we have is a 3 and D PF, who we have the bird rights too. Our biggest needs are to replace the minutes of Plumlee who has been terrible in the playoffs his whole career, a broken down Millsap who is likely being replaced buy a guy with huge upside, and Craig who was also terrible in the playoffs and is likely getting replaced partially by a considerably better player in Barton and partially by Cancar who the front office said was the best defender we had at forward last training camp or KBD who was a part time starter for the Twolves. All we really need is a backup Center.

[skywalker33]

Dam'n... at the end of the day Josh Richardson was so cheap, pity we don't try it. Reminds me on 2019 TJ Warren case. Dallas make great move, and they have space to improve more.

Minnesota improves as well with #1 Edwards and Rubio, while GSW improvement in #2 center is currently overshadowed by Klay injury.

Quick to point out others, yet you don't see within. While our draft is looking to extend our future, it doesn't detract from our present, this is a team that just went to the WCF so these other teams are already playing catch-up. Praise other moves all you want but you don't know what or how those moves will affect their team, good or bad. Chemistry and "team" concepts are over-rated in your world, aren't they? Debbie Downer has nothing on you.

So you think we don't need improvement because we reached the conference final this season? In the 2019 conference finals played Toronto and Milwaukee, Golden State and Portland. Any of these teams don't have a notable roster improvement last summer, and all four fall to repeat success in 2020. Did you note how big was the impact of our only "win now" trade move 2019FRP for Grant?

Not what I said, was it ?? If we don't sign Grant that is a point of regression, but that hasn't happened yet. My point is that you want to praise other teams to show that you seem to think these will all make them better than the Nuggets. My point is that, until it PROVES they have indeed improved, they are just transactions that may or may not improve the team. These transactions, while seemingly significant, could just as well implode on a team, let's judge after we see the results. And in my estimation, we just had a draft that will improve this team and we are just entering Free Agency so you're jumping the gun IMO.

[NuggetsWY]

Quick to point out others, yet you don't see within. While our draft is looking to extend our future, it doesn't detract from our present, this is a team that just went to the WCF so these other teams are already playing catch-up. Praise other moves all you want but you don't know what or how those moves will affect their team, good or bad. Chemistry and "team" concepts are over-rated in your world, aren't they? Debbie Downer has nothing on you.

So you think we don't need improvement because we reached the conference final this season? In the 2019 conference finals played Toronto and Milwaukee, Golden State and Portland. Any of these teams don't have a notable roster improvement last summer, and all four fall to repeat success in 2020. Did you note how big was the impact of our only "win now" trade move 2019FRP for Grant?

Not what I said, was it ?? If we don't sign Grant that is a point of regression, but that hasn't happened yet. My point is that you want to praise other teams to show that you seem to think these will all make them better than the Nuggets. My point is that, until it PROVES they have indeed improved, they are just transactions that may or may not improve the team. These transactions, while seemingly significant, could just as well implode on a team, let's judge after we see the results. And in my estimation, we just had a draft that will improve this team and we are just entering Free Agency so you're jumping the gun IMO.

I'm not convinced the Lakers or Clippers are as good right now as they were last year.

The Mavericks & Jazz look to be about the same as last year.

The Rockets & Thunder look to be worse than last year.

Portland looks like they are the only team that made significant improvement over last year - so far.

It's too early to know for sure what teams will look like though. Free agency will show us how teams are doing.