2020 Off-season Discussion

[Braggins]

I want us to have as much cap space as possible so we can resign any of the high draft picks that pan out when they are up for extensions and also be in the mix for taking on contracts for draft compensation until we find a young core worth building around. There aren't really any big name free agents I'm interested in targeting right now. The point is that we aren't at that point.

[316Hornets]

You guys ever watch NFL? You know what happens to QBs that get fed to the wolves? Most of them lose their confidence, second guess themselves, and out of the league by their 2nd contract.

Lamelo is our QB. Let's not throw him to the wolves, okay? Hayward is the only veteran star player we have. We saw what he did with Tatum and Brown. It's the best way to protect our greatest asset.

[Braggins]

You guys ever watch NFL? You know what happens to QBs that get fed to the wolves? Most of them lose their confidence, second guess themselves, and out of the league by their 2nd contract.

Lamelo is our QB. Let's not throw him to the wolves, okay? Hayward is the only veteran star player we have. We saw what he did with Tatum and Brown. It's the best way to protect our greatest asset.

Ya, Luka, Trae Young, Ja, Zion, etc, all busted because they were thrown to the wolves early in their careers.

[yosemiteben]

You guys ever watch NFL? You know what happens to QBs that get fed to the wolves? Most of them lose their confidence, second guess themselves, and out of the league by their 2nd contract.

Lamelo is our QB. Let's not throw him to the wolves, okay? Hayward is the only veteran star player we have. We saw what he did with Tatum and Brown. It's the best way to protect our greatest asset.

I bet if we just wanted to protect Melo we could have more effectively spent $40M per year over the next three years. Also if Ball doesn't work out, which is absolutely possible, we will be completely **** if this is the justification for the move.

[316Hornets]

You guys ever watch NFL? You know what happens to QBs that get fed to the wolves? Most of them lose their confidence, second guess themselves, and out of the league by their 2nd contract.

Lamelo is our QB. Let's not throw him to the wolves, okay? Hayward is the only veteran star player we have. We saw what he did with Tatum and Brown. It's the best way to protect our greatest asset.

I bet if we just wanted to protect Melo we could have more effectively spent $40M per year over the next three years. Also if Ball doesn't work out, which is absolutely possible, we will be completely **** if this is the justification for the move.

If Melo doesn't work out, we can trade Hayward for assets and retool. It's not the end of the world. I think some of you might want to become fans of the Knicks.

[316Hornets]

You guys ever watch NFL? You know what happens to QBs that get fed to the wolves? Most of them lose their confidence, second guess themselves, and out of the league by their 2nd contract.

Lamelo is our QB. Let's not throw him to the wolves, okay? Hayward is the only veteran star player we have. We saw what he did with Tatum and Brown. It's the best way to protect our greatest asset.

Ya, Luka, Trae Young, Ja, Zion, etc, all busted because they were thrown to the wolves early in their careers.

All of those guys are scorers first. Lamelo is a passer first.

[JMAC3]

The one year this team doesn't go full on tank and plays our young guys like Graham, PJ and Rozier and tries to win games is the year we get lucky and move into the top three. Seems like good Karma.

Then this board wants to go against the Karma and continue full on tank for a number 1 pick....

What lol? We didn't move up in the lottery because the universe was rewarding us for not tanking... It was random luck.

I don't really believe this, but it is a constant joke in the NBA that the team that tanks the hardest usually gets unlucky.

[JMAC3]

Good teams understand how to play the salary cap game. In a world where the cap is soft you are at a huge advantage to be an over the cap team. Hence the Warriors Salary Cap at 165 million where everyone else is supposed to be at 109 million. They do this by cheating the system and signing outside free agents before using bird rights, using trade exceptions, working sign and trades.... they are at a huge advantage to lets say the Kings who are an under the cap team who just let their restricted free agent walk and basically guaranteed themselves a max salary of 118 this season (cap + MLE). Same with Dallas or Miami who are dealing with smaller caps.

As the Hornets if we are just focusing on retaining our own free agents then we will never build a big cap like the Warriors or Nets or Sixers. And before you hit me with the "we are a small market team bs" I am not saying we have to be over the Luxury tax, but building a large cap takes years and if you are not careful you can lose years of work of building a cap in a moments notice. Hence Boston- they have a salary of 118ish once using MLE on Thompson whereas if they kept Hayward they could of kept a lot of roster equity and have a cap in the 150 range competing with Warriors and Nets. Once Hayward leaves and they do not get the TPE it will take years for them to build back up, why the TPE is so valuable.

Signing free agents now with our cap space allows us to fully utilize our low cap holds on guys Graham and Monk. If we have 40 million in cap space next summer and hand out deals to Graham for 20million and Monk 15 million but don't sign outside free agents then they just eat our cap space. Where as if we sign a free agent for 30 million, we can still give out those deals to Graham and Monk because of their low cap holds and start to build up our payroll and continue to use bird rights of our rookies like PJ and Bridges in following years to still maximize our cap space.

I know this is a weird concept, but the competitive teams are lightyears ahead of the rest of the league in doing this. Hence why Warriors sign and traded Durant. Traded for Wiggins. Used their TPE on Oubre. It just gives them more assets that they can use to bring in other players in the future by having extra salaries to match in deals to bring in another superstar.

[yosemiteben]

Signing Hayward to this deal without cap space and having to stretch Batum to close it out is just not smart. Let's not pretend like it is.

[Braggins]

If mental gymnastics were a sport, this forum would be sending multiple people to the Olympics.

[JMAC3]

Signing Hayward to this deal without cap space and having to stretch Batum to close it out is just not smart. Let's not pretend like it is.

I agree with the part with stretching Batum, and I think all of us want to avoid stretching him if possible. However I think signing Hayward was a smart move.

To make it simple I think this team had three outcomes with or without Hayward.

1. Horrible Horrible team our rookies and young players all suck and we are in the lottery with top 5 odds and praying to land the ever elusive first pick.

2. We see some progression from the young team and we make a better push at playoffs, but we are still a year away.

3. Our young guys all pop and we are exciting and we make the playoffs in the 5-8 seed range.

In the 3rd option I think having Hayward is a great addition and makes us a much better team in the playoffs, in the other two he probably doesn't matter as much. As a small market team you have to take some chances to be relevant and I like the chance we are taking on Hayward.

[BigSlam]

If mental gymnastics were a sport, this forum would be sending multiple people to the Olympics.

The Hayward signing, stretching Bats, 9m in dead cap, Miles Turner and TPE’s taking over every other thread - regardless of the thread topic.

It’s starting to break me....


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[316Hornets]

Question for those that don't want to see the team improve: If you aren't a fan, why are you here?

[yosemiteben]

Question for those that don't want to see the team improve: If you aren't a fan, why are you here?

This is not helpful.

No one takes the time to post on this board for any reason other than wanting the team to be successful.

Just because you don't agree with a team building approach doesn't mean you aren't a fan.

[Vanderbilt_Grad]

1. Just because people here were on board with tanking doesn't mean that the team was.
2. There are multiple ways to build good teams.
3. The draft doesn't automatically = success.
4. Winning culture is a thing.
5. LaMelo's development will depend a lot on the guys around him.
6. Next season is a crapshoot with COVID no matter what the team does.
7. Miles Bridges has been TERRIBLE. Just having Hayward start instead of him drastically improves the team.

FWIW, I've been very happy with this offseason so far. Yeah, I'm ready to see the GH signing completed, and I do see risks in signing Hayward - but I would rather see the team rolling the dice trying to win than rolling over.

[Diop]

My gut feeling is that we aren’t adding much more.
Charlotte are happy with zeller and rozier at the moment. Aiming for a big fish next off season.

[316Hornets]

Question for those that don't want to see the team improve: If you aren't a fan, why are you here?

This is not helpful.

No one takes the time to post on this board for any reason other than wanting the team to be successful.

Just because you don't agree with a team building approach doesn't mean you aren't a fan.

It's moreso the constant belittling and insulting. The constant here is to mock people who speak out of the box.

[amcoolio]

where is this clear path to the 5th (or better) pick that everyone's seeing in this hypothetical world where Hayward plays elsewhere this season?

For real, the Knicks were horrible last year and got the 8th pick

Luck isn't on our side, whether we want to admit it or not. We just used it all up for Ball

[yosemiteben]

Question for those that don't want to see the team improve: If you aren't a fan, why are you here?

This is not helpful.

No one takes the time to post on this board for any reason other than wanting the team to be successful.

Just because you don't agree with a team building approach doesn't mean you aren't a fan.

It's moreso the constant belittling and insulting. The constant here is to mock people who speak out of the box.

Opinions are fair game. Share yours freely and don't take it personally or question fanhood when people disagree. If you think something crosses a line flag it and a mod will step in if it is appropriate.

[Diop]

where is this clear path to the 5th (or better) pick that everyone's seeing in this hypothetical world where Hayward plays elsewhere this season?

For real, the Knicks were horrible last year and got the 8th pick

Luck isn't on our side, whether we want to admit it or not. We just used it all up for Ball

And we lucked into that, we were playing well as the season ended beating some good teams