Around the NBA: 2020-21 Season

[Leslie Forman]

The post-Petrie Kings are the NBA's biggest tragedy. Would've thought Luka was a no-brainer slam dunk for a Serbian GM. OK - I realize Slovenians are a mildly different culture, but for crying out loud... Was Vlade not getting an inside pulse from his many European contacts and friends? The Kings are such a mess.

The GMing record for ex-players who were big men is…rather unimpressive.

[JohnnyTapwater]

We're gonna be able to get some really good value for Otto if he keeps playing this well.

[Bankshot]

Anyone still upset we didn't draft Killian Hayes.....

[MrSparkle]

The post-Petrie Kings are the NBA's biggest tragedy. Would've thought Luka was a no-brainer slam dunk for a Serbian GM. OK - I realize Slovenians are a mildly different culture, but for crying out loud... Was Vlade not getting an inside pulse from his many European contacts and friends? The Kings are such a mess.

The GMing record for ex-players who were big men is…rather unimpressive.

Well Sean Marks pulled a quick one in BRK, but I'm not sure injury reserves count. Let alone Australians.

To go way off-topic, I do feel like a lot of the most intelligent NBA players were big men. Mutombo, Hakeem, Kareem, Duncan, Gasol, etc. I guess that doesn't necessarily translate to being a good GM. Really seems a job where in addition to smarts and savvy, you need to be a two-faced stone-cold assassin while also having a general care for relationships and players' well-being.

Needless to say, Divac seemed unqualified in every way and was simply an in-house/fan-appeal move, which rarely ends well (Magic/LA, Paxson, MJ & Isiah though on different teams). There should probably always be a thorough hiring process for a multi-million dollar job with massive financial and cultural implications.

[d boy gentleman]

Anybody else really hate what Nike has done with the uniforms? Each team has like 100 different jerseys now and a lot of them are awful. I saw today's Celtics jerseys and it looks like something you'd see in Summer League. I also miss the days where white was at home and your away and alternate were for away games, minus a few exceptions.

get off our lawn Nike!

I hate it too. I absolutely hate that there's no such thing as home whites anymore. Wearing red at home is just weird. There's also way too many jerseys...it's just unfamiliar. I liked how back in the day, you associated certain colors with certain teams. That still exists to an extent, but there's so many jerseys that just don't respect the team's base uniform colors that it just gets confusing in highlights.

Wearing red at home was the Bulls call. They even announced that red would be their home color. I don't like it either. White at home looks so much cleaner. I have no issues with wearing the city editions or whatever now and again, but white should be the primary color at home.

[MrSparkle]

Anyone still upset we didn't draft Killian Hayes.....

Well, the injury is unfortunate.. but that aside, my thought since the first pre-season game I watched; he is pretty much a bust/super-project. Some Detroit fans were in light denial, but you don't draft a PG at #7 if he struggles bringing the ball up-court. He is the classic case of an international prospect incorrectly hyped. His shooting and athleticism were much worse than advertised, and the NBA game is a 100 mph too fast for him compared to Div. 2 Germany. At first I was intrigued by him, but as I watched more film and realized Ulm was a "Eurocup" team and not a "Eurobasket" team, you realize all his games are against low-tier Euro talent. In fact, on the whole the German league is probably the worst in mainland Europe, when you consider that Turkey, Russia, Israel, etc. have their flagship Eurobasket teams.

O'Connor was super high on this guy, and it's another case of Mock Experts falling flat. He should've been drafted after Poku or Maxey, purely based on talent and ceiling.

Now, injury in consideration? Bummer. Anyway, honestly, Hayes was a year away from being a year away from being a year away. Hopefully the injury doesn't slow him down even more, but reality is he was about 2 weeks away from hitting the G-League. This might be an opportunity for him to rehab, train with NBA trainers, work on his jumpshot and perhaps even transition into more of a SG role. I don't think he's got a future at point, but if he gets healthy and lays into his strengths (defense and passing), he can become a nice Rubio type of player. Or he goes the way of Exum. Anyway, Bulls dodged a big fire by not going with Hayes or Deni.

[Andi Obst]

Still super high on Hayes, way too early to change that. Brutal start to his career though, that injury is no joke.

[cjbulls]

Still super high on Hayes, way too early to change that. Brutal start to his career though, that injury is no joke.

Good news for him is they are initially not planning surgery so he could be back in 4-6 weeks. He needs more court time so hopefully he can still play this year.

[MrSparkle]

So 3 hall of famers and a slew of starters and role players isn't much? Sure they don't do everything perfect, no one does. But they've drafted the best out of anyone in the last 20 years considering they're mostly late 1sts.

Of course, Parker, Manu and Kawhi.
Murray was on his way preinjury.
Kyle Anderson
Corey Joseph
George Hill
Splitter
Udrich
Scola
White

Signing guys like Scola and Bowen from obscurity.

They did all this without any lotto picks. These guys were all late 20's or late 2nds. It's really impressive. Then they plucked a great 3 and D guy from nowhere. Probably the best unsigned guy outside of Ben Wallace.

Keith Van Horn instead of Tim Duncan, and all of this results in jacksh*t.

Also, Scola (who did not come from "obscurity," he was hot property in Europe at the time but as was feared, didn't come over until ages later) literally never even played for them.

Look I ain't saying the Spurs suck or something. But all this exaltation of them as some sort of incredible, brilliant, light years ahead sort of organization is silly. They haven't done a goddamn thing of note except Kawhi in forever.

Well you say "except Kawhi", but I'd say Kawhi was a pretty incredible, brilliant, light years ahead pick/trade... and it was only 9 years ago... and they did develop him. No one expected him to become an MVP player, even after he helped win that Spurs championship. His improvement spike was kind of on par with Jimmy's. Unfortunately they barely got any of his prime. The only thing I'll say, is they probably should've accepted he's leaving and played out the expiring year instead of bothering with DeRozan... cause the Spurs' supporting cast was about as good as the Raptors'. But we don't know how ugly things got behind-the-scenes, and obviously no one expected the Warriors to lose Durant and Klay to the worst injuries in basketball.

And on that note, had he not gotten the weird mystery injury (which maybe SAS mismanaged, maybe they didn't - he seemed hellbent on going to LA anyway), Spurs were basically tip-toeing as a WCF team despite Duncan, Parker, Manu retiring. They had the Murray ACL tear on top of things; IMO he had a faint star trajectory.

Keldon Johnson is actually looking like a good starter, so their late picks are continuing to work out. I don't think there is a better organization than the Spurs. They operated on a lower budget for a small-market team, where the population was barely over 1 million until the past decade. They are the Packers of the NBA.

All this said - I never liked Pax's obsession with modeling the Spurs... because (A) Chicago is not San Antonio and (B) We didn't have Duncan and Popovich to pull off a "good soldier, no thugs" kind of a charade. Bulls should've taken talent over personality every time (JR Smith swap for Adrian Griffin says it all), and simply hired a better coaching staff (not Skiles or VDN).

[2018C3]

Here is a good story:

https://www.essentiallysports.com/nba-basketball-news-dallas-mavericks-owner-mark-cuban-gives-a-major-update-on-the-whereabout-of-former-star-delonte-west/

A few months ago Mark Cuban tracked him down and offered some help.
The latest update is positive and a good read.

[dice]

They had their best season since 2004 under Thibs

thanks to jimmy butler. and prior futility isn't particularly relevant

but the owner stepped in and played GM to bust it up. He denied the extension to Butler and forced Thibs to trade Lavine instead of Wiggins which pretty much killed the team.

and their defense never improved. not from the get-go. so the owner had jack to do with that

KAT and Wiggins gave zero effort on D. It was a bad fit.

KAT and wiggins didn't improve, but neither did the rest of the team

thibs's track record is getting defensive improvement out of veteran clubs. the wolves were not that. the knicks are a hybrid right now. so i'd expect only modest improvement from their 23rd ranked D from last season

[2weekswithpay]

Wizards wasted a 59 point game from Beal

[Mirotek]

Wow, Austin Rivers just went nuts in the 4th and the Knicks get another win

[Dan Z]

Markelle Fultz out for the season with a torn ACL.

https://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/261081/Markelle-Fultz-Out-For-Season-With-Torn-ACL

[Chi town]

Knicks and Thunder both win.

Magic will be hurting without Fultz. ACLs and Achilles. Both so devastating. 2 year injuries before you are fully back.

[d boy gentleman]

Knicks and Thunder both win.

Magic will be hurting without Fultz. ACLs and Achilles. Both so devastating. 2 year injuries before you are fully back.

Jonathan Isaac also out with a torn ACL. Sucks for the Magic.

[Leslie Forman]

Well you say "except Kawhi", but I'd say Kawhi was a pretty incredible, brilliant, light years ahead pick/trade... and it was only 9 years ago... and they did develop him. No one expected him to become an MVP player, even after he helped win that Spurs championship. His improvement spike was kind of on par with Jimmy's. Unfortunately they barely got any of his prime. The only thing I'll say, is they probably should've accepted he's leaving and played out the expiring year instead of bothering with DeRozan... cause the Spurs' supporting cast was about as good as the Raptors'. But we don't know how ugly things got behind-the-scenes, and obviously no one expected the Warriors to lose Durant and Klay to the worst injuries in basketball.

Getting Kawhi was a brilliant move…but then they made an absolutely idiotic one with that trade for him, and who knows what went on behind the scenes to get him to sour so suddenly on them.

If it's really true that the Lakers offered Ingram and they went with Toronto's offer simply to spite the Lakers, well…that is one of the absolute flat out dumbest GMing moves ever.

[ZOMG]

Knicks and Thunder both win.

Magic will be hurting without Fultz. ACLs and Achilles. Both so devastating. 2 year injuries before you are fully back.

Jonathan Isaac also out with a torn ACL. Sucks for the Magic.

What a disaster for Orlando. A few weeks ago everyone was like, "Well, sure Isaac and Fultz were serious overpays, but Orlando had to do it..."

Ugh.

[Andi Obst]

Knicks and Thunder both win.

Magic will be hurting without Fultz. ACLs and Achilles. Both so devastating. 2 year injuries before you are fully back.

Jonathan Isaac also out with a torn ACL. Sucks for the Magic.

What a disaster for Orlando. A few weeks ago everyone was like, "Well, sure Isaac and Fultz were serious overpays, but Orlando had to do it..."

Ugh.

I don't think Isaac was a serious overpay. The injury stuff is scary at this point but healthy Isaac is easily worth more than that + there are some injury protections in the contract which give the Magic some insurance (they would save roughly 10 mil over the 4 years in the worst case I believe). Also think that with the lack of top-tier free agents and all of the teams with serious capspace next summer, waiting for 2021 could've easily become way more expensive for Orlando.

The Fultz one was riskier but with the TO on the third year it's really not that bad.

[Magic beans]

Anyone still upset we didn't draft Killian Hayes.....

Nah... just Haliburton and Immanuel Quickley mainly.