pingpongrac wrote:We were loaded with depth and had some prospects, but our prospects were pretty middling pieces at the time. Poeltl was a #9 pick that looked to be a solid bench piece, Siakam hadn't even come close to breaking out as he was still primarily just a hustle player (353 of his 498 shots came in the paint) and there were numerous debates regarding which of Delon/FVV would be the back-up PG. OG, who was almost entirely just a 3+D player that finished well inside because he was generally set up, was our most intriguing prospect. Powell looked absolutely awful in 2017/18 after two decent seasons and his value was pretty low. The rest (Bruno and Richardson) held absolutely no value.
The young pieces we have now are far more enticing. We have 4+ seasons of OG being a premier defender as well as a blossoming scorer (and he's still just 24). GTJ is an elite shooter (nearly 40% on 5.6 3FGA/game for his career) that has shown signs of becoming a very good defender at 22. Banton, though in limited games/minutes, looks like he'll be a very good piece for a long time as long as he keeps working on his shot. Flynn, Achiuwa and Svi (all 24 or younger) have more value than Bruno/Richardson. And obviously there is Scottie (though I think we can all agree that he is the most untouchable player on the roster).
I don't know how far off the current talent/potential pool is from the 2017/18 team that eventually turned DeRozan+Poeltl+late 1st into Kawhi in the offseason. The only glaring difference is the top of the roster. DeRozan was always more stats than substance, but he did have 4 all-star appearances under his belt and was a 20+ PPG scorer for 5 straight season. Lowry was clearly our best player, but he seemingly held less value than DeRozan around the league and was a bit underrated. FVV+Siakam are both a step down from DeRozan+Lowry, but the gap isn't that far off IMO. Most of the gap is due to accolades and DeRozan+Lowry being on 50-win teams for a few years in their late 20s. FVV+Siakam are both proven winners that contribute to winning in big ways, but they're just being asked to do a bit too much with a young roster.
If a disgruntled star became available, I think Siakam/FVV + GTJ + picks would be very reasonable for both sides. The team losing the star would still be getting back a borderline all-star (in either Siakam or FVV) with a few years of control and a young scorer as well as a couple picks for the future. That would still leave us with a very solid base of Barnes+OG+Siakam/FVV as our 2-4 options and solid depth in Birch/Achiuwa+Banton+Yuta/Boucher+Dragic (who people seem to be forgetting would still be a valuable 20-24 MPG bench piece for a contending team). Who knows if a team like OKC would outbid us and send out a boatload of picks though.
Today's top 5 (Siakam, FVV, Barnes, GTJ, OG) compares decently against 2018 (Lowry, DeRozan, Ibaka, JV, young OG). We can nit-pick here and there, but I think it's close. Banton is probably a little lower value than where Delon/Fred were in 2018, but I won't argue that point much.
After that, it falls off completely. I'm not even going to mention the other guys on today's roster by name, but they're FAR below where the bench mob was in 2018. There was a reason we didn't want to give up Siakam for Kawhi, he'd showed far more promise by the end of his 2nd year than just a rim-runner like Precious. Don't forget, this was a team winning 55+ games, they were
good. Add Paul George to this team, subtract Siakam & GTJ - they still ain't a contender.
On top of that, we're downplaying how much doubt there was that Kawhi would ever play again. It'd almost be like trading for Kyrie today - would we be any further ahead by getting him in return for FVV + 1? I doubt it.
