Hinkie's letter to Sixers shareholders

[Snotbubbles]

If Philadelphia had a good scouting department their tanking strategy would've worked great. Unfortunately, high picks mean nothing when you pick busts.

Which picks busted?

[naabzor]

13 pages? Ok. This guy fails. There is no letter that can savage this fact. HE FAILS.

[engelbert321]

Hinkie was the worst thing that happened in the NBA. Good riddance


Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

[nitetrain8603]

It's scary how few people understand what he was doing. It just goes to show you how stupid the average person is.

I'm guessing this is a swipe at Sam Hinkie, but I guess I am an idiot, haha. He did an excellent job compiling assets and remolding the team. They are in a great position now.

But by his own analysis, the currency of the NBA is wins. It seems to me that he paid a premium in current wins in order to increase his odds by a minuscule percentage at future wins. I mean if I buy one million lottery tickets for a billion dollar payoff, that's not a good investment. It doesn't matter that I reduced the odds from one in five billion to one in five thousand. The odds are still heavily stacked against me and I have $1 million at risk. It's an admittedly imperfect analogy because every team in the NBA, even the Warriors, lose a game and "pay" a win. Bad teams, who aren't trying to be bad, are going to "pay" wins whether they want to or not. But in terms of determining whether Hinkie paid more than he had to, I think it works. He uses the Warriors as an example of long-term results, but neglects to mention that none of their key players was a top 5 pick.

The bottom line is this, would you rather win a little now and be a constant fringe playoff team or would you rather try to build a sustainable contender? What he was doing is what Theo did with the Cubs in baseball. He was trying to get a flow of young talent in there.

I thought that's why they brought him in the first place, since philly under Doug Collins was a treadmill playoff team.

[Nebula1]

They should make a movie about Hinkie and the Sixers. Not a Moneyball type but more a Major League type movie.


Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

Hinkie poster with peel-away stickers.... nice.

[HartfordWhalers]

But by his own analysis, the currency of the NBA is wins. It seems to me that he paid a premium in current wins in order to increase his odds by a minuscule percentage at future wins.

This misses the point entirely.

Whats the value of going from 30 wins to 34 wins? If anything it is negative.
Whats the value of going from 38 to 42 wins? A lot because that is usually the jump into the playoffs and that revenue.
Whats the value of going from 42 to 46 wins? Less than directly above normally as you are still a 1st round out.
Whats the value of going from 56 to 60 wins? Tremendous because (assuming the wins reflect the strength of a team), the odds of a championship just probably doubled.*

Even if you say wins are the common currency, the value of that currency is highly dependent upon where a team is in the standings.

[loserX]

Nobody writes something like this and is "shocked" and "devastated" when its leaked to the media. He wrote this for the media.

Its an absolutely ridiculous read. A resignation letter is simple- thanks, bye. Not this drawn out woe is me manifesto.

Frankly, it reads like like someone who is trying to plant the seeds for a mutiny.

I did notice this part: "With Scott O’Neil running our business operations, you are in good hands." No mention of either of the Colangelos or, you know, the basketball operations.

If not exactly mutinous, this is at the very least pretty passive-aggressive. Obviously we can't expect Hinkie to be happy about the way things went, but still.

[Winter]

since 2000, the major contributor from the Championship team that was played with the same team from the start till their championship are

Laker - Kobe (Draft 13th)
Spur - TD (1st), Parker (28th), Ginobili (57th), Kawhi (15th)
Heat - Wade (6th), if you want to count Udonis (undaft), Mario Chalmers (34th)
Mavs - Dirk (9th)
Warrior - Curry (7th), Thompson (11th), Green (35th), Barnes (7th)
Celtics - Pierce (10th), than Rondo (21th), Glen Davis (35th)
Piston - Prince (23th)

Now, few teams was in the time where FA move much easier, and less mental barrier. So Hankie really need to figure out what he is trying to sell. At this moment, if he can not figure out FA will be a major part of the team in a Champion team, he wastes a good time doing any planning.

If he really believe the path is to get top 3 in the draft, then he really deserved to be canned

His best model should be his boss' boss - Celtic's Angie, who is trying to maintain a winning team, so it can at least attract FA, while accumulate assesses, so can do major deal if things come out while those players that traded do want to come because they can see a chance to win, not because it is the place to give them max. And if get lucky, get a good draft, but good draft always be the least in the plan. Evn his old boss is taking that approach.

To draft someone you can not play, you basically waste 1 year of Rookie contract, and reduce your potential window of exchange assess to better deal. He should point to MCW's deal, and claims he is good finding worthy value in the draft and thus can get enough assess better than any other GM. (OKC's Presti probably can claim that better).

He has not prove he can build a team anyone think they will come for winning. And he basically know whatever player he drafted will not be in any part of plan once they pass their Rookie contract. And to pick 3 players that operates at the same space, you are killing their value even if you want to d statistic padding, that actually hurt your goal (accumulate more assess), and prevent you get a speedy jump up.

Maybe he should try to sell the shareholder that his plan spends much less efforts, and still give them profit, after all, their is a league wise sharing program, and as long as enough owner willing to pursue the ring, the overall league value should increase. And it always sell the future, not now, so it always not need to be tested or prove. That maybe better selling points.

[AmitabhaBuddha]

How did this take 13 pages? And with so many quotes from value investors....

His method was simple. Lose to get better draft picks. Better draft picks equal better players. Better players equal a better team.

And of course by being so simple he ignored the human element of putting all these players in the horrible spot of being on a perennial loser with no veteran guidance.

What does it to to actual people being in a place that is trying to lose year after year, what does that do to a player?

[Def Leppard]

It's scary how few people understand what he was doing. It just goes to show you how stupid the average person is.

People did understand but because they had a different opinion doesn't make them stupid.