Toronto is not, unless Siakam and Anunoby take massive strides this year. In all honesty the best move would likely be to trade their expiring contracts (Lowry, Gasol and Ibaka) for futures and try to rebuild but that’s a tough thing to do right after winning a championship.
I can see both winning near 45 games as is, which almost always does not a contender make. That’s if Toronto’s point guard play doesn’t decline too much and if OKC gets a good healthy year out of Gallinari. I would be shocked if the Thunder ever make another deep playoff run with Westbrook at the helm.
So, how do we predict how the Clippers will do? SI.com is calling them, on paper, the best team in the NBA.
Clips will be great on the perimeter and wings w Leonard, George, Patrick Beverly, Lou Williams, ands few other solid bench players. IMO certainly worthy, right now, to be considered at it near the top of the West.
Lakers recent additions include Danny Green and Boogie Cousins, who should each help immensely. They will definitely be a top tier team, but not sure they’ll be deep enough to hang w Clips; but will the Clips be able to handle the Lakers advantage in the front court?
So you’re basically saying that the west coast will be dominated by California teams for the foreseeable future? Big yawn.
I didn’t exactly say that, but it certainly is possible. The Lakers have very little depth, and I wouldn’t be surprised in the least to see them catch an injury bug and be derailed. Other teams to watch would likely be Portland, Denver and Utah, who each have quality teams capable of winning 50-55 games. And that team formerly of Oakland, of course.
Lakers just finalized Anthony Davis deal, sending Ball, Ingraham, and draft picks to New Orleans. Probably a good deal for both teams. Ball is still a good player, just part of a made-to-order shit show in celeb-obsessed L.A., his pop having too much influence, and Magic Johnson not running the team well. Meanwhile LeBron gets his superstar sidekick.
I still think the Clips are more well-rounded – and I had absolutely no idea that Paul George once dated Doc Rivers’ daughter…and cheated on her. Holy crap, get the popcorn!
ETA: Actually, though, if any coach can kinda coach past something like that, I’m guessing it’s Doc.
So the entire world decided to get flipped on it’s head over the holiday weekend. I was travelling and wasn’t really able to jump in here until now, which is a bit of a bummer since I started the thread. Damn you Kawhi!
Few thoughts after having a couple days to process this.
First, I was totally right earlier in the thread when I said not to believe any rumors where Kawhi is involved. The guy ran this process like he was auditioning for an episode of The Americans. Both impressive and kinda nuts. Also, I can only assume that the delay in announcing a decision had far less to do with him making up his mind and more with working out who was coming with him. I hate the “super team” thing and this feels too much like the behind the scenes LeBron/Wade/Bosh coordination for my tastes, but since it’s essentially re-balancing the power structure in such a way that both the Lakers and Warriors are no longer the clear favorites, I am sorta okay with it.
One of the big rumors hints that KD was Kawhi’s first choice of partners. Would have been interesting to see that combo work. I wonder why KD was so determined to team up with Kyrie in Brooklyn? Had he basically made up his mind before Kawhi came calling? Was he afraid to become an even greater villain after the last decision? Did Kawhi call him out of the blue or did he know about before his own process started? Did KD even seriously consider it? Is this entire rumor bogus?
Which twosome do you like best for the next 2-3 years?
[ul]
[li]LeBron + AD[/li][li]Kawhi + PG13[/li][li]KD + Kyrie[/li][li]Kemba + Tatum[/li][li]Embiid + Simmons[/li][li]Curry + Klay[/li][li]Harden + CP3[/li][li]Giannis + Middleton[/li][li]Doncic + KP[/li][li]Dame + CJ[/li][/ul]
There’s a handful of other really good teams without a clear 1-2 like Utah, Indiana, Denver, New Orleans and there’s certainly some things left to shake out with Butler & Miami and Westbrook & OKC. Also, no idea what’s going to happen with Russell in GS when December comes around or Klay comes back. Whatever happens, this is probably about the most balanced the NBA has been in a long long time.
One last quick thought for now, the Clippers got absolutely roasted by OKC in that deal. Giving up that many picks plus SGA is just nuts. Certainly they figured that it was the only way Kawhi was coming and that if Kawhi and PG work out as expected, none of those picks will be better than maybe the 20th pick, but most championship teams end up making a couple mid-season moves to secure a title and ate first rounders tend to be that currency. Kawhi may end up regretting forcing that as much as the Clippers do.
There’s rumored to be 4 potential destinations for Westbrook.
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The Magic. They seem likely to be able to put together the best package of players and picks to make a deal happen. They also probably need him the most to salvage a degree of relevancy. It’s the landing spot that would probably piss Westbrook off the most too.
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The Heat. I don’t quite understand how they were able to make the Butler trade happen and yet people seem to think they still have the assets and can somehow clear the space to make this massive deal happen. It makes the most sense from a media standpoint I think, the Heat would be must-see-tv. Westbroook and Butler together would either be a great pairing because of their similar intensity and no-bullshit attitudes or be a disaster for the same reasons. What would a Butler-Westbrook backcourt look like? I can’t even.
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The Knicks. Probably the one that seems the most logical. Westbrook seems like a great fit in NYC culturally. He hates the media, so that may be tough, but he seems to love attention and fashion and a lots of the off court stuff that comes with playing in NY. The Knicks could salvage their embarrassing free agency this way. They’d certainly reclaim the backpages for at least a season before KD comes back. But, the Knicks blew a ton of money on middle-range talent and don’t have nearly the cap space they should. They also have a long history of mortgaging the future to add declining superstars and Knicks fans would probably be pretty pissed, at least until he laces them up in MSG for the first time.
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The Rockets. I call bullshit. The pattern seems to be that the Rockets GM basically wants them mentioned in every single discussion about a big name talent so he leaks that to his cadre of lap dogs. None of these rumors ever pan out and they just don’t make any sense on the court or financially. File this with the rest of the fake news. I have no idea what the benefit to the Rockets is having this shit floating out there.
Toronto with their current roster is absolutely a playoff team. Kawhi Leonard only played sixty games, and they were 17-5 when he wasn’t playing.
Of course they’re not as good and would be a huge longshot to win the title again, but this is a 49-33 team as constituted. Not fabulous, but a good team with playoff experience that could win some playoff series. It’s not like the East is all that strong.
Dumping everyone is really not a good idea. It would move up the future championship window a little, maybe. It would DEFINITELY, however, sever a lot of faith with the fans. Ujiri would be turning the 2019-2020 Raptors into the 1998 Florida Marlins, who were a total disaster one year after winning it all. It’s often forgotten now but the Marlins, who now are a dumpster fire of a sports franchise, really didn’t have bad attendance prior to the 1998 tank; they did well in the inaugural season of course, but from 1994-1996 weren’t too shabby at all for a bad team in a football stadium coming out of a strike, and then were fine in the World Series year. The 1998 tank absolutely wrecked them; their attendance has NEVER come back, even when the team was good, even when winning another World Series in 2003. The Raptors have a lot of fan goodwill even having lost the bidding war for Kawhi. That goodwill is worth a FORTUNE, as much as one or two Grade A free agency signings.
Taking another shot at it in 2019-2020 is worth it. Sure, they probably won’t win it all, but let’s be honest, the odds are against you even if you have Kawhi Leonard.
Neither do I, or most other Rockets fans. Most of us are tired of the bullshit and puffery. Do a deal, then talk.
The Rockets need rebounding, defense, and 3pt shooting. Westbrook sucks at all of those. (Most of his boards, I think, are simply taken from other players on his team. I don’t think he increases the number of boards your team gets. I could be wrong.)
Another destination I’d heard is the Pistons, to pair with Blake Griffin and Andre Drummond. Lots of expirings and picks that Detroit could use, and OKC would want. Would probably piss Russ off too.
RickJay, this topic came up on the Simmons podcast over the weekend. To paraphrase, they believe that Ujiri has been chomping at the bit to do a ground-up rebuild basically since he got the job. That he’d been wanting to fire Casey for years but he kept winning too many games. The implication being that Kawhi leaving after winning a title gives him all the air-cover he needs to part out the organization in preparation for a Sixers style reboot.
Your point about the Marlins situation is worth considering for sure, but I don’t think the Raptors are really in the same boat. MLB rebuilds back then almost never happened as a result of a to-the-studs tear down, today we’ve seen it and fans are accepting usually, but back then it simply wasn’t done. Teams spent their way into contention. Also, the Marlins ownership was a dumpster fire for lots and lots of reasons at the time all of which played a large role in the fan attrition. I think it’s unreasonable to attribute the entire decline to their firesale. The Cubs and Astros cratered (not after a WS admittedly) and their fans tolerated it fine. The Sixers fans seem to be happy with the dividends of the Process. I give Raptors fans the benefit of the doubt here.
I am still scratching my head as to why Butler opted to leave a team that will contend for the Eastern Conference for a considerably lesser team for less money. Butler did say (essentially) that “$140mil is plenty” but also that “he wanted to win” and Miami is not going to win anything despite his presence. Getting Westbrook is one way this team can move up in the standings, but not sure they could share the ball enough for Jimmy to be “the man”…
It’s never been done, ever, immediately after winning the championship. There is no example of anyone else doing that except the '98 Marlins. Teams have torn themselves apart to start over, like the Sixers did not long ago, but the Sixers weren’t coming off a title.
Toronto is a better basketball market than Miami is a baseball market, but there would still be an enormous long term loss of revenue. Certainly the fans in Toronto seem extremely disinterested in paying to see a rebuilding baseball team (not Miami disinterested, but still.)
It’s also weirdly unnecessary. Most of the money is off the books after 2019-2020, so you may as well take a crack at it and then start over. They aren’t going to get a king’s ransom trading away the likes of Marc Gasol or Serge Ibaka.
That said, I do not know offhand what’s available on the free agent market after 2019-2020, which alters (or not) the rebuild plans. If Gasol, Lowry and Ibaka can be partially replaced with quality free agents (Demar is available!) and the team’s getting development out of Spicy P, OG and Fred, trying to ramp a 48-34 team into a 55-win team might be possible. If the FA cupboard is bare, a longer term approach may be necessary.
Upon the retirement of Nowitzki and assuming Udonis Haslem retires from being a Heat player, Russell Westbrook (draft class of '08) will be the player with the longest tenure on the same team in the league, according to my research.
If Westbrook is traded, then it will be Stephen Curry (class of '09).
'98 Bulls.
There’s little worse than being in NBA limbo. Winning 40-50 games year after year is a great way to become the Knicks or Wizards. This is what most GMs have learned: try and win it all or rebuild, there is no middle path. There isn’t a scenario where this Kawhi-less Raptors team can legitimately compete for a title. The West is loaded, again, and they aren’t getting past a healthy Nets, Sixers, Bucks or Celtics. As a Bulls fan, I really hope the Raptors try and reload. Best thing in the world for the up and comers in the East.
And how has that turned out for the Bulls, long term?
Eh, everyone says that - the Gospel of Hinkie has been widely spread in the media and fandom - but I don’t think the facts bear this out. The Raptors were a thoroughly middle class team for a half dozen years. Per the conventional wisdom quoted above, they were doing the wrong thing, and should have broken down their team (which could never have won a title as it was constructed). But instead, they kept retooling, kept their team competitive, and were therefore in a position to grab Kawhi when he became available and immediately become a title contender. The Clippers never did a total breakdown - their record has been above .500 every season since 2011 - and therefore were well equipped to jump from a middle-class non-contender to a title favorite.
Meanwhile, the teams that have really bottomed out have struggled, because in the modern NBA the best players are going to go where they want to go, and mostly they don’t want to go to garbage teams. How did bottoming out and clearing a ton of cap space work out for the Knicks? The new path to success, I think, is to plant yourself firmly IN NBA limbo, where you can convince a top player or two that you have the infrastructure to support an immediate title run.
I forgot about the Bulls, but in fairness that wasn’t really on purpose.
Well, as Storyteller points out, you are precisely describing the Raptors prior to this year, who BECAUSE they remained a very good but not quite good enough team were positioned to strike. Had they retooled a few years ago, we wouldn’t have had a parade in Toronto. Now the Clippers have done exactly the same thing; they maintained a pretty good team for years, and now they have some serious firepower and have to be considered a threat to win it all. One could argue the 2011 Mavs are a similar case, though they did make the Finals in 2006. The LeBron Heat were already a mid-40s-win team when they grabbed him; it is rather unlikely he’d have joined them if they stank.
It is objectively hard to prove what the right approach is when we’re in a superteam era; every got crushed by either the Warriors or Lebron for years, so it’s hard to gauge whether a team was “Successful” in their approach or not.
I’m not sure what the answer is either. The Rockets under Daryl Morey weren’t allowed to tank by ownership. Accordingly, ever since he showed up before the 2007 season, they too never dipped below .500, though they did miss the playoffs for the 2009-2011 seasons. Probably would still be in limbo without the Harden trade. Lots of good, undervalued, complementary players, but no stars until Harden. Though I guess you can make an argument for 2007 being the last hurrah for the Yao-McGrady duo, and Yao gutting it out a full season in 2008.
I imagine they’ll go the Hinkie route once the Chris Paul contract plays out, and Harden is traded to a contender. May happen after this year, depending.