Official 2016 Free Agency Thread

So...we have $$$ to spend. Onto less depressing s***.

 

I think it's pretty clear Jeanie is the leak. Every bit of info from that piece is biased in her favor and extremely anti-Jim. It paints him in almost a caricature light of stupidity, vanity, and vapidness. Meanwhile Jeanie is an ardent worker spending every minute in her office trying to be her father. It can't get more biased than that. I mean I'm sure some of what she says is true, but what good does it do Tuesday before Thursday's FA period? I mean honestly what good comes of this? It's a selfish power play to increase pressure on Mitch and Jim so she can force them out. I mean hell even in the piece itself it implies she doesn't even know who she'd hire after them, she'd just force them out regardless. Like you said it's petty and inappropriate and undermines not just Mitch and Jim but makes the company look bad.

The Lakers are far from the worst run organization, but this nonsense between the Buss kids is infuriating.

 

Wing and Big options, split up into categories. The first group is players who would be a big upgrade for us. The second would be a decent upgrade, and the third would be good depth signings. * = clear starter material, *? = questionable starter. These are ranked just in terms of how good I think they'd be for us for next year. No, I don't want Howard. I'm also not factoring in $. We could add two big names, and we still might have space for another decent addition. If we could add Courtney Lee, Marvin Williams, and Hassan Whiteside, that might give us the best combination of success now and going into the future. A second-tier signing spree of Solomon Hill, Bazemore, David Lee, and Ian Mahinmi would be a really intriguing combo. And either way I like the idea of bringing in Tim Frazier if possible.

WING
Parsons*
Williams*
Deng*
DeRozan*
Lee*
Barnes*
--------
Bazemore*
Hill*?
-------
Afflalo*?
Vujacic
Green

BIG
Horford*
Gasol*
Whiteside*
-------
Howard*
Noah*
Pachulia*
Lee*
Mahinmi*
-----
Biyombo*
Nene*?
Hill
Stoudemire
Reed

DAR/Clarkson/Frazier
Lee/Lou Williams
Marvin Williams/Ingram/Brown
Randle/Nance
Whiteside/Black/Zubac
Starting lineup gets a huge boost with three new starters, and the bench is GOOD. Clarkson Lou, Ingram, Nance, and Black include four players with experience in the league, and I think all of them have started games (except Ingram). Even the third stringers have some good potential. Could add JaBari of you want a backup SG, too. We probably have to commit $$ and years to add all of these players.

DAR/Clarkson/Frazier
Bazemore/Williams
Ingram/Hill/Brown
Randle/Nance
Mahinmi/Lee/Zubac
This team is a bit different. Lower quality Sg starter, rookie in the starting lineup, and a lesser starting C. It adds, however, by not having to commit 15m+ to probably any player, but it still gets the vet boost from the bigs. Mahinmi and Lee are both competent, and Lee can even play the 4. Yes, that's David Lee. Baze and Hill give good complements to our existing wings, giving us shooting, length, and defense, at both wing spots. Plus, they're young and can grow. This team opens itself to the possibility of adding another top flight FA in the future. The other one makes that a bit harder.

 

I've read that Solomon Hill is in line for a pretty big payday, but maybe what that meant was "relatively" big. A lot of people inside the NBA like him a lot. I'm lukewarm on him. He'd be a pretty good addition and someone Brian Shaw probably knows well. I'd prefer if we went after a vet, but we could do worse.

 

I think he's a very promising player, and he could be - at the very least - a quality backup. He's young, but he already has a full season's worth of starts under his belt, and he also has the experience of coming off the pine.

 

Just finished the article. Wow, where to begin?

First off, it's embarrassing how little disguise went toward shielding Jeanie as Ding's source here. Like, I'm genuinely sorry your little foofy dog passed away, but what in the world does that have to do with anything? ThaHELL??

Secondly, like others are saying: WHAT IS THE POINT OF THIS ARTICLE NOW? You trying to submarine our free agent hopes on the doorstep of making our recruiting pitches so you can justify ousting Jim? The point is belabored in the article that Jeanie can fire Jim at any time. You don't need to convince the public on this. Jim has always been (unfairly, IMO) cast as the "Family Idiot". Lazy Laker fans always assume he's essentially the "Tommy Boy" of the Buss family bungling through day-to-day operations incompetently.

Lastly, and I feel like I've said this so many times I could ram my head into the wall, but MY GOD can we stop deifying Phil Jackson as some front office wizard? He's done exactly JACK S*** in NY besides lucking into Zinger in the draft last year after failing to trade that pick so desperately. Oh, you just gave up real assets for washed-up Derek Rose? Cooooooool! Did I mention that advanced stats showed him as worse on the court last year than Raymond Felton? I love PJ as a coach. He's the GOAT in that department, but he was desperate to trade an early-20's Kobe for Jason Kidd, and his FO acumen hasn't gotten any better from what I've seen. Give me Mitch every day of the week.

For as many unfortunate missteps that have happened since the league screwed us out of CP3, I'm overall fine with how the team has been run, in general. Mitch has wisely fought the urge to squander our financial flexibility on vets who wouldn't have pushed us over the edge anyway. It's ALWAYS better to bottom-out in the NBA than be mediocre. I'd rather have suffered through these past 3 seasons and move forward with Randle, Clarkson, Russell, Nance & Ingram then be the freaking 45-win Hawks from now until eternity.

Now, can we focus on continuing this rebuild and leave the petty family squabbling out of it?

 

Love the content guys, but let's move that talk now into the dedicated thread!

 

I feel like this is coming out of left field. We just drafted two nice prospects, hired a great, new, young coach in Luke, and things are really looking up.

Why does this come out now..... I'll read the article and try to make some sense of it. Weird of Ding to put a thing out like this whether or not he isn't with the team as a beat writer anymore.

 

Healthy Parsons is arguably the best FA out there that we have any chance at. Parsons/Horford or Parsons/Whiteside would also be a really good offseason.