A LOT can happen in the next 16 months, but as it sits right now, I'm liking what I'm hearing quite a bit more as a Laker fan than I would as a Pacers fan.
Hmmmm....interesting. When Indiana gets bounced out of the first round again, we can resume negotiations for Paul this summer.
I don't get the obsession with acting like PG is our savior... He is a great 3rd option and a very good 2nd option. That pacers team with hibbert, stephenson, hill and west is about as close as you can get to a similar team as the Detroit champion team (in the sense that they all contributed to success). When you look at the best 1st options in the west, we got Westbrook, Curry, Durant, Kawhi, Chris Paul, Blake, Cousins, AD, Harden. George isn't better than any of those players, so effectively we got Warriors, Spurs, Pelicans, Clippers, Rockets & Thunder, all with the best player in the matchup against us. Realistically, Spurs, OKC and Rockets are all an All-Star away from being a serious road block to us for the next 5 years. Utah is built really well to develop into a contender in the short term and Hayward isn't that much different to a player of George's calibre, maybe a step or two below. Also arguably Minnesota has the another dominant 1st option in KAT and Wiggins is a potenAll-Star Star so they could easily develop to above George's ceiling. Unless we can get a dominant MVP 1st option to team them up with George and one or two of our youth prospects, with George as the 1st option, I probably see us as a 7th or 8th seed with all of the following above us (in no real order): 1. Warriors 2. Spurs 3. Pelicans 4. Clippers 5. Rockets 6. Thunder 7. Jazz 8. Timberwolves 9. Lakers
It's just an opinion, I would love to be proven wrong. But I would love to hear your point of view too!
Gota start somewhere....dont care what opt Pg is but we have NO one on the team on his lvl on either side of the floor
Do you realize George was an MVP candidate just last year? He was in the conversation as much as anybody else coming off a gruesome, freak injury no less. I'm not sure anyone who watches Paul George can realistically argue that he's not a "Tier 1" star. Now if you want to argue that the buck doesn't stop there, I completely agree. Getting George isn't the end game, it's the beginning, but it's a hell of a start. Not to mention, we've got the ability this summer to free up enough cap room to add a max contract. If you convince someone like Griffin to take the leap with the guarantee that we can get Paul on the back end, you're looking at an instant turnaround with plenty of assets still left to trade for another #3 option because George is a terrific first and Griffin is a very good second. Griffin is of course just an example, there could be another name in there.
"If you convince someone like Griffin to take the leap with the guarantee that we can get Paul on the back end, you're looking at an instant turnaround with plenty of assets still left to trade for another #3 option because George is a terrific first and Griffin is a very good second. Griffin is of course just an example" Waits for another epic Weezy anti Clippers blast ..... nothing to do with your logic, real :Headbang:
Mouthpiece's take on the situation. Basically he says the Lakers should probably wait until the summer of 2018 instead of trading for Paul George. He also says the Lakers need to focus on developing their young talents. Mouthpiece specifically mentions Ingram as someone that George likes a lot. He mentions Larry Nance Jr. as a Draymond-esque player. Mouthpiece mentions Russell as someone that needs to show he can be consistent. He even mentions Zubac as someone the Lakers need to show can be a defensive presence... He doesn't mention Randle... Hm... I wonder where Ding is getting this info. If this is coming from George and/or his agent I find it interesting. I think that's the likely source of all this: the Lakers AND the Pacers need to figure out a way to look competitive. The one that looks most competitive gets Paul George. The good news is someone like Pelinka will be more plugged into these types of situations than Mitch would be. I think we've got a puncher's chance at George in FA, but we could swing a deal for him in the summer too.
I'm aware of his great season last year. He started off hot and was an MVP candidate (top 10) till the New Year and cooled as the season went off. To finish the season he wasn't even in the top 10 of voting: 1 Stephen Curry 2 Kawhi Leonard 3 LeBron James 4 Russell Westbrook 5 Kevin Durant 6 Chris Paul 7 Draymond Green 8 Damian Lillard 9 James Harden 10 Kyle Lowry Now, I understand voting isn't an indicator of how good a player is, but it does tell you a little bit. The Pacers finished with the 7th seed last year in the east and got booted in the first round. This year he isn't playing at MVP level and everyone I listed is a better player than him (you can make an argument against Blake probably). So if the scenario is to sign PG as an FA, sign me up right there! That would be a great move. Trading for him? To Larry Bird? I'm not sold. Especially when Bird asks for Randle, Russell or Ingram and the Top 3 pick if we land it. A team of Clarkson, Young, Ingram, George, Zubac or Russell, Clarkson, Young, George, Zubac isn't a contender in the west. If we want to make a trade, offer the same package + Clarkson or Nance for Westbrook - a real 1st option on a team - and try to sign George as an FA. Depending if the package is Russell or Ingram and Clarkson or Nance alongside Randle and our top 3 if we retain it and houston's 1st. A team of: Westbrook Clarkson Ingram George Zubac or Westbrook Russell George Nance Zubac That's a damn good team if our young guys develop well.
my apologies svtzr, I thought you were the same poster who said PG is a good 2nd/3rd option in the NBA Trade Deadline thread. You oddly phrased it in the same way KB24 did in that thread. this is what i said: Paul George is as good as Kawhi, and he is dominant. I'll stand by that statement. I think he's better than Cousins, and certainly better KAT and Wiggins. Wiggins' best case scenario is becoming a Paul George type player. I haven't seen enough "healthy Anthony Davis" to conclude that he's better than PG. I can also make the argument that he's better than Harden, mostly because PG is an elite defender while Harden isn't even close, but I don't want to type all of that out. Barring his leg injury, he's shown far more durability than AD, Blake and CP3. When Blake was playing at this absolute best in the 2015 playoffs, he was doing things Paul George does on a regular basis. I'll concede that Blake, at his best, is probably a better passer/distributor than PG. As for that Pacers team, it was not like the old Pistons team, they got a lot of offense from Chauncey, Rip, Rasheed, even Okur... plus they had a do-all guy in Tayshaun. PG carried the entire offensive load on those teams and they saw success in the regular and post season. All of the guys you listed play with 1 other top-tier player, except Westbrook. Look where Westbrook is now that Durant is gone? Still an amazing player but they're hanging on to the 7th spot. It looks an awful lot like the position Paul George is currently in. And like therealdeal said - Paul George is just the start.
Shouldnt pencil PG AS a pf, thats one of the reason hes disgruntled in indy, they forced him to play pf for a while
I'm with @therealdeal in that I couldn't disagree more but I'll respond specifically to this point about the 2013-2014 Pacers being similar to the 2003-2004 Pistons that won the title. You're comparing a Pistons lineup that was the All-Time epitome of team effort where it was 5 very very solid guys with no clear cut #1. Rip and Billups led the team in scoring at 17.6ppg and 16.9rpg and both would go on to be multiple time All-Stars shortly - with Billups making multiple All-Defense and All-NBA teams. Big Ben was arguably the greatest defensive player at the time as the reigning 2-time Defensive Player of the Year. Sheed was acquired and was already a 2X All-Star and was a force on both ends of the court. Prince was a stellar defensive player and would make the All-Defense 2nd team 4 straight years after. The Pacers team was solid defensively and had good balance on offense but George was the clear leader. 21.7ppg while no one else topped 14. So the balance wasn't the same. If he is the Rip, he didn't have a Billups. Hibbert was a very solid defensive anchor but he was a tier below Big Ben - and several tiers below in rebounding. Ben was 3rd in RPG. Hibbert was tied for 47th. West was tough but was a tier below what Sheed was. Stephenson put up nice stats but that he has done little since suggests that was more of a mirage than anything. Hill was a 10.3ppg 3.5apg guy. That the Pacers won 56 games and made the Conference Finals is evidence that PG has the tools to be a solid #1 on a strong team. It's not some type of evidence that he was riding the coattails of a 2004 Pistons-type team.
i rarely disagree with svtzr, but i do here. george is, at worst, a fantastic second option. i could buy a team contending with him as #1 (because it's happened), but i think the idea is that him being in la would help pave the way for another player of similar caliber to join him (via trade or FA*). this is all assuming that russell or ingram (whoever's left after a george trade, i guess) never blossoms into a star, which is totally possible (despite the our hot-takes residents' suggestions). i think the lakers should go hard after him this summer. so much so that if they have the pick, i'm going to be disappointed if they make it instead of trading it for george. not having the pick will put a serious damper on this particular fantasy, though, because i'd rather not give up russell or ingram, and without the pick, indy would demand both, i think. *btw, people get hung up on the lakers using FA to improve, but shaq was really the only example, and that took a bizarre confluence of events to occur. their other big hits in the last 25 years were the #13 pick in the draft (who wanted to come to la) and a trade for a disgruntled star who wanted to come to la because he had a better chance of winning. getting a paul george starts to put you back in all those conversations. we've been out of them since kobe tore his achilles.
