Brandon Ingram Discussion: He Is Who We Thought He Could Be

Well, sentient, by both your logic and mine, the three-star plan was stupid.

 

You are entitled to your opinion, and I'm not trying to convince you otherwise (don't have the spare time lol, sorry). But so do I and the others who disagree with you. You claim we will know if the decision was good in a few years once the results are clear. My approach is to assess the decisions based on what we know at the time they are made. From this perspective, it was (again - IMHO) a no-brainer. As a result we have what seems very much like a true contender. We were terrible, absolutely awful and pathetic for the past several years and as much as I loved the kids, there's no telling if and - even if yes - when we could have build a contender around them. We are in the hunt and have one of the best players in the league before he even entered his prime on the roster. I don't see how this current state could be viewed otherwise than as a success from a Lakers fan's perspective. Ny ONLY complaint is he could leave this summer, hopefully he doesn't.

Just to dig a tad deeper into why I disagree with your approach - the two main reasons are:
1. the final results will be affected by things the decision makers cannot influence, like injuries, other team's and players' decisionsetc. - IMO it's unfair to judge the decision based on external factors like that.
2. My main problem with it is - if you want to judge the decision on a trade based on the result, you would have to have knowledge of the result in cas the trade wasn't made. In other words, you will be able to tell in 4 years if we won championships in that span, but you will have zero knowledge of the alternative outcome. So for example, we win 2 championships in that time and at face value that seems gerat, but what if we could have won 4 with the kids? Going a little extreme here, but you get my point.

 

What if Ingram had had a normal game instead of his worst game since OKC last year where he shot 1-9 but had 11 assists?

He would have scored 35 points and we would have lost the game. (would have made 3 more 2 pt shots... made 3 more 3 pt shots... missed 3 more FTs according to season averages)

What if Zion was healthy?

Now, would I have said... hey, you guys are wrong... see how good Ingram is? Nope. I would have said it sucks, and that we shouldn't take the Pelicans lightly... but I would still think we don't know the big picture. It wasn't like we were locking down Ingram... maybe a few shots we disturbed, but he was just flat out choking. Hopefully unless he psyched himself out, he will continue to do well except against us.

AD is excellent, but this team is still too Bron dependent. We were climbing back into the game when AD's elbow was injured. Bron is the most important factor in our ascendance... although AD has been a fantastic Robin. If Bron goes down, and AD keeps us winning... not at this pace but even at .500... then maybe I'd feel he was worth all those sacrifices. Just to remind people who think I'm a hater... I like AD as a person... I like him better than Bron in that respect... I have no reason to tear him down other than my personal analysis of his play.

I understand what you mean Samson in terms of we will never know for sure what would have happened... but all I know is the LBJ's successor is the key to our future success as opposed to AD himself and AD's best asset in my mind is that he's likeable, and he might attract some great scorer to play with him.
If LBJ stays too long... let's say he drags on two years past his prime to play with his kid... or if we don't pair someone great with AD... we will be back to square one in three years.

 

I must say Sentient, some of your takes are just so... weird, they are difficult to even comment on. Sometimes it's difficult to even tell what your position is. So now AD's best asset is his hikeability? Like, WTF? In the same post you write he is excellent, so which is it? What is his value in your opinion? Top 5 NBA, top 10, 20, outside of it?

You make it seem like he's not good enough to carry us after LeBron .If that's your opinion, I'll be more than happy to agree to disagree on one for certain.

Are you making the point that maybe BI will be better than AD? I wouldn't say this is completely out of question, but I would give it like a 0,1% probability. Guys like AD are extremely rare and I hope you'll come around and see just how great a player he is.

I agree on the point that we seem to struggle without Bron and AD so far has not been able to carry the team when James is sitting. IMO, that is to a large extent the result of our team's construction. It is more structured to fit Bron than AD. During Shaq and Kobe era we were also struggling heavily more often than not when Shaq was not available. The reason was not that Kobe was "robin", but because outside of Shaq we had a huge hole under the basket.

BTW - the fact that AD is not a creator doesn't mean he's not a top player in this league. Many greats were not shot creators.

 

AD for Harden. BOOM. SJGR

 

I've said several times I think he's the best second option, but hasn't shown the ability to lead the team to victory himself. Shaq could do it even before Penny and Kobe. He only stopped when he got too old and fat.

His likeability is a huge plus because I believe we can get the alpha shot creator to compliment him... if we had prime Dwight, I don't think he could draw a similar player.

I have never made the point that BI will be better than AD... I've said he might become better offensively but will not be the same quality two way player... what I have said is that all our kids with two elites might have a better long term outcome than AD/LBJ and role players.

But right now, I'm enjoying the victories and thinking positive. I only comment when people declare the trade is an empirical success after 18 games.

 

Taken out of context? I don't think it matters as it is that hilarious that you would even say it. Shows how low your opinion of him SEEMS to be (deep down) and that as Cookie says you intend to carry this weird debate for the next 5 years. OMG. But congratulations ..... 3 times in about a week. That has to be a LB record of some dubious sort.

 

how does zion keep getting dragged into this? it's not like he signed there as a FA because ingram was damned impressive (you know, like nobody else did for years).

if zion's a superstar and they win a bunch with BI as a second option, we still can't be sure that would have happened here, as no FA had given us a sniff aside from one who had already cemented his legacy as an all-time great and wanted to retire in style.

paul george had an opportunity to play here and didn't. as did kawhi. not sure how having a bunch of underachieving 20 year olds instead of lebron shifts things.

and once again, if ingram scored 35 points yesterday, it wouldn't have changed anything. if he scores 50 tomorrow, it doesn't change anything. he's not AD and we got AD for him and largely spare parts.

 

That makes a lot more sense than your previous statement, even if I still don't agree with the overall sentiment. Maybe you should try wording your displeasure with how we like the trade a little more precisely in order to avoid misperception of what you actually mean . Make a point and stick with it/defend your position and not change the argumentation every other post.

If your point is that all our kids with two elites might (your wording) have been better than AD/LBJ and role players, I am pretty sure you'll find many people who disagree on this board. The problem is, 1) this doesn't seem like what you were saying in all your other posts and 2) as much as I wanted it to happen, it was probably a pipe dream. Who is to say if we could have attracted "two elites"? LBJ was the first one in a looooong time who came over. Were we supposed to thank him by waiting year after year until some other "elite" decides to join while his last years as a top player go by? Is that the plan you would have preferred?

 

I'm not SM but from what he's said it seems more like he would have preferred 2 other superstars than Lebron and AD and keep the kids. As there were around a hundred other combinations I recall from another post.

 

word. two guys as good or better than paul george + keep all assets?! yes. was never going to happen; didn't come close at all. and we ended up in a spot nearly as good, tbh. unless you're like vash and sentient, who both seem to believe that three stars is the only way to go. i mean, almost nobody ever has had to/been able to do that and the team that wins this year won't have that, but...

two superstars weren't coming here. the nets got two "superstars" (does kyrie count? does kd post-achilles count?), i guess. would you rather be in that spot?

again, lebron saved us. thanks, lebron.

 

Haha literally every champion had 3 stars from Tony/Gino/Duncan to Bron/Wade/Bosh to Bron/Ky/Love to Curry/KD/Klay/Dray

Our own FO was angling for 3 stars this past summer, or you already forgot? Speaking of which, how many stars those Showtime Lakers got?

 

Fonz gifs for the win

 

each of those teams had two or fewer superstars. as did the showtime lakers (kareem, magic). three superstar (like three perennial all nba guys) teams like the one we were trying to form are incredibly rare. for a reason.

parker was all nba about 1/3 of the time; ginobili was all nba just twice in his entire career (3rd team).

you're also leaving out several champions during that period, including the rockets, bulls, mavericks, raptors, and all non-showtime lakers teams since then. all of which had two (or in the mavs/raptors case: one) superstar-level players.

you certainly don't need three stars to win.

 

Sure, you don’t need em, but it helps.

I mean you’re making it sound like teams or fans wouldn’t envy more star power clumping me and Sentient into a small collective that does.

I’m confident you can ask any team exec or fan base whether they would take more marquee names over role players what the result would be....and I wouldn’t need a crystal ball either.

 

To clarify my position... I felt the trade was justified had we landed both AD and Kawhi... giving us three stars and a legitimate pair to build after LBJ was gone. I was irritated that we made a half assed disorganized last minute hail mary at signing Kawhi, instead of using the methodical approach that the Clippers had employed all season. Like everyone else, I got caught up in the media frenzy and truly believed we could have signed him, however... in retrospect, I realize what folly that was.

As it turns out, we might have dodged a bullet in terms of signing Kawhi to a long term contract (we'd be like the Rams with Gurley in a way) but giving up everyone for AD and healthy Kawhi would have been worth it in my eyes.

Giving up everyone for AD, Danny Green, KCP and random signings was less optimal.

 

The more you talk about this, plus your earlier 100 combinations of 2 "stars" other than Lebron and AD ... plus keep the kids, the crazier it sounds. IMO.

 

This was the odds until the last minute shift in the media narrative according to Caesar's Palace

You can disagree with me... but I wouldn't call me crazy.

 

" half a**ed disorganized last minute hail mary at signing Kawhi" plus the myriad combinations (a hundred you could think of 2 stars joining us that weren't Lebron and AD) and keeping the kids plus your way of looking at Anthony Davis vs Brandon Ingram in this trade while still not wanting to waste Lebron's time here plus AD's best attribute being he's "likable" and all the can't build around him and needing 3 - 4 years to determine if we made a rational move at the time it was made to trade for him.

All of that.