2023-24 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

Luck of the Irish finally ran out



Not celebrating his injury. Just shocked it didn't happen until now.

 

So your knit-picking one guy's three point percentage? Come on man.

 

Everything you always wanted to know about your soleus but were embarrassed to ask:

https://www.google.com/search?q=what+is+a+soleus+muscle&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-us&client=safari

 

I hurt my gluteus soleus once

 

it's not just one guy

i'm not going to go back and look at all those numbers, but all you have to do is look up guys like wayne ellington, malik beasley, reggie bullock, jodie meeks, etc. guys who were brought in specifically to make 3s. hell, i remember artest and barnes made 3s at a lower rate once they got to the lakers. all started with glen rice

 

If you could would you trade Rui straight up for Jonathan Issac?

 

yes. his injury history is TERRIFYING, but his ceiling is super high and he's on a one-year deal as opposed to rui's 2.

 

Idk, he's incredible defensively but pretty limited offensively. I see him as a better Vando, not sure it makes sense to have both guys. If I were the Spurs I'd aggressively go after Isaac to pair him with Wemby in that frontcourt.

 

If you could pull off the Isaac trade then you could use Vando as a tradable asset for a dependable shooter

 

isaac's offense has actually improved over time, too. he's basically vando without being a total minus on that end.

 

in your plan, you go below the cap but also use the mle. you'd have to use the room exception. and lebron would have take a substantial paycut (like down to near mle levels). also, i don't know if thompson's worth 25 per anymore. i also don't think melton and plumlee split the mle. each one probably goes for more than half of it, imo.

 

On another note..just curious

Austin, Rui, D'Angelo, Jarred and Max

Any of these guys start, or replace top rotation players. In Den,Minn,OKC, Dal, Flippers, Sac, NO?

Who? What teams, Why?

 

i think reaves starts over (or at least is more valuable than) giddey (okc), jones (dal), jones (NO), huerter/ellis (sac), kcp (den).

if vando's healthy, he's basically NO's jones and slightly better than dallas's jones, imo.

so, mostly no. not sure what your point is, though. most of those teams don't have two players eating up 100 million in cap space, and almost all of the comparison players make more money than our guys.

if your point is then why not trade our guys? sure. for whom? if they're not replacing any of those guys, who are you trading them for?

 

We aren't the only team with at least two highly paid stars tho..AD at 40M is still a bargain..Porter Jr makes around the same salary. AD's salary jumps in 25-26.

I was just thinking about something Magic said, about the talent level in the West. The good guys have to keep up.

Of course I'm talking about the role players here, but there are plenty guys playing on other teams, making similar or less money.


D'Angelo and Rui would be the highest paid players, outside of the stars, on all of those teams that I listed. Austin, Gabe and Jarred(next season) are getting more money than some of these guys too.


It's not just homegrown talent either, it's a lot of players, that weren't drafted by their current teams. It just interesting to see how these other playoffs team, rosters were fleshed out.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/contracts/LAL.html

Just for laughs...Kuz actually makes more, than KCP and Caruso combined. SMH It does help to have a lottery pick pan out. I agree on that.

 

we have to, but we really don't have much means to do so. not when those same teams are competing in the same trade market with the same idea. our model was built on our stars being better than other teams'. that was true at first, now lebron is old and it's not true. i don't think there's a way out unless lebron plays for a lot less.

mostly those still on rookie deals.

only kcp makes less on denver than rui/dlo, and that deal is about to expire. harrison barnes and huerter make dlo/rui money. washington and hardaway make rui/dlo money.

a lot of it is, though. and you would have us give up even more chances at that to consolidate these guys.

again, i'm not sure what your point is. if it's that we could use a reliable player in the 30 million salary band, i agree. i've even named some i'd go after. we're in a position where we can trade 2 for 1 and come out better for it because we replenished our lower end salaries after emptying the chamber for russ.

what i disagree on is chasing any max players or doing anything that puts us back in the lebron/AD/3rd player/vet min situation. that's a disaster.

washington is maybe the worst-run organization in basketball for many years running. their only victory in a decade was dumping russ on us.

 

Man..I'm not with this current max player hysteria going around..I mean Kyrie was the move IMO, but I'm not interested in the Trae Young noise. I don't really believe, we are that interested in him. I don't have a problem with the concept, I just don't like that particular guy in that role.


It's a lot of guys in that 30-36M range that could change the outlook around here,some in the 20's.

Looking at the payrolls..D'Angelo would still be the top paid role player on most of these teams. It's wild looking at Minnesota though..McDaniels is already worth 22M? The Timberwolves are going to be kicking out a lot of cash soon. KAT potentially on the move?

Yall keep hating on the Russ trade, it presented us with an opportunity, to collect another high end talent, we just whiffed IMO.

We weren't going to win anything with Kcp and Kuz..Vogel didn't like Trez anyway.

We should have kept Caruso, and we could have still picked up Rui.

Sometimes I wonder, if Rob is a bit too worried, about it looking like Lebron is running everything. He most definitely is NOT.

Lebron taking less doesn't solve anything, he's a Bird FA, that's just bad for business anyway. How would that look to a potential courtship of Luka,Tatum, Giannis? Hey come here and we are going to ask you to take a paycut at the end? So we can save money and chip chase on a budget? Those guys, Ant Edwards too, would be coming from teams already spending more money than us.

 

we weren't getting irving, and crying about it now isn't going to solve anything. bkn was just moving goal posts on us like indy was doing in the turner/hield discussions. they wanted us to put everything on the table, and even then i'm pretty sure they weren't going to take it.

it's one of the worst trades in nba history, tbh. and it presented us with no opportunities that we wouldn't have had without it and took away A LOT of opportunities we could have had to make other, better moves. i award it no points, and may god have mercy on its soul.

it's the reason lebron won't get another ring. set us back 18 months in what was a 3-year window, max.

i've already explained in detail how lebron taking less would make us much more competitive. if you refuse to accept it, that's your problem.

in terms of future recruitment, great. fine. take your huge paycheck. in return, i ask that lebron stfu about management and you know, box out here and there. you don't get to eat up 40% of the cap, lollygag on defense, and whine about not having help. i'll allow the first two if i don't have to hear the third.

we haven't asked lebron to take a paycut, either. we're apparently ready to offer him his full max well into his seventies. my point about him is i'm tired of the whining about the roster. it's largely your fault we're in this situation.

 

If he wants to compete, he'll go to Philly. Maxey is crushing it and even a hobbled Embiid will give you numbers. Like I said before, In the East you'll be one of the top teams. You can easily get in the top 2-3 teams and only have to get through Boston. If I'm a FA in the West and want a chance in the playoffs then I'm fleeing to the East. West is at minimum 10 deep for at least a couple more years and you're battling all season long against those teams.

I'm not sure Orlando is a great fit. They have a lot of forwards already. They need a floor general upgrade more than a Paul George.