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

I’m scared to get all this over the hill guys who play worse than ever when they sign here.

 

would take him over Bamba in a heartbeat, but seems he's resigning with the Heat.

 

Irwin on his substack confirmed the interest in Brown is real

 

brown would be a good signing, but not at the cost of losing DS

 

As constructed, I think Bruce is a much more valuable piece. We're running out of minutes for ball handlers -- AR, DLO, JHS, Bron.

What we're not running out of minutes for is a physical defensive wing. We have Christie who's an unproven second year player and Lewis who should spend the year in the D league. We have power forwards who can masquerade as SFs in certain lighting, but that's not who they are. Bron, Rui, and Vando are not SFs. You get Brown or someone similar, there's a good chance they start. DS is not starting.

I'd spend that financial resource on a wing or a backup C before shelling it out to Dennis. We will miss his D, but that's partially why JHS was brought on and I think we'll add whatever minimum guy we can get; whether it's a younger guy like Aaron Holiday or an old vet like Lowry, Eric Gordon, Rose.

 

Hmm Portis won't be available. More than that, no way Christie starts nor JHS/Lewis will be our guard backups.

I think our rotation will be something like this:
Dlo | Schroder/alternative | JHS
Reaves | Beasley/alternative | Lewis
LeBron | Max | vet min
Vando | Rui
AD | Bamba/alternative

It's basically running it back and replace whoever doesn't return for similar alternatives at the vet min or using the exceptions.
Again, we were a true contender with this group without any training camp, practices while playing each game as a "win or go home". We have all to gain if we keep most of this group together.
Our roster construction finally makes total sense. 2 stars. Multiple ball handlers to load manage LeBron. Multiple shooters and spacing. Defensive solutions to throw at any position. Let's just build UP on that.

Bruce Brown would be perfect and would replace Beasley and the SF vet min (Troy Brown spot) slots. Having one guy taking 2 slots in the rotation, makes Max move one slot up. Then we would just need a backup PG and C using the BAE or vet min.
Not sure it will happen though.

At this point, I think Reaves, Rui, Dlo, Vando and Bamba stay. Schroder walks and Beasley too.

Pelinka always has something in his sleeve so I'm really curious.

Btw, what's happening tomorrow? FA starts but contracts are only signed on July 6. Is it tomorrow that we start to know deals in place or only in July 6?

 

The flood of wave one agreements will be announced tomorrow. They can't sign on the dotted line until the 6th, but much of the movement will be known tomorrow evening.

 

Stein's latest...

He doesn't think we can land Brown

Regarding AR, it's an "automatic match"

..."[he] ain't... go-in NOWHERE..."


FVV and Brooks expected to be Rockets by tomorrow night

Rockets just picked up K-Mart Jr's option, so depending on the raise breakdown of those two deals they should have $10m-ish left to play with. Successfully removing them from the conversation with any of our big 3 FAs.

(Quick detour to look at those numbers)


Back to Stein...


No one wants Marcus Morris or Powell and that's why Gordon was cut loose

Andre DRUMMing up interest in Dallas

McGee really about to be stapled to that bench


Pacers still have $ after Strus but it likely won't be going to Barnes, who will probably stay a Queen

Stay away from Rui! If they only have $14, they're clearly out of the Kuz race but could be in the Rui race. $14m is an easy match on our part. I just don't want anyone finding creative ways to shed dead salary, up their offer and pry him away.

Lee is the most likely of Phoenix's free agents to return

 

If that was part of the deal then DD or LaVine are on the move. Only way to significantly up his touches.

 

we need indy to go after strus; that's great for us. basically just leaves san antonio as the team that can mess with our vibes. haven't heard much at all about their plans. you'd think they'd want a veteran pg with wemby showing up, but it's slim pickings on the FA market, particularly with fvv going to houston.

feel like the spurs are going to be the team to give reaves the max offer that we match. question is whether they get cute and then throw something large at rui.

 

Ahhh ok. Yeah I had that perception but yesterday reading about RFA got confused and couldn't find an answer.

Because basically what I understood is that if a team makes an offer sheet to a RFA, let's say Reaves, the 24h (before was 48h) rule for us to match starts counting on July 6. The intriguing part is that the team who made the offer sheet will have a sort of cap hold of that amount in their books, meaning they will have less cap space to do other signings while not knowing if the other team will match, which if they do, that team ends up with nothing and a dry Free Agency.
Is my understanding correct? Because if that's true, it really narrows down the amount of offers to RFAs because you don't want to wait so much time and then not get the player when it impacts your flexibility from tomorrow to July 6, right?

 

right, even though the money is only tied up for a day, in reality, it could be tied up for a week, given how agreements largely all happen in the first couple of days.

look for who still has space after the first flurry, and those are the rui/reaves suitors. again, reaves isn't an issue to me. as i've outlined before, we sort of want someone to make him a big offer, else he'll sign with us for two years with a PO or something. rui's the guy whose price could get beyond a point that i'm comfortable with if some team gets desperate.

 

btw, if the mavs really do sign drummond, it could mean powell's available. if we could split the full mle on powell and schroder, i'd let bamba walk.

 

Same. I'm sensing we are going after that MLE.

Btw, I haven't said this year but I would really love a good screener. I think it opens the floor a lot and as AD is so bad at it, having a good screener coming off the bench would be great

 

A few guys I could see the Spurs look at:
- Jevon Carter: seems like Pop guy. They could cough up more than the MLE teams.
- Cory Joseph: coming back to where it began
- Kyle Lowry: if he is about the money and not a ship, they could let him be the adult in the room and overpay him for a year.

 

While Bruce Brown may have value greater than the full MLE after his postseason performance… which of the few cap space teams is really going to be targeting him?

I also agree that I would gladly take him over Dennis (and I’m a Dennis fan). Brown could play a similar role for us, but he also has a lot more versatility as well. Could play some PG and be a POA defender while also being able to switch onto wings

 

I hope the kid is strong mentally because his father will f*** him up. LeBron is creating all the hype for the kid, which is all fun and games until he is in the league and he busts. He'll be crushed by the media and LeBron haters. Everything the kid does will be overanalyzed. Every airball, 1-8FG game, TOs, wtv. A bunch of jokes and memes comparing to his father. It will be craaaaazy
It's too much pressure. LeBron was just too good and it's impossible to replicate.

 

Yeah, the fact they kept being linked to bigs (even before Drummond) had be thinking he might get squeezed. That + being stuck paying McGee, I think Powell might be gettable.

Maybe chop up the NTMLE and BAE between Powell, Prince, and DS (or replace the latter two with a similar wing and PG). I'm good with that, too.

 

dwight powell? that guy is trash. i'd rather keep bamba