Austin Reaves Discussion: How Much Is He Worth?

Well and also the fact that the 2024 Mavs lost that Finals convincingly, largely due to the fact that Kyrie couldn't sustain his production in the Finals against Boston's bigger, more athletic and switchable defenders. Which is the same issue we're seeing with Austin against OKC and others. I think that 2024 Mavs "formula" makes sense (Luka, a scoring guard, lob/rim protecting centers and 3&D wings) but the scoring guard needs to be a better player than 2024 Kyrie or current Austin. It would need to be, ironically, someone like Brunson or Mitchell. In the absence of having a legit, high-end #2 guy like that you need to build the team a different way.

 

i also don't think anyone would be talking about letting markkanen, wagner, white, fox, or lamelo walk in FA, nor trading them for walker kessler.

also, almost all those guys make more than what reaves will make next year.

 

Oh for sure, I've never advocated for letting Austin walk. That would just be dumb. At worst, you sign him to the number you need to sign him to and then try to trade him for a couple of smaller salaries.

 

Hard nosed response to AR's shooting woes last night .... FOH don't care that he's still working back from 1 month not playing and may still be dinged. Reality of course it affects shooting and most everything. See LeBron's play for a month or more after coming back from no on court activity vs what it is now while healthy. Is what it is. But what it also is, all the more reason the new contract is in that 35M ish range as a Laker.

Regarding overrating him .... here is an anonymous players poll from The Atlantic with 81 of them contributing to it. He flunks, not even placing on it .... even in the "others receiving votes" section at the bottom.

While he scores highly in the most underrated counterpart according to 151 participants.

EDIT ..... the copy / pastes with their bar graphics show up here when preparing the post and then don't take when it is. Here's the link below.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/72...e_newsletter&campaign=17913796&userId=8156210

 

Don't waste your breath, @LTLakerFan

 

there are a lot of emotions on the forum today. lots of folks seemingly shocked by us getting beaten handily by okc. uhhhh...yeah...you been asleep for two years?

 

That’s the thing that I personally don’t understand.Why trade him for one person with more production when you can probably get two who fill holes this team has.
For instance what if you could get Murray and Jones from the Pelicans while also signing Watson? Doesn’t that make you a significantly better team with out one single player with better production?

 

They sound like Steven A Smith

 

trade his a** either to Siberia or BC Cherkaski Mavpy

 

The oldest player in the league, is still our 2nd best player, and the most reliable one in the playoffs. That's the conundrum. How do we fix that?

Fwiw..OKC ain't all that without Jalen Williams IMO. A healthy Luka and we can absolutely beat those dudes. This " Oh my God! OKC is incredible " s*** is outta hand. IMHO.

 

because you're creating a bigger, harder-to-fill hole in the process?

it's like we have three 2-foot holes in the yard, and i end up digging a 6-foot hole to fill two of the three holes.

sorry, been doing fence repair this week...

i'm honestly not sure. i think people are underselling the value of a true secondary creator on offense.

i was thinking if you could get murphy and murray or murphy and jones from NO for reaves, that's not necessarily a bad thing, but there's also a great chance murphy will have trouble carrying offense in the playoffs (or the regular season, tbh).

lebron's a secondary creator for one more year, maybe. then what? we want luka to be full early-houston-era james harden? that went poorly. it wasn't until harden got cp3 that houston scared anyone. and luka won with brunson and kyrie, respectively. asking him to do it without anyone is a tall order.

the only secondary creators who move lately (e.g., lavine, trae young, etc.) are paid more and are less valuable than reaves. i'd rather dance with the devil i know.