Luol Deng Discussion: No #Dengdump, Rather Stretched Into Cash

Discussion in 'NBA Discussion' started by trodgers, Jul 2, 2016.

  1. Weezy

    Weezy Moderator Staff Member

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    That wasn’t my point. He recently said he’s in good shape or whatever, the only shape I see here is round. But sure, play him, show he isn’t done, and trade him. Or..play him, watch him be embarrassingly bad, and risk driving his trade value from zero to negative numbers.
     
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  2. TIME

    TIME Administrator Staff Member

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    [​IMG]


    Calls to play Deng in order to "up his trade value" are well intended but pointless. Right now his trade value is in the negative. If we do manage to up it, it will likely never surpass zero.

    Then, there is the issue to consider of who's minutes will he be replacing in the trade value effort. Deng can only possibly play the 3 or 4 spots. Those two spots have a total of 96 available minutes per game. Here are our players in those spots:

    3: LeBron / Ingram / Lance / Svi
    4: LeBron / Kuz / Beasley / Moe

    Do you really want Deng to take a single minute from any of those players in the faint hope that he will magically acquire some trade value?
     
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  3. vasashi17

    vasashi17 LB's Resident Capologist

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    Yes.

    [​IMG]
     
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  4. LTLakerFan

    LTLakerFan - Lakers Legend -

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    [​IMG] ^^^


    But no. As Weezy says it could backfire and drive his value further down plus whose minutes does he take. Certainly can't give him meaningful rotation minutes at the 4 or 3.
     
  5. Khmrp

    Khmrp - Lakers Legend -

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    that Twitter acct really think deng can still because of some charity bball gm? might as well start looking at the dreweague while we at it
     
  6. sirronstuff

    sirronstuff - Lakers Legend -

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    Give him garbage time minutes

    That will really chaffe him

    :Laugh:
     
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  7. LTLakerFan

    LTLakerFan - Lakers Legend -

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  8. vasashi17

    vasashi17 LB's Resident Capologist

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    So we sit on his contract till it expires... brilliant!

    [​IMG]
     
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  9. LTLakerFan

    LTLakerFan - Lakers Legend -

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    OK how many token minutes a game and whose are you giving him? Do token minutes do any good?

    From Deng dump to play Deng?
     
  10. vasashi17

    vasashi17 LB's Resident Capologist

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    We played the kiddies last year to highlight/develop them for potential free agents this summer. I completely understand why we did it last year, but considering the injuries we faced and the next man up getting injured as well (Zo goes down, so place BI at that spot and then he goes down), Deng at spot minutes made sense to me (especially after the trade deadline) but we chose to keep him shut down so in a way we hurt his trade value more. If the dude isn't getting called up while we're down players, what does that say about how we value him? Other teams see that too and we just deaded his value even more with that tactic.

    This season is completely different. We got our free agent to commit. Even if Bron plays a similar position, there's talk of going small and having Bron play as a gimmicky center, so that still leaves Deng available to play next to Bron as it does our other wing players. That alone should open up the floor for dude and raise his trade value.

    Putting less on our kids also places them further away from a season killing injury...not to mention LABron as well.

    Deng's value is trash. So play him spot minutes and let's put less burden on our more valuable assets. If he's still garbage or injures himself we dead his trash value even more and y'all can have your wish as we sit on his contract till it expires....but what if he balls out and is serviceable?

    Why not find out?
     
  11. Weezy

    Weezy Moderator Staff Member

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    Actually I think we played the kiddies last year because they were better than Deng. In games and in practice. Ingram, Kuz, Randle, all were better than Deng. We lost Randle, but we’ve added Stephenson and Beasley, both likely better than Deng. Hell, Svi might be better than him too. I get your point, and it would be great to prove he can play to be able to trade him, but I don’t think it’s gonna happen, we are better when he doesn’t.
     
  12. KareemtheGreat33

    KareemtheGreat33 - Lakers MVP -

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    Sacrificing wins just to see if Dung can raise his trade value is a gambler's folly, guy is done and out of shape
     
  13. vasashi17

    vasashi17 LB's Resident Capologist

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    But how do you know that if you don't at least give it a shot?

    We lost our young players (injuries), lost 47 games (no playoffs and lost the 10th overall pick to Philly when we coulda killed that pick further) and lost further value in Deng because everybody saw enough of what they needed to see in 13 total minutes of action last year...

    And that's not folly?
     
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  14. KareemtheGreat33

    KareemtheGreat33 - Lakers MVP -

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    He was playing hard in this exhibition game but still missing defensive assignments, and was pushed several times by his teammates towards the opposing player he is supposed to defend...I don't know if we can all endure that for even a minute in an actual game.
     
  15. Weezy

    Weezy Moderator Staff Member

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    I think we saw all we needed to see in the 2016 season. The chances he got better as he’s aged since then are incredibly slim, and he was BAD then. He looked so slow and like the game had blown by him the one time he got in last season we never wanted to see him again. I think there is validity to what you’re saying, but the fact that some unnamed Lakers exec referred to him as “semi-retired” recently to me shows the Lakers don’t share your plan.
     
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  16. sirronstuff

    sirronstuff - Lakers Legend -

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    Deng is exactly the type of experienced veteran we were looking for this offseason.

    If he was 5 years younger
    If he was 15 lbs lighter
    and if his contract was under 5 mil
     
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  17. jbiggs

    jbiggs - Rookie -

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    LOL is this even possible?

    For the record - I am with @vasashi17 (did I just write that) in that I want to at least see what Deng can do this year. I would have him on a short leash but id like to give him a little burn early on to see what we have (or more than likely what we don't have)
     
  18. TIME

    TIME Administrator Staff Member

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    Why are you playing this game?

    [​IMG]

    No one in this thread has made a case for "sitting on his contract until it expires". Everyone here wants Deng off the roster. The sooner he is traded the better. Don't claim anyone is saying otherwise.

    BUT, to then insist that we must give him minutes in order to up his trade value is just missing the point. Even IF he had any actual trade value left (he didn't), the FO effectively killed it by playing him a total of 13 minutes last year. There is no redeeming his value now. Dude is DONE. Why do we have to litigate that question anymore. It's going to cost us something to offload him. We already know that. That doesn't justify using valuable minutes for him to try to create the illusion that he can still contribute.

    You still haven't answered the question: who's minutes are you going to give Deng? It's not gonna be LeBron's minutes. Should it be BI's? Or Kuz? Out of those 96 minutes for the 3-4 spots they should be divided something like this:

    LeBron = 30 minutes
    Ingram = 28 minutes
    Kuz = 28 minutes
    Beasley = 10 minutes

    And if any of them are injured then you play Lance / Svi at 3 or Beasley more minutes at the 4.

    But in any scenario you don't give any minutes to Deng.
     
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  19. Helljumper

    Helljumper - Lakers All Star -

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    I think we should’ve found a way to give Deng an opportunity in the rotation last year. Would’ve rather thrown him out there to see if he could raise his value over giving minutes to someone like Travis Wear.

    Now I don’t think there is an opportunity for him. We have too many guys fighting for minutes who all deserve it way more than Deng.

    Also, dude still looked incredibly washed up in that NBA Africa game. Yeah he had 13 points, but there were all pretty much on layups where the defense didn’t really try anything.
     
  20. vasashi17

    vasashi17 LB's Resident Capologist

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    How did our youngn's handle the load last year? I'm all about letting these dudes develop and giving them minutes... But do it responsibly.

    I feel both parties are misinterpretting what the other side is saying. But in reality we're much more like of mind than it appears.

    We both want what's good for the team and our youth. But I'm bringing up the double positive that you up Deng's trade value while responsibly handling the minutes of our squad (particularly the young guys that couldn't handle that type of load last year...to the detriment of our team).

    So...
    [​IMG]

    Btw, @jbiggs dont act like this is the 1st time ;)
     

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