Odin

I was thinking more in terms of keeping cap space available next year. Basically, does this not cut into cap space they could have used next year to sign a free agent? (since they could sign McCollum over the cap). I tried to look at their cap situation for next year, but the site (hoopshype) didn't seem to have all of the correct # for next year.

Sure, but would you want him on our team? I half thought he would be in China next year.

Can't they basically do the exact same deal next year? Why do this now, financially speaking? Otherwise, totally not surprised. Portland was shockingly good last year- I think they believe they have something good going on there (and there is a very good chance they are right).

Hahaha, who is calling the Knicks a super team besides Rose here? This is hilarious.

Don't we already get killed by Kemba Walker?

I know, was just joking. Here are the players considered all nba forwards over the past 5 years Lebron James Kevin Durant Kevin Love Blake Griffin Paul George LaMarcus Aldridge Anthony Davis Tim Duncan Carmelo Anthony Dirk Nowitski David Lee Kwahi Leonard Draymond Green He definitely has the talent to squeeze himself into that conversation.

I mean, if DeAndre Jordan is an All-NBA player....

I am really trying to keep myself from getting too excited about Gordon, and it is getting really really hard. Somebody talk me down from thinking he will be at least a multiple All-NBA type player in the future.

I think it is a mistake to say the Magic picked Fournier over Oladipo, which seems to be propagating all over the place. If both needed to be signed this year, and the magic picked Fournier, then they picked Fournier over Oladipo. If OKC stated that they wanted one of either Fournier or Oladipo, then we picked Fournier over Oladipo. However, what they really did was pick Ibaka over Dipo.

Which bad shooters? Orlando was an average team, fq%-wise, last year. It isn't win percentage- it is win-shares. He had the 12th highest per 48 minutes on our team.

Shouldn't league average PER be 15? I thought that was the whole idea behind PER.

Do we have any metrics to back up the idea that Smart is an elite defensive combo guard? All the numbers that I have seen have pointed more to the idea that he is slightly above average than elite. On shots defended, opposing players shoot .3 percent lower than their normal percentages against him. opposing players have average basically a PER of 15 against him and an efg% of over 50%. The only positive correlation that I found that might show that he is elite (or close to elite) is that Boston is 1.2 points better on defense (per 100 possessions) when he is on the court.

Is Smart really even a point guard? The only thing that he is good at is defense- he doesn't create offense (he averaged 3 assists a game last year...) and he can't shoot. That second part is really key, because, while he is actually not awful around the rim (53% within 3 feet), he is atrocious everywhere else, while rarely getting into the paint. He took 4!!!! shots per game behind the 3 point line and made an amazing 25% of them last year for context that is equivalent to shooting 37.5% on 2s. It will be interesting if he can get back to his rookie year's 33%- at least that is ok.

Here Gordon is against team USA (Kyrie, Durant, Demarcus, Thompson, Carmelo). He scores twice and generally looks pretty good. (comes in at the 2:30 mark).

Wilcox will be an end of the bench/ not dressed/ d-league player for the most part. He is not normally going to be getting any minutes.

I think they should look at maximizing butts in seats over profits. I understand we aren't very good right now, but it looks bad when your lower bowl is half empty. I was able to go to a game around Christmas last year when I was in town and there were a lot of empty seats. Sure we were only playing Brooklyn, but we had a winning record (or close to a winning record) at that point. And I completely understand why. I am very willing to spend some money going to the game and to buy super over-priced food and drinks, but I often go to buy tickets and then look at the prices and have to sometimes re-convince myself to spend the money instead of just watching at home.

No doubt. Just thought his attitude on his position seemed to be very healthy- he will play anywhere required. Too often, I read or hear players claim that they play ____________ position, and they seem unwilling to play at other positions. If his skills improve, as I think they should, he should be well suited to be our Swiss army knife that can be played anywhere to take advantage of the other team.

It sounded more like he was going to play small forward more this year, so he is a small forward. Otherwise, it didn't sound like he much cared what position he was playing, as long as he got to play.

I think it will definitely make Jerseys uglier- and some of the jerseys are already ugly enough. Personally would prefer no ads as it does not add to my enjoyment of watching the sport. At the same time, ads will only mess with the aesthetics of the jersey and also won't interfere with my enjoyment of watching the sport. It would be nice if they lowered the seat prices after receiving the ad revenue- but I know they won't. (would maybe help some arenas actually be mostly full every night *cough*amway center*cough*cough)

I try to keep realistic expectations in mind when projecting players. (Though you then must determine what is and is not realistic-) Far too often though, I hear/read people proclaiming that this player or that player is the next "name of all time great". While it is often possible that they become that type of player (or even better/different) at their top, they will most likely not reach those heights. When they fail to become that player that everyone was claiming they would be, the fans seem to turn on the player as he did not become what they imagined he would become.

I think Gordon is already on his way to be an all defence type of player- to really be a star he needs to improve offensively. I think he is putting together a nice arsenal of skills though.

His last year is fairly similar to their early years, statistically.

If our defense is going to improve and he plays large minutes, he needs to drastically improve his defense though. Center is the most important defensive position in the game. There are almost no good defensive teams that did/do not have at least an average defensive center in the middle.

People need to stop expecting Miracles from Vogel and our players. Vucevic is not going to suddenly improve his defense by leaps and bounds. Also, he really isn't that efficient of a scorer. His TS% is 53.1%, which is 248/476 players that played in the NBA last year. Our offense would likely be better served if a lot of his attempts were given to other guys.

Can't say I can really remember watching Augustin too much, but statistically Payton is also a better rebounder, passer, and has a higher 2P%. Augustin is a much more efficient scorer though.