2018 NBA Draft Thread

[J-Mac 80]

6 minutes ago, ?4thewin said:

You're basically saying "Phoenix draft a player we want so that 14 days after the draft Aaron Gordon will forgoe restricted free agency and agree to a sign and trade specifically to your team when he has no reason to do so and nothing binding him into changing his mind"

That never happens.  Too risky.  It's basically an impossible scenario.  Why would Gordon want to go to Phoenix? 

Went to college at Arizona his buddy can throw him lobs again.....lol it just was a random thought that came to mind it most likely won't happen like you said

[Magicfan1987 266]

1 hour ago, ?4thewin said:

Vegas set the over/ under for trae Young's draft slot at 8.5

gosh they'll bet on anything 

[magicblue 315]

2 hours ago, JJZFL said:

This is true.  The only thing tanking guarantees is that your team will be terrible.  Hoping to draft that one “centerpiece” who can single-handedly turn things around isn’t impossible, but it’s very unlikely. How many more years will be rooting to tank starting mid-January or so?          

Every draft it looks like some of the players will make a huge difference. I remember how people wanted us to tank for Wiggins, who would by himself make us into a contender.  Everyone is hoping history will repeat itself and give us another Shaq, a quick fix, instead of actually going through the hard work of building a winning team.  Building a winning team requires a single minded focus on winning rather than losing. 

And for the 68th time please explain in detail how you would have built this “winning team” going back to right after the Howard trade. Please enlighten us all

[Fultz4thewin 2,464]

27 minutes ago, magicblue said:

And for the 68th time please explain in detail how you would have built this “winning team” going back to right after the Howard trade. Please enlighten us all

I think tanking is fine when you're trying to transition your team into a new direction.  But "be bad until something good happens" is kind of taking the easy way out as it's not really a defined plan.  

[Irelando 6]

JJJ entering the draft

http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/23003634/jaren-jackson-jr-michigan-state-spartans-enter-nba-draft

[Magicfan1987 266]

29 minutes ago, ?4thewin said:

I think tanking is fine when you're trying to transition your team into a new direction.  But "be bad until something good happens" is kind of taking the easy way out as it's not really a defined plan.  

knowing the kings and timberwolves hadn't been in the playoffs in a combined 20+ years is terrifying and we should count ourselves fortunate for the runs we've had and the pedigree of our new front office for hope in the future

[Fultz4thewin 2,464]

2 minutes ago, Magicfan1987 said:

knowing the kings and timberwolves hadn't been in the playoffs in a combined 20+ years is terrifying and we should count ourselves fortunate for the runs we've had and the pedigree of our new front office for hope in the future

Yeah.  That's the fear

[Odin 137]

4 minutes ago, ?4thewin said:

Yeah.  That's the fear

Have either of them truly tanked until recently? Not saying that our front office is competent, but their front offices have been some of the worst recently and only recently did the Timberwolves really tank.

[Soul Bro 1,419]

Prediction time on this April 2, 2018. Orlando’s starting five next year will be:

PG: Brunson

SG: Fournier 

SF: Isaac

PF: Gordon 

C: Jackson Jr.

What’s your prediction for our starting five?

[fan for too long 2 530]

PG: Young/Jevon Carter 

SG: Ross 

SF: Isaac 

PF: Gordon 

C:    Not Vuch or biz. 

[Mike1989 68]

2 hours ago, magicblue said:

And for the 68th time please explain in detail how you would have built this “winning team” going back to right after the Howard trade. Please enlighten us all

I personally don't think we could have done much better for ourselves because we never got lucky in the draft (e.g. the year we fell one spot it cost us Porzingis). However, we did make some mistakes like trading away Saric for Payton, and Oladipo/Sabonis for Ibaka. Neither trade was a major step forward for us and while I could understand the Ibaka trade, I personally would not have made either trade.

With that said, teams have managed to rebuild without tanking. Utah's highest pick on their roster is Exum. Their star duo were taken outside the top ten (Mitchell) and late in the first round (Gobert) by Denver and traded to Utah. Their other main talent were either drafted outside the main picks, second round, went undrafted, or were acquired through trades and free agency. Denver are another team that has managed to rebuild without tanking and top picks. So rebuilding a roster without tanking can be done, but for whatever reason our front office has not been able to rebuild this team. 

Fingers crossed our new front office can rebuild this team, otherwise we have many more years of lottery basketball to look forward to like the Sacramento Kings have done for the past decade plus.

[Justin Jaudon 221]

2 hours ago, magicblue said:

And for the 68th time please explain in detail how you would have built this “winning team” going back to right after the Howard trade. Please enlighten us all

I think the notion of tanking has been affected by the Sixers' "Process". Tanking to start a rebuild is not a bad idea. Tanking as a franchise strategy is foolishness most of the time. I think we probably did the right thing in tanking for two years after the Dwightmare. We got 2 top-4 picks and another top-10. Only one of those turned out to be a bust (Elf). Year 3 I think we still did the right thing. We basically said, "Okay, we're still going to be bad, probably top-ten bad. But let's see what we have and try to start developing a culture with the young, top-10 talent we have." We were a bit worse than expected, so we fired the coach (still probably the right move). I think even year 4 we started off right. Sort of. We hired a tough, hard-nosed coach, to build a culture of accountability and hard work. But the GM trusted his own ego too much (refusing to replace Elf), the coach flaked out, and things went off the rails. The GM panicked, the culture turned toxic, and the new coach probably never had a chance of salvaging what was there. So now we're back to tanking again.

 

But tanking in this situation is different. We already have a couple good young players. We may only need to truly tank this season's end to get things back on track, depending on the pick we get. If we get Doncic or Ayton, I could see that being enough, if that player is clearly a future All-Star. We'd still have holes to fill, but the building blocks would possibly be there (if Gordon also takes another step forward and Isaac can get healthy). At that point, we're back to year 3 of the last rebuild, with 3 top-10 picks. We can turn it loose and see what we have. But we have to be rid of Vuc and probably Fournier for that to make sense. We need to have youth and flexibility, together.

 

Year 3 this past rebuild we made one major mistake. We started relying too much on Vuc for offense. He was somewhat efficient and capable of a fairly high volume, so it made a little sense. But it clearly killed what little defense he had. We should have continued to focus on Oladipo (we basically abandoned him as a franchise after his second year, which is just absurd). We can't go into next season with Vuc still in place as a starter, taking a lot of the offensive load. We probably can't go into next season with Fournier in place as a starter, either. Those guys have plateaued, showing that they are probably best used as 6th men on a good team. So we need to trade them as such. Vuc should be easy, if we don't ask much in return. Fournier will be harder. He's paid like a starter. We might need to find a team that needs a good scoring SG/SF to take the next step. Not sure who that would be.

 

But that's how I think we should view this rebuild. Not as a franchise strategy, but as a hard reset. If we don't get a top 4 pick, maybe we tank another year. But that should be it. This should not be a protracted rebuild this time.