Between Capela, Nene, Ryno, Harrell, Dekker, Ariza and hopefully a healthy DMo we have plenty of options in the front-court. At any given night we can expect that at least 3 of the above will give us a decent performance. While there is definitely room to upgrade, we should get solid contributions for 48 minutes every game. The same is not necessarily true for our guard/wing rotation. We have just 3 players that are rotation worthy (Harden, Gordon and Beverly). Obviously Harden and Gordon have been playing out of their minds, and thus masking our lack of depth. When one of them is having an off-night, we end up giving minutes to players that are not producing much. Having just one player off the bench that can come in and change the game is not enough. Our 4th and 5th guard options (Brewer and KJ) are not giving us what we need. Ideally, we should find someone to push Beverly to being the 4th backcourt option. George Hill was attainable in the summer and would have been a massive upgrade. No such “silver bullet” solutions exist now. With that in mind, there are some players out there that could be available and would likely give us more than what we are getting from Brewer and KJ. If we get lucky, one of them could be the difference between a first round exit and a surprise trip to the WCF. Gary Harris or Jamal Murray: The Nuggets will need to trade one of them to give the other one the minutes he needs to develop. Barton and Mudiay get the bulk of the minutes, Chandler plays some SG, Nelson provides veteran leadership; there are not enough minutes for both Harris and Murray. With Harris injured this season, the issue has not come up, but he is back soon and will not enjoy being the 3rd guard off the bench. At some point the Nuggets will need to decide whom to keep. Harris has just 1.5 years left on his rookie contract and Murray has shown a strong shooting touch. If I were the Nuggets GM, I would think about how to maximize asset value from Harris before I have to pay him $10m or so in his next contract. Monta Ellis: He has been playing horribly this year. There are trade rumours in Indiana. Not sure what the reason is behind his rapid decline. He just turned 31. If he regains his form, he would give us a massive scoring boost off the bench. Belinelli: Probably a better fit in terms of his style of play. D’Antoni would dig the Italian connection. He is on a value contract for another season past this one. Will the emergence of Jeremy Lamb make Charlotte think about trading him? I would be excited to see a Gordon-Belinelli backcourt when Harden sits. Lou Williams: Between Clarkson, Williams and Young, the Lakers have too many score-first guards to make a winning rotation in the long-term. Team is performing above expectations, so everyone is happy. But at some point they need to invest in a 3&D player to balance their roster. Clarkson is there for the long-term, under a great contract; he is not going to be an easy target unless the Lakers get significant value in return. Nick Young would drive Clutchfans mad with his streakiness and decision-making. I wouldn’t mind putting a cheeky offer for Lou Williams. Shabazz Muhammad: I have always been intrigued by Shabazz, thought that there was more to him than the production he has put on the floor. He is bouncy and chunky enough to play the SF spot, so he would be a more straight-up replacement for Brewer than the other options above. He doesn’t shoot the 3, but he finishes well close to the rim. His minutes and performance are down this year, as Lavine has claimed the SG spot as his own. The Wolves are in need of a change and there are trade rumours for Shabazz. Would they see a solution in our assets? _________________________________________________________________________________ Houston Assets: Harrell, KJ, Brewer, Onuaku, Ennis, Wijlter, picks, money Sample trade: Harrell + Brewer + 2nd round pick for Belinelli Playoffs bench rotation: Gordon, Belinelli, DMo (with Dekker and Nene getting spot minutes depending on matchups) Any other options out there that would move the needle? Or should we wait for KJ to develop?
Totally disagree. The 3rd guard has to be at least as good a defender as Beverley, and not worse offensively. Beverley is a tremendous 3rd player in a 3 man guard rotation, league wide. Can't see us acquiring a better fit at this point in time. Also, would be horrified if we went into the playoffs and Bev wasn't part of the rotation. He is the most playoff player on the roster. I'm all for getting an upgrade, but those are not upgrades. Belinelli is arguably maybe a slightly better shooter. Why on earth would we give up a young asset in Harrell who will be an RFA and also give up a 2nd round pick for an ageing Belinelli who is not necessarily a better player than Bev and will become an unrestricted FA by the time we're contenders? KJ being the 4th option is a good thing. He makes $3-4m and he could develop into a valuable trade chip if injuries force him into the rotation and he plays decent for a stretch of games. There are no minutes to have at SF if we sign D-Mo because Ariza and Dekker will take 99% of the SF minutes. So for the guard rotation there are 36 minutes for Harden and 30 minutes each for Bev and Gordon. If we wanted to rest Harden an extra few minutes, any of those 2 can fill in. If there are still a few minutes to eat up at SG or SF, KJ can play 5-10 minutes a game and he has been good enough to play that many minutes. It is EXACTLY the opposite of the time to give up young players for vets. All our assets will be far more valuable in the summer, when we can get a far better return if we were to trade them. And we would have the right team/assets to become contenders, so that would be a good time to cash in whatever chips you have. The team is perfect for what we CAN do right now. I think people tend to prefer change and lean towards trading for the sake of trading. I know the idea here is to shuffle assets to fill rotation minutes, but trading out the exact same players you are suggesting in 6-7 months will yield a much better return and if you do it now instead it will make net 0 difference to our chance of winning a championship this season.
Nice work OP but this thread is not going to cut it in the midst of all the DMo threads. It's also a TL;DR With the weekend approaching, Clutchfans don't want to read essays. Good luck to you and yours.
Someday Bev won't be here and everyone will be wanting him back. So underappreciated. Anyway I do like the thread. I would like another 2/3 if possible.
I'm pro-development so i'm biased, but i wouldn't trade Harrell, Decker, KJ, or even Onuaku. The only trade i'd make is Brewer + 2nd for a salary dump and call it good for this year. Hell, apparently GP2 is the next Bev anyway - just send him to Russia for a year to make him desperate and then turn him loose on the NBA.
I'm not advocating ditching Beverly. The point of the thread is to find someone that can be an upgrade on KJ and Brewer. We need more than 3 competent guards for a deep playoff run. Most top teams have more than one decent player on the bench for positions 1-3. The 15 minutes we give a night to Brewer could cost us home advantage in the playoffs. KJ could improve and provide solid minutes, but for whatever reason he is not being used. I get the point of waiting for the summer to make any further moves. Whatever trade we make now won't make us a true contender and could limit our flexibility or asset value. However, we could theoretically make trades for players that 1) make us a better team, and 2) increase our total asset value. Belinelli at $6m/year under D'Antoni's system could be an example of that. Of course, Harrell may show a lot of improvement over the course of the season and be a more valuable asset in the summer than what he is now. Our 4th best guard/wing right now is KJ. Other teams have: Lakers: Lou Williams Portland: Crabbe Nuggets: Murray Charlotte: Belinelli or Lamb Clippers: Rivers Suns: Barbosa Spurs: Ginobili (or Mills) Jazz: Johnson (or Burks) More here: http://basketball.realgm.com/nba/depth-charts .We are one of the few teams with only one bench guard in the rotation. Combined with Brewer as our SF back-up it's one of the shallowest guard/wing rotations in the league. It means we have to lean heavily on Harden, Beverly, Gordon and we suffer when one of them is having an off night.
Joe Ingles? He would come with a lower price tag and has been pretty solid this year. Also shoots from distance well.
I'm all for moving KJ and Ennis for a serviceable guard. Man, what a luxury it would be to have picked up Jonathan Simmons.
I love the thought of acquiring Lou Williams from Fakers. It won't happen anytime soon because he is playing out of his mind right now. If / when Fakers eliminated from playoff consideration, we might be able to acquire him.
I agree we need one more player that can get buckets, and brewer or KJ are not that guy. use to be brewer that could come in give us a spark
Trading Ennis and KJ for another scrub that will play 2 minutes in a 30 points blowout is meaningless. Trading Ennis and KJ for anything meaningful will be laughed by any GMs in this league. So please give it a rest.
Ariza cannot play 48 minutes. We are giving 15 mins a night to Brewer. 30 mins for Beverly is on the high side. Brewer and KJ are giving us nothing, but are still part of the rotation. We should upgrade those minutes.
If you're specifically worried about the playoffs. The rotations at the wing positions wouldn't even go that deep unless its a blow out. Dekker will start getting minutes at his natural position behind Ariza in the future assuming Dmo comes back and can contribute positively in the coming months
I'd rather gamble on someone from the D League than get anyone mentioned in OP. Murray would be nice but highly doubt he's available as he is outplaying Mudiay
KJ and Brewer get more than 20 mins combined each game. That is horrendous. Ennis may not get you anything useful, but Harrell is worth at least a high 2nd round pick, if not a low 1st. KJ could get you a 2nd round pick too. Add our own pick and you are building a package. We are not looking to attract a starter-level player here, just anyone that can replace those 20 mins we give to KJ and Brewer and maybe take some minutes off Beverly. As much as I like Harrell, DMo will likely make him redundant. There will be teams that can use his talent better than us. The same applies to Gary Harris (Denver, stuck behind Barton and Murray) or Belinelli (Charlotte, stuck behind Batum and Lamb). They are both 3rd in their SG rotation and are better than KJ or Brewer. They both have 18 months left in their contract; their teams will seek to get some value out of them before their contract expires.
