[Feigen] Andre Iguodala, JaVale McGee up next on Rockets' wish list

I'm not sure what you can build around him, he's not a star, he's an elite role player/boarderline all star potential at best, he's not even close to being a franchise player. No top tier free agent will sign in Toronto to play with him and they have no asset to get one if someone becomes available unless they move him in the first place.

Sure, they can decide to keep him and build around him, good luck having a relevant team with that. Reality is, with Siakam there, without Kawhi and Gasol they were nothing more than a pretender, now that Kawhi is gone, Lowry and Gasol are aging and they don't even have a Derozan, they won't go anywhere.

 

You can trade draft picks without Toronto having to take any salary in return.

 

He’s not available!

 

He's not untouchable. You'd have to overpay for him but if you make an overwhelming offer then I suspect that they would trade him.

 

You’ve given the same argument before. So I guess let me ask you this. How likely is it that you think we resign him next year? Given his desire to play in LA, what do you think it’d take contract wise to keep him? And then do you think DM would be willing to pay it? Bc if not that’s a 1st for a one year rental.

 

LA is going to be capped out, so his most reasonable route there would be by sign-and-trade. As we've seen this summer, Bird rights have a lot of value.

And considering Memphis just took two 2nds for Delon Wright, I don't think it's a given that Iggy would require a 1st.

 

Understood, yes bird rights allow us to offer more. I guess the question is would you offer more than other teams for his services? And if it took a 1st to do it would you?

So 2 prong question: would you beat market asking price (or length of contract) next year to keep him and would you pay a 1st if that’s what it required to get the deal done?

 

Bird rights aren't just valuable because you can offer more. They're also valuable because they allow you to sign and trade him to a team like the Lakers, which is also useful to LA because it allows them to keep their MLE for other targets.

If the pick we're talking about it is in 2020, which is guaranteed to be in the 20s unless there's a catastrophic Harden injury, I would probably do it. With that said, given how little Wright went for, I'm hopeful that maybe you could do it for a couple 2nds.

 

This is true but we have Shumps bird rights too so isn’t that just a wash? We get iggy’s bird rights in exchange for Shumps. Either can help to facilitate a trade. So really you’re paying the pick(s) for a potential one year rental unless you’re willing to beat market rate once he hits FA next summer.

I’m down with Iggy for a couple 2nds. But a 1st for a 1 year rental without having a plan/desire to retain him doesn’t seem to make sense. Just my opinion though.

Appreciate your thoughts on the matter though...

 

That is.... quite a big step up haha.

For reference, supposedly Toronto turned down a deal with OKC because it revolved around Siakam.

So those Ego + Nene based scenarios aren't going to cut it.

 

and luckily for Toronto, Ujiri doesn't give up on 25 year old players that have improved every year since entering the league. Siakam has doubled his PPG average every season he's played in

I think Ujiri knows what he's doing, and trading Siakam is not what he's going to do.

 

YUP! Plus it would seem to make more sense for Toronto to hold onto OG & Siakam, since Lowry, Gasol and all the rest of their big contracts expire after next season. They literally have under 20 million committed in salary for 2020-21, yet certain posters here are so certain that their future is doomed to be irrelevant, pretenders & losers.

Why anyone would think Masai would trade an improving 25 year old for the likes of a first round pick or two from the Rockets, is beyond me. Picks from the Rockets aren't that valuable, especially when compared against the picks of other potential trade partners.

Get Siakam for a first rounder & throw in a second rounder for OG!

I'm sure masai knows what he's doing

 

Reminds me of Capela

"Jokes" aside hey, i'm not saying he should do it, maybe i'm wrong, we'll see

 

And when all that money expires who's going to sign with them to make them relevant? Derozan? Drummond? Lol.

But the reasoning (which can obviously be wrong) is simply based on the fact that before they got Kawhi they were good, nothing more, now they lost him and they don't have Derozan anymore, other players are older and probably with little motivation left. They don't have assets for a substantial upgrade unless they literally gut their team starting by moving Siakam. Meanwhile other teams in the East stayed the same or got better.

The Raptors as today, no matter what they want to do, they can't compete. If they decided to rebuild, why wouldn't they consider to move Siakam who's 25 years old and not a star anyway? A rebuild in Toronto would likely require at least 2/3 years since it's not L.A or NY, top free agents are not going to sign there. At that point Siakam would be 28 if not 29 and already maxed, likely surrounded by players around 22 years old. OG is another argument and makes more sense for them to keep him since he's 20/21.

And as for the picks well, nobody said our assets are great, but if an old ass team like Houston is willing to move future unprotected 1st, those are great picks to get, whether you like them or not, and you can always add swaps, players, 2nd rounders. I don't know if that would be enough to get Siakam, but if it wouldn't i'm the one who's not going to trade for him in the first place, cause he's not worth more than that anyway, i'm not goign to trade a Paul George kinda of package for Siakam, that's for sure. Toronto can either get a couple of unprotected 1st rounders and pieces or keep him and rebuild around him, we'll see where they end up with that.

 

Siakam would easily be the 2nd best player on the Rockets and it wouldn't be close. Ujiri is a better GM than the one we employ and would drive a hard bargain for such a valuable young piece.

 

Possible if Chris Paul is washed, if he's not yet nope, he would likely be the third/fourth depending on if Gordon can stay consistent, but yeah, third is most likely.

On Ujiri i don't know, i'm not saying he's not good, i think he is, but the riding on him is soo high now...to think that we were one rim bounce away to kiss Elton Brand's ass makes me kinda laugh at this, although this is how it always works...people only cares about results in the end, that's the same thing the media do afterall, it's just that i don't agree with that.

He's the same guy who paied McGee 10M per season for 4 years when the salary cap was around 55/60M. The Raptors under him have also been worse then the Rockets for many years and have been considered a joke...until he got Kawhi, which was a nice bet by him, but also a good amount of luck helped him since he had an all star caliber player to move for him (drafted by another gm while the team was tanking) and they were in the other conference. And let's not forget in the end his team won also cause the Warriors were gutted by a couple fo series. That's a good amount of luck to have in 8 months. I wish the Rockets had that luck in at least one of the last two seasons.

Back on topic though, i totally agree that getting Siakam won't be eventually easy, i never said otherwise, also cause other teams might very well offer more than us. And as today we don't even know what the Raptors plan to do, if for some reason they plan to keep competing than there's no chance in the first place.

 

You seem to be under the impression that trading Siakam to the Rockets is the only smart option Masai has.

Masai might very well trade Siakam, but let's not pretend that the Rockets will be his only suitor. The guys is barely 25, makes 3 million next year and was the MIP, you think the Rockets are Masai's only choice? Why would Masai, who is not an idiot choose to trade Siakam for a couple picks from the rockets when he has teams like, the Knicks, Suns, Wizards, Bobcats, Kings and many more to choose from. Teams which unlike the Rockets haven't been consistently good for the past 15+ years.

Furthermore why would they need to gut their team when the team will be mostly free agents the following year?

I don't pretend to know how the Raptors will do this year, i wouldn't be surprise if they made the playoffs or struggle and miss. Nor do I pretend to know what free agents they'll sign in 2020 or 2021. Perhaps they'll be like Memphis and take other teams bad contracts in exchange for picks, perhaps a star decides to go to toronto. Perhaps through trade they'll acquire another instance like the Lowry trade or even the Kawhi. Perhaps they'll miss on everything and rebuild slowly... lots can happen.

But to act like you know the future and the only and best option for them right now in regards to that future is to immediately trade Siakam for 2 rockets 1st rounder or else they are doomed is asinine.

 

Lol, i just said this in the post above so, no, i'm not under that impression

As for gutting the team i was saying that because that's the only way they can make a substantial upgrade is by moving Siakam and OG in the first place, they don't have other assets. And in terms of free agency who's going to sign with the Raptors next summer? There'll be no superstars available, only some (overrated imo) all star, and let's not act like Toronto has been a free agent destination so far, if Kawhi was still there then i could've see another top player sign there, but with him gone good luck with that. And even if they for some miracle reason end up with getting every top free agent their team would be like:

Drummond
Siakam
OG
Derozan
Lowry

And sorry, but the asinine one here it's you since you're making up stuff and putting that in my mouth. We are disagreeing on their chance of being competitive soon and that's fine, that's an open argument since nobody really know what will happen. But i'm not pretending to know they should trade Siakam here since i never said that. What i said is that if they plan to rebuild they could consider moving him, not that they should move him regardless to the Rockets.

 

No they didn’t. Woj squashed that rumor a few couple days ago. Okc was using Toronto as leverage to get the picks they wanted from LA.

You think Toronto turned down a trade for George and Westbrook plus resigning kawhi because of Siakam, nah.

 

Not sure why you are so certain, the raptors would go after Derozan, Lowry & Drummond in 2020 as if that is the only way they can utilize their cap space or that those would be the top free agents in a year. A LOT can change in an NBA season.

If you think moving siakam and oG for a couple Rockets picks is the best way for them to rebuild, I probably wont be able to change your mind.

Not sure why anyone has to be asinine, but I'll defer to your opinion. And to clarify, I'm calling the idea of "that the raptors future is so bleak, that their only smart recourse is to trade Siakam to the rockets" asinine.

Furthermore this point should be crystal clear as every remark I've made on this subject, including the ones you've quoted, explicitly argued the opposite... ie. "Masai isnt likely nor would it be smart to trade Siakam to the rockets"

It might be smart for the Raptors to wait till next year or the following year or even the year after.
It might be smart for Masai to trade him to this Dec or Feb, to a team like the knicks or Suns or Wizards etc.... for young players or for draft picks.
It might be smart for them to keep him. Might be smart for Masai to do a lot of things, but IMO barring the Rockets offering 4+ unprotected picks, it definitely wouldn't be smart for them to trade him to the Rockets.