As much as I'm trying to downplay this deal; the Thunder just upgraded from Oladipo to George without depleting their depth. That's serious.
Sabonis has potential, and can be flipped in a year or two once Indy inflates his stats by giving him starter minutes. Dipo went to IU, so name recognition sells tickets. His contract blows but Indy won't be relevant again, at the very least, until his contract is up anyway so it doesn't even matter. Not a terrible trade for Indy, imo. They should have traded him at the deadline but I'm not sure he had flat out told the FO he wouldn't be returning at that point.
so they get to pay dipo money to be mediocre and then, at best, watch sabonis develop into a decent player in a couple of years, at which point they get to pay him. mediocre players who you have to pay $20M are the bane of building a team. what's the point of having them? you can do it if you already have a star(s) and are filling out the roster, but starting your team with them? makes everything more difficult. outside of ryno, this is what morey's always been so good about. not overpaying role players and looking for stars, who are almost by default underpaid. you can find cheap decent players. you don't wanna find non-impact guys like oladipo who have labels like "upside potential" or "scorer" that make them almost by default overpaid.
That'll last until October, when they have to start playing games with a relatively NBA newb as their coach, trying to massage two MASSIVE egos. Here, we've got an old hand and two superstars who just want to win.
Best thing I think it does for OKC is clear dipo off the books. PG isn't staying there and PG imo doesn't make the Thunder better than the us or let a lone golden state, so ultimately unless they do some more with that roster I think it's all for naught.
How so? We may have given up a lot but that was basically the only way to get a star with less than half the assets Boston has to offer anyone. You see how much of a difference it makes when you have two superstars that guys wanna play with... it entices even more interest and helps make finding players that much easier.
but isn't that morey's who thing? taking these kind of risks? basically get the star in the door and hope he stays because there are only so many stars to get. i'm a big morey fan so it seems weird we wouldn't (maybe it's just couldn't) beat this. maybe morey figures paul is the risk and george being a rental could screw that up and would rather be sure now that he has 2 top 10 players and go a different route. but figuring out a way to get george is certainly the home run and, in an era where it takes a grand slam to beat colluding weak stars, i don't know if you can go for doubles.
this hurts, PG was exactly what we needed and OKC got him for some expired Doritos and a used condom...smh How does Indiana not even get a pick?!?
I hate Ryan Anderson. Have hated him since he became a Rocket. Will hate him as long as he is in a Rockets jersey. Massively overpaid scrub that is holding this team back. That's a wrap. We will be competing for second place alongside the Spurs in the West. We needed PG's defense to matchup with the Warriors. Just hope Rockets don't meet OKC in playoffs either. Harden will be neautralized by PG on defense and Rockets are going to have a tough time scoring.
Signing Ryan Anderson wasn't something Morey especially wanted to do. He was told to spend the money.
What I meant was the CP3 trade could be perceived as a "trashy" trade by other bitter fan bases. We gave up Beverley and stuff. OKC gave up Oladipo and one other asset. I'm just happy to be a Rockets fan.
Pacers weren't going to let PG pick and choose his team. I blame PG for lowering Pacers value so they dumped him to a place he is not going to have fun with. I'm going to say PG will not get a triple-double for this upcoming season, only if Westbrook is not playing in the game.
