greatest current need for this team heading to playoff run

Magic pills cost more than 2nd rounders and I'm not looking for someone to come take us to the playoffs, we're the 3rd seed we're making the playoffs anyway. No point debating things that cost more than multiple 2nd rounders. Maybe a very late FRP. Of course I'm aware that in general there are better players we can add. I'm trying to discuss a realistic one rather than a hopeful one here, I don't think anyone believes there's a chance FVV gets benched or traded. Jalen can't really get traded. The team has essentially announced that this is it, so the only things we can improve is role players and offensive system.

I disagree with your assessment about its impact on our backcourt. FVV is irrelevant, he's just shooting too much because Jalen is struggling so bad. You put a Jimmy Butler there instead of JG and FVV becomes a role player again. I'm fine with him if he takes fewer shots and usage, which you would achieve by getting our wings up to par offensively. That's the whole idea here. The point of Vucevic is not to get interior points or rim protection. The point is to create space for the wings. Vucevic would absolutely make a massive difference for Amen and Green in those 25-30 minutes.

Adding a 6MOY type player to the 3rd seed in the West without losing a serious rotation piece will obviously move us up the offensive rankings. We're like 27th in TS%, average players added outright would absolutely generate a couple more wins.

Also as the Amen superfan, I can't believe you're arguing against getting a stretch 5. I wonder genuinely, do you have some sentimental attachment to winning basketball in an old school way with non-shooters? Do you feel like it would be reliving some lost past glory? Actually curious why you wouldn't want such a cheap high production bench player who would create more space for Amen to drive. Doesn't affect our financial flexibility, doesn't cost assets, doesn't cost any of the core any minutes. Or are you simply just saying you wish we could get a way better player for just 2nd rounders?

 

They've basically started running a lot of DHO's for him with Jokic since he became a starter. He'll run at Jokic, grab the ball, never slow down and just goes full speed for a dunk or FT's. No slowing down and hunting for shots really. WB has spoken recently about how Malone has allowed him to be himself in that way.

 

This sounds more like Jokic has the ball and is acting like a great player and Westbrook is just acting like a role player. This fits what I've seen. I've not seen the DHO stuff much, but I've seen Westbrook used as a glorified KJ Martin with Jokic as the defense focuses on Jokic. The DHO would be a step up from what I saw earlier and what KJ Martin does, but the way your post sounded originally to me was that Jokic was brought to the 3 point line so that Westbrook could cook.

 

I don't know if I see it that way, I feel like Westbrook's task is much more difficult in that situation.

They will occasionally let Jokic rest as the spacer while someone cooks but not often. They don't need to. They aren't busy asking why Westbrook is shooting so poorly for someone who got drafted so high. They just made up their minds about the only thing he can do well - run very powerfully - and made that possible for him when they saw he was struggling just chilling off ball earlier in the season.

It's what I talk about with Green all the time. We need to have a selfish approach for our team. If we can get something out of him by tweaking something that doesn't hurt the core, of course just do it even if he's disappointed you personally.

Anyways, whether voluntarily or by force, I know that ultimately we will run that kind of offense. This will be our 4th year in a row in the bottom 3 in TS%. You will be amazed how quickly a human (Stone) can normalize something (elite defense). Even just with Ime's 1.3 years of internal improvement, we should be better at making shots than this. Our roster is better than the 27th ranked offensive roster in the NBA. A team with that low of offensive talent simply cannot win 11 games in a row against bad teams. In fact, no one but the Rockets and Celtics won 11 in a row last season and many teams had easy months in their schedules.

Like I said in an earlier post, it's not a coincidence Jaylen Brown, Jason Tatum, Al Horford and Derrick White all shot poorly under Ime. This guy can be an all time great coach if he doesn't keep waiting for his teams to implode before making a change. Last season we went 6-16 while the team was exhausted from trying so hard and Ime didn't believe them for A MONTH lol. Just kept saying to work harder, until it started looking bad on his CV and he made changes. Better not happen again. Let's be proactive this time. You can already see small signs of fatigue in the players and they're young and it's early in the season.

 

Truly the greatest need isn't a player - we really just need to get the team there and exposing them to the intensity of a playoff series and learn from how they handle that. It's a whole other level of execution and teams picking apart your biggest weaknesses. To some extent we will certainly be exposed just because the things that you could get away with in the regular season you won't get away with in the playoffs - namely execution on every play...and this team doesn't know that yet so that's going to be a valuable lesson for them to take into preparation for future years.

That's also going to show us things like how bad the weaknesses of our best players is going to be picked apart - we need to know THAT before we make big roster transactions because it's possible guys like Jalen(shooting, defending), Amen(shooting), Fred(shooting, defending), or even Alpi(guarding "up"/providing support at the level on screens against good shooters) get exposed and make us reconsider the long term plan. There was a time when Enes Kanter looked like a solid young offensive big for OKC in the regular season and then the playoffs showed how badly he could be exploited defensively and OKC started remaking the roster without him.

My point is - don't panic and lose assets facilitating a trade today to address a perceived need - roll into the playoffs, get your ass handed to you, and figure out what you need in the future based on what you learned from the playoffs.

 

I can't imagine FVV coming off the bench and Amen starting. There is just waaaay too much pride to make that bold move. If you're Rockets front office and you think Amen is ready to be the PG today, get on the phone and find a new home for FVV. He has value as a trade chip.

 

Greatest need is a starting caliber SG that can shoot.

 

Boston will be here tonight. Our perimeter shooting is a guaranteed struggle. It is perfectly clear what the problem is, and I have zero confidence that we can fix our shooting/scheme with internal improvement.

As I've mentioned before, we've been very fortunate not to have injuries, and if one comes our way, we'll be in a huge struggle to stay afloat. That is how fragile our offense is. I would try to find an opportunistic piece you could add without mortgaging the future (Fox or Butler or someone else), as I think some players might be available now for less than what they might go for in the offseason.

Chances are Stone doesn't have the nerve to make a deadline move like that.

 

None of the above...we need a CLOSER.

 

I said I wanted Vucevic for cheap. I just said it won't solve our problematic backcourt. Who is being unrealistic thinking we are going to be a 3 seed. We are a 3 seed 1/3 through the season going into a horrible stretch of the schedule. Unless FVV and Jalen massively improve their offense there is more of a chance that we are a play-in team than a play-off team. We beat up on scrub teams and keep lucking out missing the likes of Luka. Earlier in the years we missed JA and loss to a Curry-less GS team. Adding a backup center that shoots well is not going to improve our outlook more than a couple of games.

 

I think they've committed to Sengun as the closer and it's not a viable option based on his conditioning & inability to hit FTs. I'd like to see Jalen with the ball more but I don't think Ime wants this

 

The advanced stats don't make him hit his 4th quarter free throws or turn the ball over. Not sure why'd you argue this given he's been our go to option & we've been losing 4th quarter games while closing

 

I didn't say we're going to be a 3 seed. I said we are. Which we are. If we're going to fall because of the schedule, it would be good to have shored up our depth in order to fight it better. As far as play-in team that's very pessimistic for me, I don't think that will happen unless injuries.

I don't care about having a good record against elite teams this season to be honest with you, it's not achievable with this roster. Wasn't even on the table to start the season, I'm greatful for where we are. Some things just have to do with the number of hours you've put in (experience) and our rotation doesn't have the requisite hours to beat elite teams. I'm sorry but everyone looked at the schedule before the season, no one predicted we would win at this rate against all but the best teams. I don't think you or I predicted we'd be that good in the first 1/3rd. I'm happy for us to mop up the bad and mediocre teams while making gradual month to month progress on beating the elite teams. We'll be fine with that.

 

we need an allstar sg

 

Cam Johnson

 

What do you mean "we've been losing"? Yeah, we've lost some games, and we've also won a lot of games with him closing. You're acting like we're some loser team that is dropping every close game because Sengun sucks. We're #3 in the west and on pace to win 55 games.

 

Here's the clutch stats this year from our starting lineup. I think it's pretty clear that we need a closer on this team, I don't think Sengun is it, but the other options are worse. Jalen has not done well, and Fred has been completely terrible. It's not like Jalen hasn't had opportunity though.

 

Greatest current need is health.