Stone will trade for a 2nd round pick or a 15th man and cite he wants to give the young core more time once we get 4-0'd.
Close but no cigar. Your same trade and sign Naz Reid as a FA. Amen/FVV Bane/Kennard Jabari/Tari/Dillon JJJ/Jabari/Tari Reid/JJJ/Jabari That surrounds Amen with Shooters and good defensive players. Also have an incredible bench. I don't think there is any way Memphis would do it though, unless that Phoenix pick was no. 1 and, then, would the Rockets do it? We could just sign Naz Reid and push Jabari to SF and hope Jalen learns to shoot. Amen, Jalen, Jabari, Naz Reid, Sengun. Bench FVV, Cam, Dillon, Tari.
I can’t imagine we can land Naz Reid. A large reason why the Timberwolves traded KAT was to resign Reid.
They are a second apron team with no way to get under the 2nd apron as long as Gobert and Ant are on the team. I can't imagine the T-wolves being a small market team will take on another 30-40M player. He may even be more expensive than that. They also will have to find a taker for Julius Randall, who sucks and is owed 33m next year. They have sh*t for draft assets. They are probably second only to Phoenix that are unable to make moves to get better. Is their owner so rich that he can start paying GS type luxury penalites? If he is then he could pay Reid, but I don't know to what purpose. They are currently a 7 seed with all these players. If they are willing to pay the price for Reid now, they might as well have held on to Kat and at least have a chance at contending. Maybe you are right. The Gobert trade was 2nd only to the Doncic trade as the worst of all time, so no telling what they will do. The Rockets should at least go hard at him and make them pay the price to keep him.
They are a second apron team now. The difference is they will have a ton of cap space after next season without KAT’s contract if they let Randle walk or trade him, or this offseason if Randle opts-out. The whole point of trading KAT was to lock in guys like Reid, NAW, DD etc. to contracts around Ant.
They are 16.1M over the 2nd Apron. If Randall opts out at 33m they will be 17m under the 2nd Apron. Signing Reid would put them over the second apron again for the second year in a row. No one will take Gobert for 3 years. I guess if they can get an expiring contract for McCollum they could barely get under the 2nd apron again after signing Naz. If they don't sign Naz they can get under the 2nd Apron and have more flexibilty going forward, although they will still be in dire straights to improve. Maybe they find a fool to give them a good pick for Randall.
I didn't mean they would have salary cap space this season. I'm saying they gain a ton of financial relief once Randle leaves, and they'll have less than 130m on their books in 2026 with a projected cap of 170 mil. They'll literally have max cap space then, though I expect they'll use the space to extend guys like Reid, DD, etc. That was the whole point of the KAT trade - to extend the the non-KAT young core around Ant.
4 years Vs 5 8% raises Vs 5 The only thing is ..... who in their right mind wants to live in that frozen wasteland? (who the hell wants to live in this furnace?)
People who like the cold I guess? I live in Colorado now, generally prefer the wintertime here too. Couldn't pay me to jump back into the Houston furnace. Of course I guess Minneapolis is a whole 'nother level.
Guys, naz reid is a negative defender except in the post. He's totally incapable of protecting the rim. He's extremely bad on the perimeter. Foot speed is bad laterally and vertically. Jabari is the much better overall player at PF. If we're starting Naz Reid, something went horribly wrong in the rebuild. As a bench player would love to get him, but feels like he'll get bigger money than we can afford to pay for a backup. That's why I told you let's sign him for $15m when he was an FA. You guys called that an overpay. Now you want to snatch a player someone else patiently developed when his price is peaking. Can you understand that the team that absorbed the hiccups gets the prize most of the time? If you have to pay in picks or assets, you're only going to add to your roster marginally. I've never used this cheesy line before but, you have to develop the Chandler Parsons, not acquire him when he's expensive. The money is all locked up for stars, you have to be seeking undervalued players everywhere else so we can afford more of the core. I'd take a lesser shooter in Isaiah Stewart ten times out of ten if we're trying to pry someone away. He has a long contract, undervalued, can't bolt quickly. He's one of the best rim protectors in the NBA by DFG% and % at the rim. He's quietly embarrassing the owner's favorite player Jalen Duren. He's right now EXACTLY at the point where his 3PT shot will take off soon. This is the time to acquire someone like that. After his 3PT shot takes off, it will not be worth it anymore.
Fair enough. I just want either Sengun to learn to shoot 3's and ft's better or find a center that can. Amen and Jalen surrounded with 3&D players (with length) is my wish. I love Sengun, but his shooting peformance has been very disappointing. Sengun in a trade for JJJ would be even better than Naz or Stewart, but I doubt Memphis would play and I'm not sure the Rocket's FO have the balls for something like that. Instead they are talking about an extension of old and slow FVV, so that Ime can run it back with his lame JVG style offense. They did a great job on a quick re-build, now let's see if they can build a contending roster. I know that TS% is not the end/all be/all but 42.4%, is really really bad.
Totally on board with your mindset but I'll give Sengun plenty of time because there's never been a 20/10/5 player who can post up and hit an open 3 that is not worth the max. That's worth the patience. That's the kind of player we can't acquire with picks, no one lets that go. Getting 5 assists from your C is such a massive piece, I advise doing some fun research about it. Shooting or passing C's are WAY overrepresented on championship teams, it's no coincidence. We experienced this under Harden (the lack of it). Two passers on the wing get in each other's business at times. When you have a passing C, the opponent has to defend a multi dimensional offense. It means their team defense has to hold up outside-in AND inside-out. That's SO difficult to do, much harder than just creating walls in the paint. Trust me, he's a key just like the other two. They don't overlap. The shooting is a bit late but if it comes for him or Sengun plus Jalen very slight improvement, MAN. I feel good about FVV slowly being pushed off ball. Ime has resisted it less than I expected. You feel he's being stingy with it?
Good comments. I don't trust Ime with anything regarding rotations, minutes, or veterans. Every change he has made has been forced by injury. We lost a few games without FVV and most of the fans on this site are ready to throw the bank at him. Ime seems to have a similar mind-set. Dillon should have never been given the starting job over Amen, after Amen proved himself last year. His putrid decisiions in the 4th quarter, especially early in the season cost us at least 5 games. I hope you are right and when FVV gets back he plays off the ball about 70%, Dillon goes to the bench. He should absolutely be screaming at Sengun to shoot those open 3's until he starts makeing them at a better clip.
I mean, I can't blame you, Ime does not instill confidence with his offensive choices. He just keeps calling his offense good shots. I also want to toot my own horn and say: exactly word for word as I predicted, his first interview back he's smiling and walked back his comments about the identity of this team. I don't like that he does that, but usually we play well after he comes clean. Myself maybe I started off too suspicious but he's exceeded my expectations with moving FVV off ball. I've criticized him a ton, so I have to give him credit where he surprised me personally. I didn't think we'd have the ball out of Fred's hands this much. Next season let's see. If he comes back cheap or only for the team option (no extension) I'd be ok with that if we struck out on everything else. As the 3rd guard in the rotation, he's a good influence and don't underestimate the power of performance. Amen and Jalen are going to be putting on a masterclass and sometimes when people step into their role fully, the people around just know to step back. Let's hope they make it crystal clear - starting with tonight (I think FVV is out).
Hope you're right about JG putting on a "masterclass". Hasn't been much sign of it since @Cleveland on January 27th. His shooting has been pretty godawful again for about the past month. Just the same old sh*t with him--when he shoots well, our offense is very good, but he goes through these prolonged slumps where his jump shot is just broken. Hope he can go on his usual post-ASB tear and it didn't just come early this season.
I excused this one. Personally - and I get it would be hard to trust my opinion on this - but personally I think anyone even a veteran star playing in his position, fatigue/minutes, spacing, injuries would have slumped for those games. Man he was injured like 3 weeks before the deadline, people kept going down and he just kept playing. I honestly think if we were healthy he would have missed games. I even said before he slumped I've never seen him this tired, he's going to go on a slump. My perspective is this was his first legit slump from real circumstances outside confidence and poor shot selection. It was not just the offense this time either, he was equally fatigued on shooting, transition, defense, everything. Hopefully a masterclass for these 28 games of everything he's learned so far put together.
Naz Reid has a DRTG of 109.7 which is far from a negative defender. He also averages more stocks than Jabari. Jabari is slightly better rebounder about board more than Naz but Naz is significantly better offensive player especially in efficiency (56% vs 60% TS) and 3P% (35% vs 40%). But don't take my word for it compare both players in link below. https://3stepsbasket.com/player/jabari-smith-jr/vs/naz-reid?season=nba25
Make whatever moves you need to get Giannis and KD. Then buyout CP3. Anybody but Amen can get it. All available picks also.
