So last year GS traded J-rich and some random dude for the 8th overall pick in the 07 draft. The pick turned out to be Brandan Wright, a 6'10 20 yr old kid with an amazing wingspan, hops, and seemingly unlimited potential. A lot of the draft profiles at the time likened him to Chris Bosh, but personally I thought he was ther 4rth best prospect at the draft, and considered him as the slightly inferior 2nd coming of Garnett (only without the crazy pills). I also thought he would be a good complement to Biedrins, and yet he was stuck on the bench all of last season. Now, rookie Anthony Randolph is actually ahead of him in the rotation. Normally you'd think he was a bust, but the thing is he never gets playing time, and when he does he almost always produces. During the game last dec 8 Wright scored 15 pts on 5-6 shooting in only 22 mins of play. You'd expect more playing time with a performance like that but he got 3 straight DNP-CDs instead. What gives? Can someone enlighten me why rookies like Morrow, Randolph and Kurz are getting minutes over this guy? Or is Nelly just insane? profiles http://www.nbadraft.net/players/brandan-wright http://www.draftexpress.com/profile/Brandan-Wright-277/
See, I think this is the problem with Don Nelson in Golden State. In Dallas, they had a solid checks-and-balances system with Cuban, and their other FO guy (the name is escaping me right now), along with Avery as an assistant, so Nelson never REALLY had FULL control of the team, and its personnel. Sure, he had full authority to do what he liked with the roster, but nobody ever let him run rampant with personnel moves. Now, in Golden State, he's got full immunity to do what he wants, and I think he's too much of a loose cannon to put your full trust in as a franchise. I understand that he's one of the most successful coaches of all time, but he's definitely lost his edge with the players, and his constant tinkering with the lineup has finally caught up with the team. I may be wrong, and they might go on a tear once Ellis gets back, but I have a hard time believing that one player will take from the cellar to the sky. Especially with Regrette in there hogging all the shots.
They had 3 straight years of bust drafting in the 1st round. Ike Diogu, Patrick O'Bryant, and Marco Belinelli.
Brendan Wright actually had some good games this season before he got injured. Last year he basically sat on the bench the whole time. I think that Wright will get plenty of playing time once he returns and will develop quite a bit this season. By the end of the season Wright maybe considered a legit building block for the Warriors.
Now that I got some sleep I was thinking this is a great way for us to get under the cap and sign Deke. Would you consider trading Landry for Wright straight up? This should allow us to get under the cap and sign Deke. Normally a team wouldn't trade their 8th round pick for a 2nd round pick, but Landry has shown that he's a first round talent at worst. He also fits in GS system very well, and could be the type of big man Nelly likes (scores all over the floor, can run with the guards, faulty defense etc). What do you guys think? Get it done Morey
^ Or, we could just cut luther rather than give up one of our rotation players for Dikembe who with all due respect will probably just sit on the bench until Yao gets hurt
No. Funny how any trade suggestion that ends with the "Get it done Morey" phrase is usually a bad one.
Why is it a bad trade? Wright is 4 years younger than Landry and has more potential then he will ever have. He doesn't have any emotional baggage or personality problems, and I think he's pretty mature for his age because he hasn't gone ballistic despite not getting minutes. This move may be a downgrade right now, but I'm pretty sure Wright will reach (or more likely surpass) Landry by next season. Landry is good but he's not part of our franchise core. We can stand a downgrade if it means you can sign Deke right now and you get a player who will be as good as he is in a few seasons. Funny how people shoot trades down without even explaining their reasoning. P.S. We can't cut Luther head. Well actually we can, but cutting him won't do anything because we already have a roster spot open. What we need to cut is his salary, and we can't do that because its guaranteed. Cutting him would just allow him to earn more money by signing with another team for the minimum
^You're trading our effective back-up PF for an unproven player who plays on a bad team(GS nonetheless, where numbers can easily get inflated by the system they play). Do you really think we're in a position to take that gamble this year?
The proven commodity is Deke. The unproven one is Wright. We have a logjam of sorts in the PF slot anyway with Hayes still in the rotation. We can afford to take a project, especially if the project looks as promising as he does. We're not talking about some Lithuaninan foreigner dude no one ever heard of here. We're talking about the eighth lottery pick in one of the deepest drafts in history. If Nelly wasn't coach of that team we wouldn't be even having this discussion because I'm sure Wright would be off limits by now. I guess my point is this is a way to get Deke on the roster to help us now, and not sacrifice our future. Les just stated that he won't go over the tax for Deke, and I'm pretty sure no team will take Luther Head straight up without us giving up anything else. Would you rather have us go into the playoffs against the lakers with no other player besides Yao Ming over 6 feet tall?
I like the thinking. But I dont think trading Landry for Wright straight up is enough savings to get under the cap and to get Mutombo. RealGM has Landry at $3 mil, Wright at 2.5 mil. Veterans mininum is 1.2 mil ($400,00 paid by the league). So Rockets would still be adding to their luxury tax figure.
He still has a lot of potential. Just that he is not Nelly kind of player. I think warriors fans are still very high on him.
