Terrific trios: Three's good company for these 10 teams

since gutting the team to get tmac we have needed a 3rd scorer. of course the next step after getting tmac was bringing in good role players.

we are still working on that. once we have a nice deep team of role players you can trade two or 3 of them for a good 3rd option.

 

Hate to break it to you, but I don't see how we can get that "deep" team that we seem to always be lacking unless we top $70 mil in payroll. Now, Les definitely can afford to spend that kind of money on the team because of all the revenue he's generating, but I strongly doubt he would.

San Antonio is really an exception since they have two of their "trio" players who're argubly underpaid when compared to other players. The Pistons likely won't be able to afford Prince and I am not sure about Billups and Rip's contract situation, but I am fairly certain neither are getting anywhere near the max, but they will be due for that or something near that once they become free agents.

IMO, Dallas, NYK, and Lakers are the only teams that can go that high in payroll, but even Cuban (in the case of Dallas) has shown some fiscal responsibility recently, so who knows?

 

rafer could be the man, if he wasn't injured.

give him a chance at least.

 

i think prince's contract situation is already settled. he's getting around 9+ per year for the next 5 years if i'm not mistaken. its ben who's contract is up next year.

 

It will be:

Head (he's only a rookie) - Yao - TMac

 

Rip Hamilton is signed and sealed for 4 seasons after this and Tayshaun just signed his extension for the next 5 years or so. Rasheed is also signed longterm. Billups is signed up for the season after this one. Ben Wallace is a free agent after this year, but it's almost a certain lock he'll stay.

Detroit has been able to find bargain players (Billups and Ben Wallace were unwanted, but heavily courted by Detroit and signed for MLE type deals), make smart trades (fiscally sound ones like getting Rip for Stack when Stack wanted too much money) and sign their own free agents to deals that aren't outrageous (Tay will be making the same as Dunleavy in the future... who would you rather have?).

Any team could do what Detroit did, but it takes someone with a brain running things. You don't sign a guy to max money if he's not a max player. You don't trade for bloated longterm deals. You don't go after injury prone players. You don't pay bench guys obscene amounts. Every money move you make effects every other one.

 

Agreed.

There's no doubt in my mind that Joe Dumars and whomever runs the Spurs are the two best GMs in the league. They have done wonders for their teams. However, it did take time and patience for them to develop what they have now, something the Rockets aren't willing to do, IMO (mainly because they feel like the window of opportunity is shutting on them with McGrady getting older and more injury-stricken).

 

That's why I've been ranting about these quick fix trades they've been talking about.

"That's my kind of player. Let's get him." Then one month into the season, "Oops, I guess not. Let's go trade for someone else." And the apologists say, "We have new rotation players. Let's give them time to gel." And the whole cycle repeats itself every season.

 

I wouldn't exactly call Bill Laimbeer or Horace Grant as part of a trio. There were a lot of stupid trios in that list to. We think of duos more so than trios.

 

Bill Laimbeer was a lot better than you think he was. He was an excellent rebounder, clutch shooter, and his ability to destroy teams by getting into their heads was invaluable. He's a borderline hall of famer.

Grant wasn't so bad either.