Good write-up on Nik Stauskas's pro potential
I thought people might enjoy this write-up from the Sixer's-focused Liberty Ballers blog. As a Sixers fan I am very excited about him coming to Philly; their player development from Brett Brown (former key assist to Pop in San Antonio) on down and the fact that there will be much less pressure (and no mercurial teammates like Boogie Cousins) affecting his confidence.
Lot's of good video walks down memory lane as well....
http://www.libertyballers.com/2015/7/3/8889425/stauskas-rich-mans-redic…
I'm jealous of the 76ers. They have a franchise that wants to win a title, not just make a the playoffs as a 4-8 seed.
lol what? 6ers desire to win a title doesn't excuse their blatant tanking for years.
Blatant tanking is better than fringe playoff contention. It's about championships, not making the playoffs. That's just a cynical way to sell tickets.
I would say that the Pistons roster moves under SVG are indicative of a team that is being patient (thinking big picture) rather than being panicked (making a hard playoff push).
There is nothing patient about waiving Josh Smith (instead of waiting for his contract to become a potential asset as an expiring contract) and signing players like Meeks, Baynes, and Jackson to well over-market contracts.
The Pistons are locked into this roster for the long-term. Once Drummond signs a MAX extension and KCP inevitably signs HIS extension there will be little to no cap space, even as it skyrockets. The Pistons have an unproven core locked in - there is nothing big picture about this. It's very similar to the model Bowerfollowed in New Orleans/Charlotte - overpay to fill out a roster that on-paper makes a ton of sense if you are talking about fit, roster inflexibility makes it impossible to make significant adjustments and the talent is well below elite. It took the Pelicans many years (and Anthony Davis landing in their lap) to recover.
Meeks is on contract for 2 more years at a reasonable cap number, Jackson is a solid PG at the price you'll be paying him when the salary cap balloons in a couple of years and allows you to move away from Jennings if you need to, and Baynes is on a reasonably-friendly contract over 3 years (though I'll agree that's a bit more of a stretch).
Waiving Smith needed to be done; he was a bad dude in the clubhouse apparently and was a mess on the court; sure they could have handled it better, but in the long term that decision won't make or break these Pistons.
I think you are just down on the Pistons, which is reasonable in general but feels misguided here. This is a young team with some nice parts, and frankly I'd rather have a core of Drummond, Jackson, and KCP over the Noel, Okafor, Embid whatever that the 76ers currently have.
Meeks is very overpaid for a backup SG. He is was and will be a gunner. A low talent/low maintenance version of JR Smith/Nick Young getting paid.
Jackson is solid - he'll put up numbers and ensure the team has a competant offensive facilitator. He's also bad at defense and inefficient and has a track record of not being a team player. That's not worth a MAX-level contract.
If Smith was such a bad guy they could have suspended him. I don't have a huge problem with him getting waived, but I do have a problem with continuing the cycle of overpaying massively for sub-all-star players (Hamilton, Gordon, Smith) and then paying to pawn them off on others.
What you are missing about the Sixers is that they can still sign 2 MAX level players to add their young core. The Pistons will not be able to do that.
I'm willing to give you that they likely overpaid for Meeks (assuming he doesn't have a big year this year). The Baynes deal is in line with market value.
Jackson was playing at all-star level towards the end of last year and his contract is comparable to what other FA point guards were getting this year (slightly more than Brandon Knight, slightly less than Goran Dragic). I'm willing to admit that the deal is rife with boom or bust, but Detroit isn't going to attract a lot of top FAs so unfortunately they need to "overpay" to get talent.
All the contracts you listed where the Pistons overpaid for sub-all-star players were under Joe Dumars. You could argue that the Jackson signing is a continuation of that, but this deal has way more upside on a player with a lot more potential than any of those Dumars moves. Hamilton, Gordon and Smith were all known, over the hill commodities at the time of their respective signings.
There's a lot of NBA pundits openly questioning the Baynes and Jackson deals, even in this context of exploding salaries, for good reason.
Baynes is a replacement level backup center. Jackson is getting paid at an all-star level without having performed at anywhere near that level AND being a bit of a cancer on the team that drafted him.
Jackson has been in this leage for years and cherry picking his stats from the end-of-the-year win-streak is no more compelling than cherry-picking Brandon Jennings run between the Smith trade and his injury. If anything, last years PG game of musical chairs showed you that anyone, even a career backup like Augustyn, can put up numbers when surrounded by wing shooters and a force of nature at center. It's the same reason that MAAR can look like a potential all big 10 player. The ball handler in a 4-out/1-in offense will always put up numbers. It's the same reason Jeremy Lin can go nuts when he's in a guard-friendly offense.
Detroit didn't overpay for Morris or Ilysova or Brandon Jennings or their draft picks. Free agency is not the place to get bargains.
SVG/Bowers are continuing Dumars tradition of paying top dollar to try to sneak into the bottom end of the playoffs. Meeks, Butler, Baynes, Jackson are just more of the same stuff we saw before.
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that have been making stupid free agent signings and bad overpays for years. This is what that path leads to.
The Lakers have Kobe - a me-first guy who struggles to get along with others and demands a ton of shots.
The Knicks have Melo - "
The Pistons have Jackson - "
The difference is that Kobe and Melo proved they were all stars before they got paid like them.
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Lets say the wings (KCP, Morris, Ilysova, Johnson) are very very good (and I think they can be)...
Let's say Drummond is an all-star, some combination of Howard/Chandler and legit MAX player....
Let's say Jackson reaches his ceiling as the 4th best PG in the east, maybe 10th best in the NBA....
If EVERTHING goes right is that a championship contending team? Legitimately good - yes. Perennial title contender - probably not.
I suppose it could get you there in a 2004 Pistons way, but if you compare that to the "everything goes right" scenarios for other teams and it's not so great. Look at Milwaukee's version (Parker and Giannis as all-NBA forwards), or Clevelands (duh), or Chicagos (duh), or Minnesotas (Wiggins/Towns as all-NBA), etc.
In no way am I acting like Philly's plan is a guarantee. I'm saying Detroit's is a near-guaranteed to NOT result in a title. Sixers at least have hope for a bright future.
The Meeks contract is a dispute of opinion; it isn't great by any means, but it's off the books in two years and isn't going to cripple what the team does. And if you are Detroit, you are going to have trouble getting guys to come to you without overpaying a bit. I'd take him over Smith or Young, though, and they'd be way more expensive.
Jackson isn't getting paid max money given the new cap; $80M for 5 years averages out to $16M/yr, with no team or player options. You know what you are paying, and while I'd like a team option at the end there are going to be a bunch of guys putting up worse numbers with just as many holes in their games making more than that. If that gets me a "competent offensive facilitator" I'll take it. And Jackson is only 25 and finally getting his first sustained playing time; me could well become a better overall player especially with SVG harping on him to be better defensively.
I agree you shouldn't overpay for second-rate players, but at the same time an NBA GM exists to compete and try to get the best players possible. Smith was a terrible fit from the word go, but Gordon and particularly Hamilton were elite scorers who could have worked.
And for all the talk about Philly having the option to sign to Max guys, that would go against everything they are trying to do because it would force them to solidify the team as it stood. Sure, you might be able to get a Harden-type and turn into a fringe contender, but it could also mean that you get stuck with, I don't know, Monroe and Eric Gordon because you guessed wrong. Not all max players are made alike, and so that's why Philly seems hell-bent on lucking into stars in the draft and then signing guys around them while they are cap-controlled. But right now Philly is still not sure if they've drafted even one stud, let alone the 2-3 you need (and at different positions) to succeed with that plan.
Meeks makes more than Young and Smith. You can argue he is a better team player if you want, but none of these guys (with the possible exception of Smith) is considered a bargain or a significant asset. Smith got dumped for nothing. No otherteams in the league want Meeks at that cost. To an extent, that's the nature of free agency, but there are ways to work through the process without doing things you immediately regret.
"Only 25". That's not particularly young to expect a huge leap. It's the same age as Brandon Jennings who many have given up on (and is far cheaper BTW). It older than Brandon Knight (who is also cheaper). Isiah Thomas, Eric Bledsoe, the list of young PGs go on and on and most of them are cheaper and/or have more upside than Jackson, if they aren't better already.
Anyway, it's beside the point because they didn't HAVE to pay Jackson that much. There was no competition market to pay a career backup that much money. Bidding against yourself is just burning money, same as Villanueva and Gordon.
I would argue that NBA GMs exist to facilitate winning championships, not "to compete and try to get players". It's their job to keep the short-sighted goals of coaches in check.
The Sixers, like the Rockets before them, have not been shy about stating that they are willing to spend when the time is right. This is not some small-market penny pincher or Sterling era Clippers. They are waiting to commit until they have the core pieces in place. A couple weeks ago they didn't know if they'd have Okafor, Russel, or Towns. Why would they sign free agents who may or may not fit around their franchise players BEFORE they know who those franchise players are? The part that the Sixers get and the Pistons don't is that you can't just sign mediocre players and hope they develop into all stars. That's not how it works 9 times out of 10.
One of the biggest reasons the Pistons won the title in 2004 was that they DIDN'T sign a free agent. Grant Hill leaving for Orlando set up the chain of events that led immediately to that title. Chauncey Billups was Chauncey Billups in part becaue his contract was a bargain and allowed them to get Rasheed Wallace and all those other guys eventually.
Smith makes slightly more than Meeks right now, and I'm guessing he'll get quite a bit more in the FA market. The fact that Smith and Shumbert were "dumped" by the Knicks and then were key players on a championship-level team says more about the tirefire that was the Knicks than those players' values.
The Pistons tried to sign Grant Hill; he just wanted to go to Orlando. That had very little to do with anything they were doing. And yes, they got luck with Billups, but lest we forget Billups was 25 then as well, and had been a middling player everywhere (the Celts gave up on him, as Toronto, Denver, and to an extent Minny) before coming to Detroit. You say Jackson wasn't in a bidding war, but part of a GM's job is to see if he can sign a player while his value is lower than it would be a year later; there's a real chance Jackson looks good this year with a full season of playing time and then you are paying him way more than $16m/year.
I keep hearing about how Philly is "ready" to sign players when they want to, and that Houston is a great example of a team doing it right. Well, right now Houston is locked into a 29-year-old Howard with back problems and a diminishing game, few options to get dramatically better, and a solid 2-3 teams better than them in the West for the foreseeable future. And for years, Houston was competing each season, getting 40-ish wins with mediocre players and hoping to find some greatness, which they did when OKC dumped Harden. That's great for Houston, but also waiting on that type of fortuitious fortune seems like a bad proposition in the NBA.
Philly has been great as convincing people they have a vision, and maybe they do and it will work out. But right now they have a bunch of lottery tickets with varying possibilities of paying off and a real chance that they'll suck about as much next year and be back to drafting again in the lottery. At some point I'm sure Philly will get a superstar in the draft; a blind squirrel can find a nut. But portraying the Pistons' plans of signing good NBA players for contracts and trying to win basketball games as nearsighted or illogical strikes me as the hipster-ism that pervades lots of these discussions.
The point about Hill was that avoiding that massive free agency commitment was a blessing in disguise. Instead, they planted the seeds for the 2004 championship team.
It's funny because Billups, Hamilton, and Prince are the 3 moves where I think luck was the smallest factor in the Pistons rise. The Sheed thing was obviously very lucky to be in the right place/right time to get something for nothing. The Hill thing (falling into Ben Wallace and those guys) was very lucky for Dumars/Detroit. Whereas Billups was an obvious buy-low option - a high end lottery talent that was rapidly improving. Prince was a proven college player who was just too skinny. Hamilton was dealt for Stackhouse at his height. Those were all very SMART, more than lucky (to me anyway.)
I think it's an enormous leap of faith to think that Jackson will be worth more than $16M next year or the years after. It's possible, but the risk of having to pay more next year are small compared to the security of not commiting 5 years and $90M to a guy who has never proved he's even an above average starting point guard. In other words, the chances of him being a bargain require his value to become close to future MAX. The chances of him playing at the level he has played at the last few years in the league are far more realistic. Furthermore, he might cost even less next year than the $12M OKC offered him not so long ago.
Houston certainly does NOT regret signing Howard. There was a very short reboot between Ming and Howard, enabled by Houston having a clear vision that they had to rebuild. Those kind of franchise altering deals (like Harden) actually happen pretty regularly. The Cavs swapped Wiggins and Love. The Blazers COULD have swapped Aldridge (if Mathews had gotten hurt earlier they might have) had they been smart. Iverson, Bryant, Garnett were all nearly traded before their prime. Steph Curry was poachable as recently as 2 years ago. etc. If you put yourself in position to take advantage of these situations things will come up. The Sixers are doing that.
"portraying the Pistons' plans of signing good NBA players for contracts and trying to win basketball games as nearsighted or illogical strikes me as the hipster-ism that pervades lots of these discussions. "
Or, you know, it's exactly what's happened. Hamilton, Gordon, Villanueva, Smith. These are all good basketball players, better than what the sixers had to offer in 2015. It just wouldn't have helped one bit if a non-contending team like the sixers decided to sign those guy to help them not win a title anyway. In fact, it's a loss opportunity to progress towards a title, and there's a good chance they give up assets in the future to dump Jackson just like they had to give up assets to dump those other guys.
In free agency, by it's nature, you have to pay more than everybody else. In other words you have to outsmart around 30 other organizations. It happens (e.g., Billups), but it's very difficult to acheive.
Winning teams get their cornerstone players either through the draft (CLE, SAS) or by attracting A-list free agents (Miami, LAL). The 2004 Pistons were a weirdo exception that got very lucky. And chauncey billups (whose upside was/is higher than Jacksons) didn't get a near-max contract to join them. If he had, they never would have been able to get Sheed and the other finishing touches.
With Hill, though, that was a star player in the perfect sense Philly wants - he was from the draft, relatively young, and elite. But then he left and the Pistons lucked into Ben Wallace and Chucky Atkins and then Stackhouse took a step up that next year and the wheels were set in motion. Billups' stats were fine in Minny but he was still a flameout at 25 who certainly benefitted from playing with a young Kevin Garnett. There were questions about his signing; we just forget that because it worked out. Hamilton was an offense-only player that Detroit got cheaper because Jordan wanted to win in Washington and nobody threw themselves in front of that deal, but the Rip that won in Detroit wasn't completely there in Washington. It took some luck that he matured and the rest of the squad formed into such a solid nucleus. Prince was a good late-round selection but had some flaws in his game; I don't think he was grossly under-drafted at the time. Casey Jacobsen had been a dead-eye shooter who went a pick before Prince and never caught on. Stuff like that happens late in the draft.
I'm not going to go through each point you made because it's just more arguing for the sake of it; I don't think Houston is all that poised for success in the future, you do. Howawrd seems broken-down and will limit what they can do for the next couple of years; hell they had to move a Omer Asik to make Howard happy, and I think Asik fits in better with what they wanted to do going forward on a cheaper contract. Lots of those rumors you heard about guys being "close" to being traded had a healthy bit of skepticism attached to them; for example, Kobe Bryant already pushed his way to LA from Charlotte; I had my doubts he would have been moved regardless of how mad Shaq was.
You love where Philly is trending; I see a team that will just keep playing scratch-offs and when they win will ignore the pile of discarded ones behind them. Free agency isn't about beating 30 teams for a guy; it's about beating the 4-5 teams with cap space and a need at that position. Detroit bet wrong with Gordon and Villinueva; that was pretty much a given when it happened. But that was Dumars trying to win with heaps of cap space to play with. That was him collecting bad contracts (Iverson's deal being cheaf amongst them) and then turning that money into better players; he just got bad ones. The teams you list who got it right are SA (a team that has been so ahead of the game, and lucky, that it has been virtually impossible to replicate), Cleveland (which got one of the 5 greatest players in history and haven't won a title with him, or looked particularly close, both times they've gotten to the finals), LAL and Miami, which benefit from geographic advantages Detroit and Philly don't enjoy.
My point is that I'm sure Philly will make a run at a title at some point in the future; it's practically inevitable. But if it takes them a decade to be even competent and then they only do so because some random event occurs that lands them, I don't know, Anthony Davis in a trade, I'm not going to count that as proof their method worked any more than a half-dozen otehr ones.
Detroit:
"that was Dumars trying to win with heaps of cap space to play with." To me, I see the same thing now with SVG/Jackson.
Philly:
I guess there is a legitimate point of contention here. I view Hill like I view Jackson - paying big for a free agents that has not won anything. I view Billups/Wallace like the bargain-hunting that Philly is looking for. I could see an argument that Philly would never sign a Billups, but I disagree and think that's the logical next step for them as some of these lottery picks turn the corner. I think they will make these sort of Billups-style signings at some point in between the asset-collection and pursuing max free agents. There should be an in-between year or two where they just try to get better like everyone else - the same way that the Rockets aggressively went after Jeremy Lin to steal him from the Knicks (though that felt as much about marketing as basketball).
You already see PHI value-minded approach in draft picks (Okafor, Embid, Saric). I see the Stauskas aquisition as evidence of grabbing a guy post-hype too (a la Billups). The point is that Philly recognizes you can't do it overnight and have to take risks in the pursuit of franchise players.
I don't love any single asset the sixers have but I think their approach is vastly superior to the Pistons/Bucks model.
Houston:
I can see the concerns about Howard/health but in 13-14 playoffs he and Aldrige went head to head in a pretty epic dual and played each other to a draw. They are both elite, is my point. This year it was DeAndre Jordon and Tyson Chandler he did battle with. Howard's still a force of nature and if the Rockets wanted to trade him to a contender they very much could. But I acknowledge that the health is worrisome and risky.
The rockets still have an eye for bargain and good talent. They completely knocked the 2015 draft out of the park IMO, for where they were drafting especially.
The Rockets have succeeded in finding superstars and then fine-tuning later. I would argue it's already worked (in that they are title contenders), but obviously they haven't won yet. With the Spurs and Cavs loading up it's not going to be easy. Not having the best player in the world never is. The sixers now that and are trying to get that guy (or as close as they can).
With Hill, though, that was a star player in the perfect sense Philly wants - he was from the draft, relatively young, and elite. But then he left and the Pistons lucked into Ben Wallace and Chucky Atkins and then Stackhouse took a step up that next year and the wheels were set in motion. Billups' stats were fine in Minny but he was still a flameout at 25 who certainly benefitted from playing with a young Kevin Garnett. There were questions about his signing; we just forget that because it worked out. Hamilton was an offense-only player that Detroit got cheaper because Jordan wanted to win in Washington and nobody threw themselves in front of that deal, but the Rip that won in Detroit wasn't completely there in Washington. It took some luck that he matured and the rest of the squad formed into such a solid nucleus. Prince was a good late-round selection but had some flaws in his game; I don't think he was grossly under-drafted at the time. Casey Jacobsen had been a dead-eye shooter who went a pick before Prince and never caught on. Stuff like that happens late in the draft.
I'm not going to go through each point you made because it's just more arguing for the sake of it; I don't think Houston is all that poised for success in the future, you do. Howawrd seems broken-down and will limit what they can do for the next couple of years; hell they had to move a Omer Asik to make Howard happy, and I think Asik fits in better with what they wanted to do going forward on a cheaper contract. Lots of those rumors you heard about guys being "close" to being traded had a healthy bit of skepticism attached to them; for example, Kobe Bryant already pushed his way to LA from Charlotte; I had my doubts he would have been moved regardless of how mad Shaq was.
You love where Philly is trending; I see a team that will just keep playing scratch-offs and when they win will ignore the pile of discarded ones behind them. Free agency isn't about beating 30 teams for a guy; it's about beating the 4-5 teams with cap space and a need at that position. Detroit bet wrong with Gordon and Villinueva; that was pretty much a given when it happened. But that was Dumars trying to win with heaps of cap space to play with. That was him collecting bad contracts (Iverson's deal being cheaf amongst them) and then turning that money into better players; he just got bad ones. The teams you list who got it right are SA (a team that has been so ahead of the game, and lucky, that it has been virtually impossible to replicate), Cleveland (which got one of the 5 greatest players in history and haven't won a title with him, or looked particularly close, both times they've gotten to the finals), LAL and Miami, which benefit from geographic advantages Detroit and Philly don't enjoy.
My point is that I'm sure Philly will make a run at a title at some point in the future; it's practically inevitable. But if it takes them a decade to be even competent and then they only do so because some random event occurs that lands them, I don't know, Anthony Davis in a trade, I'm not going to count that as proof their method worked any more than a half-dozen otehr ones.
Don't threadjack.
This post is about
More Than Just a Shooter™.
The past is the past. The Pistons have a legit max player in Drummond but have locked in a below average roster around him. They have no viable path to being a championship contender. The Sixers are trying to acquire multiple franchise players. The Pistons have one and they are done.
Obviously the Pistons are a better basketball team in 2015 - they are also farther away from contention because they have zero flexibility going forward.
The stockpile of young talent that the Sixers are putting together is going to be better than the Pistons within 3 years. Enjoy the ride Sixers fans.
You don't know that the 76ers have anything either. Nerlens Noel can't shoot a lick and has already missed a season due to injury... Then there's Joel Embiid just might be Greg Oden's younger (older?) brother. We'll have to see with Okafor but he's not going to be the biggest dude on the court every game anymore. Everything else is unproven or hot garbage. I'm staying away from the Sixers until they trade assets for a true superstar or actually draft one and that's not happening next year either.
If you consider Okafor's age and body composition, he very well may be the biggest guy on the court every game in the NBA as well in a couple years.
players at his position. Consider:
DeAndre Jordan, Andre Drummond, Dwight Howard, Marc Gasol, Steven Adams, Roy Hibbert, Al Jefferson, Boogie Cousins, Nikola Pekovic.
He's going to have to really try to move those guys
Okafor may outweight Adams by 40-50 pounds once he matures. Howard and Gasol will be retired when Okafor is in his prime. Hibbert might already be. Pekovic? You talkin bout Pekovic?
I appreciate that there are some big physical centers and Jordan and Drummond project very well over the next 5 years as Okafor evolves, but the OP is right to point out the limited number of guys who can contend with a 300 pound old school post threat.
The bigger issue for Okafor long-term is probably chasing around small-ball centers. Bogut became unplayable against the Cavs...
Sure, none of their guys could pan out just like Drummond might not pan out into being a true all-star either.
The difference is that they have flexibility while the Pistons have put their eggs all in one basket. The Sixers have 4 or 5 guys that could be all-stars and franchise cornerstones with plenty of room to sign additional max-level free agents down the road. The Pistons have 2 potential all-stars (counting Johnson) and very little flexibility.
Name the 4-5 guys who could be franchise cornerstones in Philly. Noel has potential to be a very solid defensive player and Okafor may be an offensive savant, but both struggle mightily on the other end of the court. I mean, Okafor's ceiling could well be Greg Monroe with slightly better offensive numbers, which isn't going to lead you to a title.
Okafor, Noel, Embid, Saric and (slides on Maize-colored glasses) Staus... oops they cracked under the pressure. OK, maybe it's only 3-4.
We can pick apart the games of these rookies but we can do the same for Johnson and Drummond (especially Drummond during his rookie year). Noel was a kid who dominated McGary in high school and he has the age/talent to absolutely evolve his offensive game into being a Chandler/Jordan type of PNR big.
It's obviously WAY to early to assert that Okafor won't be able to defend or say anything really significant about last year's lottery picks (which they now own 3 of counting Stauskas). Okafor's ceiling is far greater than Monroe's that is for sure.
It's true that there is no way to play all 3 of the bigs together in the modern NBA but the Sixers are smart to collect the best assets they can get now rather than trying to formulate a team when their ETA to contention is still at least 4 years away. It's the opposite approach of the Pistons, whose player personnel decisions focus on immediate fit/roles at the expense of long-term vision/value.
DeAndre Jordon just got a max level contract (which most analysts thinks is a huge bargain) with lots of teams clawing at each other to try to get him to sign without any skillset beyond finishing pick and rolls. If Noel is just that, it might be more than enough.The other guys were consensus lottery picks you are judging without having seen in the NBA. Stauskas is the only one who has played. If you want to argue he can't be considered a future all-star (potentially) anymore, I won't argue too strongly but the JJ Redick example is still out there.
The statistical models that translate euro to NBA success suggest Saric is a quality NBA starter. He's probably not Dirk, but he's probably better than Ilysova within 3 years (if they can get him signed). So, it's not entirely subjective.
RE: The 76ers plan - I can crap on the Pistons just as easily. Their approch has been tried again and again and again. They are following the status quo. Now "different" isn't necessarily "better" but at least they are trying for titles instead of playoff berths.
- The Pistons absolute best-case scenario is Jackson playing to a sub all-star level to pair with Johnson and Drummond. Their worst case scenario is being handicapped by very big contracts and either repeating the cycle of overpaying for mediocrity in free agency or waiting to tank.
- The Sixers best-case scenario is that the 5 lottery picks they have in 2015 all pan out, AND they add a couple of MAX-caliber all-stars to them over the next 3-4 years (not to mention supplementing with all their other picks they've been hording.) Their worst-case scenario is repeating the cycle.
It's true that either approach feasibly succeed or fail spectacularly. However, we have history to consider and one approach reminds you of the Houston Rockets. The other reminds you of the Sacramento Kings.
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You didn't see Harden there a few years ago either. They hoarded asset and put themselves in a position to steal an MVP-caliber player for an expiring contract, a few protected draft picks, and Jeremy Lamb.
They also got Dwight Howard to come -- a move the Pistons can not match because they will have tied up all their cap space with their current roster.
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What assets did the Rockets have 5 years ago? The Yao Ming injury/retirment was devastating, but they had some young pieces to build around. Nobody thought much of Lowry, Budinger, Carolle, Dragic, Budinger, Patterson, Thabeet, but they cycled through prospects always wheeling and dealing looking ahead until they landed the two franchise pieces they could build around.
They got Harden for a bunch of 'assets' and then got a max level player to play alongside him and now they are title contenders.
You get assets and don't commit to dumb contracts until you land legit franchise players - then you try to finish the job. If you take yourself out of the pool you have no chance. Overpaying and building around average-at-best talent just means you are taking yourself out of the title contending pool.
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Was what the Pistons ran out from 2009-2014 really much more enjoyable than a D-league team?
I think the sixers 5 lottery pick and massive inventory of picks is vastly superior to Kevin Martin, Jeremy Lamb, and draft picks that became Adams and McGary. I think it's more than what the Cavs gave up to get Love. The Sixers goal is not to trade for James Harden (who Houston will not trade under any circumstances), their goal is trade for a young player who will be the NEXT James Harden.
Drummond could be that MVP-level player. I agree the Sixers would trade any of their lottery picks for Drummond. That's literally the only advantage that Detroit has over other programs and as soon as he signs his max contract that goes from asset to ... maybe/maybe not an asset depending on how he develops.
The problem is that Jackson contract will be a drag on this franchise for the next 5 years, just as Hamilton, Gordon, and Smith were.
Philly's picks are definitely not more than the Cavs gave up (Wiggins) and even if they packaged then with Okafor and Saric right now, what would they get for that?
The Harden situation was pretty rare. Not many early 20s superstars on the trading block right now.
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I think we're just going to keep going in these circles because we have different opinions on the same facts, but here I'll go.
Jordan's contract still seems like a bad bet to me, with $20M a year for a guy who doesn't score a lot and is a good defender but not a truly elite one. Personally, I've never been in love with Noel's game, as he's not big/strong enough (yet) to be a consistent finisher around the rim and his range is pretty limited. I mean, he only finished aorund 61% of his shots at 3 feet or less from the rim; Jordan finished in the high 60s/70s% by comparison, and seems capable of slightly more range. How much of that was helped by Chris Paul and Griffin, though, remains to be seen.
Embiid hasn't played a game yet because he can't stay healthy. He couldn't stay healthy in college, couldn't stay healthy as a pro, and has the type of injuries that could absolutely be chronic (foot and back injuries). By all means keep beating the drum on his potential, but he hasn't played anything resemble orgnaized basketball in over a year, and there are questions if he'll be ready in 2015.
Stauskas as a Redick comp seems off to me. Stauskas was a better playmaker than Reddick in college but maybe not as great a shooter; people underrate what Reddick did in college because the numbers are more common now, but he was hitting 42% from 3 when that wasn't remotely common, with huge usage rates as well.
I'm all for Saric's game translating to the pros, but I've see enough of these guys not live up to that billing when they come over to view it with a healthy grain of salt. I suspect he'll be a competent NBA player, but I'm not ready to expect much more.
Everyone keeps bringing up Houston as an example of a team that "got it right." Well, what they've gotten right is getting James Harden because OKC had a bad read on their team's composition and then signed Howard to a big contract and got 75% of the player they probably expected to get, and he'll be on the books for 2 more years at around $23M/year. They have little cap flexibility and are stuck with a team that is absolutely behind 2-3 teams in the west with no chance to leapfrog them. And that's assuming Harden can repeat an MVP-like season one year after it looked like he might have been over his prime.
Again, we are holding different opinions of the future. I don't love what the Pistons are doing, but I'd rather them try to win now and maybe hope Jackson, Johnson, KCP, Drummond, etc. take a step up and you can attract a FA rather than just keep accumulating assets and hoping someone down the line wants to sign big money with you for the 1-2 year window you'll have before all those young guys become FAs and you have to start going through the same cap issues everyone else does.
The argument for Jordan and Jackson is essentially the same: They can be/are elite offensive players on the pick and roll, which makes their shooting and play-making limitations marginal concerns. The difference is that Jordan is also a beast on defense and Jackson is... not. Believe me, I'd feel a lot different if Jackson was an Eric Snow-level defender.
Re: Noel. Again, he was a rookie. You can't make final determination about these guys at this stage - look at how the entire non-Lebron editon of today's all-nba team did when they were rooks. Noel was in Embid's shoes last year. Nikola Mirotic was in Saric's. I don't think much of Stauskas' NBA prospects to be honest but whatever - kid can shoot and we'll see. Nobody thought much of the 2010-12 kids on the rockets and now half of them are making north of $10M/year.
The NBA got a lot smarter than 10 years ago but there's still a lot of opportunity. Teams still do dumb stuff - Reggie Jackson is an example of that (thunder gave him up for nothing, pistons oversigned him for way too much). The Knicks and Lakers and Kings are still out there doing stupid stuff. Teams who can feel a title like Cleveland are giving away people like Wiggins. Stuff happens....
The Rockets made the conference finals and Howard is STILL a bargain at the price. They did that with their franchise guys, Ariza, and a bunch of other guys they scraped together mid season. Don't forget they lost their starting PG and PF to injury. Are they better than the spurs or warriors? No. But you can expect them to keep improving, which they've done for 5 years now. They're entering the last (hardest) phase, but regardless of what happens they definitly 'got it right' in comparison to the Pistons and many other franchises to get where they got to relative to 5 years ago.
The problem with the pistons is that if "Jackson, Johnson, KCP, Drummond, etc. take a step" there won't be much room to "attract a FA".
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The Sixers got Embid, Okafor, and Noel through tanking but got Stauskas and Saric for nothing but unwasted salary cap space.
For the Pistons, the franchise turned the corner when Dumars decided not to sign Ben Wallace. That was the end of title contention. Despite noble attempts to keep it up and extend the run, Webber and McDyess types weren't up to being an all-star caliber player like Wallace was. Once that was clear it was time to embrace rebuilding. That was a looooong time ago now and instead of doing that, what we've seen is consistent attempts towards mediocrity.
The Pistons were blessed to have quality players like Knight, Monroe, and Drummond fall to them in the draft, and even with that their free agency spending bound them up. Then they try to undo the mess later. It's not like it's hard to see this coming. The Hamilton, Prince, Villanueva, Gordon, Smith signings were all immediately criticized just like the Jackson signing is now.
The Pistons problem hasn't been drafting talent, it's everything else. They needed to trade Monroe when he had value and it was clear they were still years away from contending. They just gave a max contract to guy who is AT BEST an average PG but hasn't even proved he's that yet, and they did it without there even being a discernible market for his services. Instead of trading Knight for assets they downgraded to an inferior and more expensive verson of him (in Jackson).
Given that the Pistons aren't going to attract elite franchise free agents they either have to build through the draft, make shrewd trades, or both. They need to go on a hot streaks of smart moves just like they did in 2001-2005. But you have to have flexibility to do that and the Pistons are throwing theirs away for the sake of being semi-relevant right now. It's short-sighted and obviously misguided.
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Sixers: Chance of being awful, chance of winning a title.
Pistons: Chance of being pretty (but not quite) as awful, no chance of winning a title.
One the Pistons sign Drummond (and KCP, I"m sure) they will not have the cap space to add another elite player to their core. They will be stuck drafting outside of the lottery hoping they can find a Tayshaun Prince.
Again, I would point you to the 2010-11 Rockets who had about 10 guys who were in their first 2 years in the league and a ton of cap flexibility. Everybody could knock the guys they had accumulated but many of them are now very good players (e.g., Lowry, Dragic, Parsons, Carrolle.) Most are gone now, but the endless cycle of asset accumulation paid off.
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That's just flat-out not true.
The Sixers can sign or trade for a better PG for less than what the Pistons just paid Jackson for. Setback or no, they can trade Embid for a Ty Lawson or Eric Bledsoe caliber PG. Doing so now would be dumb, but if they wanted to they could. Actually that might be a great place for Jennings to sign next off-season and he might be a better PG than Jackson.
KCP and Johnson are late lottery picks. They are on par with Saric and Stauskas in value. We can quibble about proven production and contract cost/benefit, but objectively speaking we are talking about players who a lot of teams passed on and have little chance of being all-stars.
The Pistons have a big advantage in Drummond vs Okafor IMO, but that view could change by the end of the season and Okafor will be far cheaper. No one would blink if that one for one swap was made (i.e., their values are similar)
The rest of it -- Philly has a boatload of draft picks and cap space while the Pistons have Reggie Jackson, Aron Baynes, Marcus Morris and a handful of expiring contracts for overpaid players people dumped or want to dump. I know what I'd rather have.
You think Jennings, Bledsoe, or Lawson is the superstar player Philly needs to land to become a title contender?
Again, you keep referencing a Rockets team who just made a fluky run to a 5 game WCF exit and isn't even a top 3 team in their conference next year. That's your best case scenario?
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Embid stock may have slipped a bit with the setback but you're talking about a #3 pick in last years draft. The #9 pick just got traded for Nick Batum - who is an above average SF (whereas Jackson is a below average PG) - after a lackluster first year.
The Nuggets would surely love to offload Lawson for any reasonable package of assets. Bledsoe would be much harder to get since the Suns want to win now, but Embid's a guy that a lot of rebuilding teams would love to get their hands on.
If the Sixers were interested in winning this year they could get quite a haul for Embid. If they could prove Embid was healthy, the Warriors would probably not say no if the Sixers asked for David Lee and Harrison Barnes. Big IF, I know... but you get the point.