RedDawg#8

I love how Quin has come in and said we need to change this roster to put size, length and shooting around Trae. 21-22 season - We trade Cam for Knox and a pick. Cam is 6-8, with a 7 foot wingspan, defense and shooting, and some ball handling. 22 offseason - We trade Kev for J holiday and a pick, Kev is a 6-7 floor spacing SG. 6-7 is taller than our entire PF rotation this year not named JJ. 23 offseason - we trade JC for a TPE, which we wont use. JC is 6-9+ PF, solid role player. We have no PF on the roster when JJ went down. Cam asked for a trade, so I'm not mad a the decision, but the return was awful. The return on each of those trades was below the value that we had for those players. And here we sit thinking that we are going to win ANY trades with the roster we have left. Needless to say, all of this to find player that can fit next to Trae when WE ALREADY HAD THOSE PLAYERS IN OUR POSSESSION AND GAVE THEM AWAY FOR SALARY CAP RELIEF. We have no path forward as we are stuck with players and contracts nobody wants, and the one player of value can only net us more picks and cap relief. What the hell is this franchise.

I feel you, but that’s why the fan vote is so important. Unless the players and coaches are on the exact page about who the (2) best guards in the East are, they are likely just splitting votes against each other. There is no consensus name that is being overly screwed in the fan vote for them to rally behind either. Maxey, Brunson, Dame, Spida, are each equally deserving. The New England market alone will push Derrick White and Brown to both make it which will sacrifice votes from the other guys. In the end, if Trae stays as the #2 fan vote guard, it’s extremely hard to supplant him in a year with so many other options to choose from vs 1 or 2 strong and obvious candidates.

Google search Herb Jones and every one and their mama are chomping at the bit right now to get him after this article. Going to be a ton of competition for his services.

Orlando is 23rd in offensive rating (112.2) Miami is 20th (113.8) We held Orlando to 104, with Trae.(-8.2) We held Miami to 108, without (-5.8) I don’t think discrediting Orlando is the best way to make your point in this case. Even if you add in the 2.5 point spread for being home vs away then it was an identical defensive impact on both teams with or without DJ at PG, or Trae in the lineup. The truth is that Quinn has made schematic adjustments after we got embarrassed by the Wizards, and we are playing to the strengths of our bigs in drop as well as masking the weaknesses of Bey and Bogi who get routinely killed on backdoor cuts. There is a 3 game sample size of us playing better defense and winning, and 2 of those games include Trae Young at PG. Let’s let things play out a bit longer before making conclusions about our defensive ceiling with our new approach. After all, we were playing half decent defense in October and early November. Not to mention, your boy hasn’t even played a game since JJ has been back in the lineup. I’m sure his otherworldly impact is going to do wonders for our defensive potential compared to having Bey in the starting lineup.

Has nothing to do with playing more zone and drop coverage to eliminate the backcuts that have been our achilles heel, Im sure. It’s only Trae’s absence. Even though the defense gave up even less points the previous 2 games (99, 104) with him in the lineup. So is it Trae or is it a strategy adjustment?

Just want to pat myself on the back real quick. Things always feel different when you win.

Shhhh, don’t tell him. Let him work his agenda lol

Congrats to Udonis Haslem, now hold this “L” my guy.

So, what are we thinking now? Hold DJ until summer when we can revisit the KAT stuff? Make a couple of mid level moves to get off contracts in the interim?

Yesterday’s price is NOT today’s price !!!

Yesterday’s price is not today’s price

Was thinking this same thing. There shouldn’t be any excuse for lack of offense or defense production at his natural position tonight.

KAT about to be the new Siakam on these boards. He WILL get traded Im sure, but not to Atlanta.

We have always been an offensive engine with Trae. We have always struggled on defense. Yet somehow we look worse at both aspects under Quinn. Im more disappointed in our defensive output. We have outright fallen off a cliff even after starting the season off pretty solid on that end. It is very obvious to me that whatever the issue is with our personnel, Quin has dug in and said no, he will not change his approach to help the talent on this roster just to win games now. My issue is he is very clearly sacrificing wins and loses for some bigger vision that nobody but he, LF and Trae can see, apparently. I don’t think he is a bad coach. He is definitely coming across as a stubborn one though.

I will say this, historically speaking, “Weak Drafts” are typically the drafts you find superstars in the late lottery and 2nd round. Weak drafts are weak because there isn’t an easy choice at the top. There isn’t a Lebron, Wemby or Zion type of hype on a guy. But in those drafts, if you do your scouting correctly, that’s when you find your Giannis’ at 13, Jokic’s in round 2, Draymonds, DJMs, McCollums, Millsaps, etc…. There is always talent to be had, it’s just not obvious in a weak draft class. Somebody has to get drafted early, and those guys are typically overrated. And someone has to get drafted later, and those players are severely underrated in years like this.

6’4 is not small for a SG. You have 6’4 guys playing full time at SF these days; Josh Hart, Bruce Brown, JaeSean Tate. Isiah (6’1), Dumars (6’3) and Vinny Johnson (6’2) showed you can win with small guards on the floor together. We have to stop getting stuck on inches and pay attention to toughness and mindset. A guy can have size and still play small and vice versa. Hell, Bey has size. Whoever is playing with Trae needs to be aggressive and tough. We thought DJ was that kind of dude. We lack that mindset more than any thing else.

Lakers don’t have real assets. They really just need to stop all the cap with these trade rumors. edit: Lakers don’t have real assets THAT THEY ARE WILLING TO TRADE.

I wasn’t bragging by any means and yes that is exactly what it was like lol I was moreso just trying to use a first hand example and that’s all I had to go off of lol

I agree that Trae has to be smarter in his approach with the refs. For instance, when I coached our intramural team, we blatantly were getting hacked with no calls from the refs. Our best players were arguing for calls to no avail. At one point I shouted to OUR team loud enough for the refs to hear “Stop arguing calls, just play, they are not calling fouls for us tonight, the whistle is not coming, so just play through it!!” To which everyone could feel the sentiment. I was not speaking to an official, I didn’t go after anyone directly, but the refs knew I was not happy. The very next trip down we got whistle in our favor. It’s like, they needed the wake up call too. The lead ref came to me and apologized later saying he missed some calls. I was frustrated, I was heated, our team was emotional, and even though I was being passive aggressive, I made my point without escalating the situation. Trae has to learn how to voice his frustrations without attacking anyone directly. These refs are sensitive divas too. You have to hold their hand and protect their egos too. The best thing Trae could do honestly is every time there is a BS call or no-call against him is show the ref his back. Don’t say anything, just look away. No gestures or words. Don’t give them any attention. Go to a teammate and chat through the next play or assignment. The refs will get the same effect. They will feel frozen out. But you can’t get a “T” for ignoring. Next time you speak you keep it short. “Great game”, walk away. They would get the message and honestly feel worse at some point to where they are like aight, Let me try something else to get attention from him.

Losing dictates the direction. Getting blown out by Washington and San Antonio in 6 of the last 8 quarters makes the decision easy. Two tanking teams that are both 7-32 have had their way with us. This is not a “put a band aid on it” roster. We are very clearly out classed by teams 1-8 in the East. If the Play-In didn’t exist we would be so clearly a lottery team already while TRYING to win games. We are losing games without trying to lose on purpose. That tells you all you need to know. No need to sugar coat the situation any longer. What is worse, telling Trae that we are going to make some hard moves to put us in a better situation long term to win a championship OR that a 16-23 team in 11th place is a Pascal Siakam away from being a title contender this season? Trae has to understand the reality of the situation. There are no more short cuts left on the table. Either we bite the bullet and fix real problems, or we keep pretending everything will work itself out and regress for the 3rd, 4th consecutive season and he leaves anyway.

I understand anyone who is against a rebuild. I dont need to repeat any of those points as they are all valid. But the point that is getting lost is that we are already losing NOW while we thought we were built to win. That is a huge problem. Looking at the company we are keeping in the standings, we are next to teams in similar situations (Bulls, Raps, Nets) who all overvalued their players and the product on the court doesn’t match the expectations of the fans or front office. We can keep telling ourselves we are one big time move away but it will just delay the inevitable. It is better to make the hard decisions now and maximize value/return for your (underachieving) assets with hopes of getting the right pieces in place. I don’t think it can happen by keeping a bunch of drafted players, but if we can use resources to acquire skilled veterans that fit the profile of what Trae needs then it can work. There is just too much money tied up in a losing roster that is trending downward by the day. Whether you want to rebuild or not, we are a BAD team either way. Might as well be smart about it if you’re still going to lose games. I don’t thing swinging big is going to work, not unless we get lucky again with another player who demands to play with Trae like DJ did. Trae and JJ are your centerpieces. Soth already explained the vision with building around these two. There is no 3rd star magically appearing, bit damnit if we can’t at least find size, length, IQ, and some hustle, you can do worse than a walking 30-10 PG and a stat stuffing forward as your starting point.

Everything that came out from that time said that Luka was top of our board and we would have been fine keeping him, and that Trae was right there as well. The only motivation for the trade (beyond Quavo telling the FO Trae would be a better fit for the city) was ironically Schlenk’s school of thought that he wanted more swings at the plate to find talent. He valued that extra first round pick more than he valued Luka. So if we believe this then Luka would have been the pick without the additional pick offered from Dallas. This a a reminder to those that are asset seekers, that having a bunch of picks will always pale in comparison to finding one legit premium talent. With all of our draft picks from that rebuild we are sitting here with Trae and Jalen as our (2) cornerstones moving forward. That’s the gamble of relying on the draft.

Proof that size and length do not equal basketball talent/skill.

This. If we’re moving Dre or AJ for him that’s one thing. But for DJ? Nah

I HATEA playing against Rick Carlisle teams. He calls quick timeouts to stop any kind of momentum and he has consistently ran bodies at Trae at halfcourt to get him off the ball and disrupt our offensive rhythm. It’s always an awkward, herky jerky game flow against his teams. Not so much trapping tonight but it’s coming.