In re all the Kawhi talk, how much of this is a black mark on Popovich? Both in re alienating Kawhi and then not getting great value for him? Pops is one of the all-time greats and this doesn't change it, but...even the greats have black marks and this one it seems to me is a pretty big one.
I don’t know how much if any of this is on Pop. The issues Team Kawhi had was with the medical diagnosis and medical people for the Spurs. I’m guessing that would fall more under Buford’s watch than Pop’s although not certain of their management infrastructure in SA to say that definitively.
Let’s not forget that Kawhi is still damgaed goods despite his performance in these playoffs and is still a FA in another couple of weeks (or sooner). He sat for 22 games this year to protect his knee and is now is hobbling around on one leg while clearly not at 100% especially defensively.
Also, in re Jaylen having more value last year than this -- sure. But that's the job of Ainge just as it's on the Lakers that they overrated their young guys (and other examples of the same sort of overrating by teams of their own kids are noted above): we're chat board slobs, a guy like Ainge needs to have gone all in on Leonard and it's on him if he overrated Brown/underrated Leonard or some combo of the two. Fair or not, that's the way a GM has to be judged ...not to say there's a lot of inevitable uncertainty in making such calls.
That isn’t how the Laker GM can be judged because a title doesn’t necessarily mean you have the final say......in many organizations they don’t and LA is one example.
Going back to infrastructure.....who were the Lakers decision makers? Buss, Pelinka, Magic, LeBron, Rich Paul, Kurt Rambis, Mrs Rambis, Walton, any of a slew of others?
They overrated the guys they kept and underrated the guys they let go in Randle and Russell but we don’t know who made these calls. It’s a complete cluster of an organiation right now thanks to Buss’ lack of leadership.