Fair enough but the point that I and others (I think) were trying to make is that in the modern NBA, the lines have really blurred between who is a primary ball handler and who isn't. You will certainly see more than a few possessions tonight where Durant brings the ball up the floor and Curry is playing off of it. Ideally any NBA team has multiple players who can initiate offense depending on the situation.
I'm probably giving the impression that I think this is a bigger issue than I really do. I liked the trade for them at the time, I really like Fultz as a prospect, and the past two months haven't done too much to change my opinion of him. My main point is that a big part of what makes Fultz such a good prospect is that a team could just hand him the keys to their offense and let him run the show, but that may not be as valuable to a team that has a guy like Simmons than it would be to, say, the Knicks. Part of this is coming from just how impressed I've been with Simmons- if I'm the Sixers, I want him setting up the offense whenever he's on the court. The college version of Fultz could certainly still bring a ton of value to Philly, even if he's playing off-ball 40% of the time, I just haven't really seen him play off-ball much because he's so good with the ball in his hands that he has rarely been asked to do it.
If that happens, you just have Embiid or Redick or whoever bring the ball up and Simmons has a huge, huge size advantage in the post on those dudes
I don't think you can "hold" on an injured player. An injury is always a bad sign for a player's prospects. Embiid and Griffin are exceptions to the rule.
This. Part of why I thought Fultz would be a fit with the Celtics (back in the old pre-draft days before Tatum, Hayward, and Kyrie) was because he was a guy who ought to be able to play with or without the ball. His issues aside, there is no good reason to think he wouldn't be a fit with the Sixers and Ben Simmons. And we have no idea what to make of his issues yet - they may have no long term impact on him at all.
That's the bit. I think we can hold on him given that it s 15 games into his career and there is no indication that this is serious. If this mid november turns into mid march... then we can reassess the severity.
Completely disagree. Both Simmons and fultz show off ball instincts. Simmons as the roll man in PNR with fultz. Simmons is a weapon in transition and that two man game with embiid is fire.
Well no because Covington is one of the best 3&D players in the league and just got extended. For now Covington is better than Tatum. Tatum may end up better long term of course.
Yeah this basically. But it's more than that.
For sure possible, but Paul George would be a good fit too if he didn't go to LA
With the Covington extension finalized, Spotrac has them at ~66.6 for 9 players guaranteed. That's if they renounce Redick, Johnson and Stauskas and decline the options on Holmes and McConnell. Assuming they get the Lakers pick and it's no worse than 9th, that's at least another $3.6m cap hold; their own pick will likely be another $2-2.5m unless they stash him. An incomplete roster charge of .582 brings the total to ~$73m.
There's also okafor who will be gone.
That was the conclusion I came to as well, move Bayless' expiring deal as he's pretty expendable if Fultz is playing 30 a night; I'm not sure if they'd need to include a pick, he has value as a rotation guard and his contract is cheap.
I wouldn't want to be the one paying him depending on how much he gets and because of his injury history, but Tyreke Evans is having quite the comeback year and may come relatively cheap.
I think Fultz is close to a perfect fit with the Sixers. With that said, Dario Saric is playing over 27 minutes a game for you guys. They would have room for Tatum.
That is true but that is with the injuries to Fultz and Bayless he's been pretty bad so far.
I think it's basically impossible to worry that your otherwise totally dominant center may not also be a knockdown three-point shooter. This is like asking if Cavs fans were worried about LeBron's free throw shooting.
Even less worrisome. Lebron can't abandon the FT entirely. If Embiid actually is terrible at 3's, he can just never shoot them and still be amazing.
Not if he's playing with Ben Simmons.
I don't think there's a problem with his 3-point shooting. He missed his first ten, including 0-6 against the Celtics. He's shot 33% since then.
His fundamentals also point to the 3 being fine long-term: he's a decent to good FT shooter with a good mid-range touch. The 3 isn't critical for his game, but I'd happily bet on him being over 35% in a year or two.
The Clippers pick will carry 4 years of cost control on a rookie contract while Holmes will be a UFA following next season. That is the type of trade that Ainge would nor should never make.
According to Agent Bill Duffy the asking price has gone from two #1's to one #1 and a good player to the current price of a 2nd rounder with nobody willing to bite. At this point it seems that Colangelo is holding onto Okafor as salary filler in a multi-player deal by Feb 9th. After that a buyout would seem likely.
I was talking about Richaun Holmes, not Okafor? I was also referring to the fact that the Clippers pick is protected 1-14 in 2019 and 2020 and if it doesn't convey by 2020, it turns into a 2nd round pick in 2022.
Nice—I’ve been trying to articulate something like this for awhile, but as a relative newbie to the “new NBA” I wasn’t sure I might not be missing something.
Last 10 games:
Covington back to being...Covington. Still some regression to the mean left shooting percentage-wise for him, too.
