wutang112878 said:I know its way too early to think this way, but in my dream world the Celts continue to struggle as do the Nets who also have a major injury and we are looking at 2 really good picks in the draft!
If the former is true, why would the Hawks not be looking to upgrade at PG with Rondo?nighthob said:The Hawks are a pretty good team. I'm not sure how anyone ever got it into their heads that they weren't. They brought back last year's team while trading defense for offense (swapping out Smith for Millsap), while Jeff Teague has continued to improve. They may not be a title contender, but they're pretty clearly a 46-48 win team. In fact, the worst aspect of the Hawks has been Teague's play so far, otherwise they might have been the sort of team that would have been willing to trade for Rondo.
fairlee76 said:If the former is true, why would the Hawks not be looking to upgrade at PG with Rondo?
The four game winning streak was cute and all, but I vastly prefer tuning in and hearing that the 2013-14 Celtics are down by 24 at the half.
Right, I totally forgot about Schroder. From the scouting reports I read, he sounded a lot like a young version of Rondo.Grin&MartyBarret said:
They did just draft a PG. At the very least, I'm sure they're going to take some time to figure out what they have in him before they trade for a PG that needs to be paid shortly.
The Hawks weren't ever looking to tank. If Teague was still just above average then they might certainly have been willing to make a deal for Rondo . But Teague has taken his play up another notch so far, so they're out of the market. What Atlanta's owners want is profitable respectability (because they're selling the team).fairlee76 said:If the former is true, why would the Hawks not be looking to upgrade at PG with Rondo?
Eddie Jurak said:Celtics are now 6-10. That puts them 12th in the league - right on the edge of making the playoffs.
If Rondo comes back, that makes them a better team.
Barring some key injuries or Danny finding a way to unload some parts for future value, this looks like a team with a better shot of going "one and done" in the playoffs than of finishing badly enough to have a shot at one of the top players.
It's truly a bummer that we don't have the Nets' pick THIS YEAR.
It's OK as a fan because as fans we have no control over the outcome. It's not OK on the part of management. They should have a plan, and the plan should include figuring out a way to scoop up some of the very best talent in the draft. Danny's intentions in this regard may have been revealed last week when he was on the radio and said, essentially, that this year's draft class is OK but not as great as people are making it out to be. So maybe he doesn't think it's worth tanking for. But if not now, when, Danny?cardiacs said:Is it OK, as a fan, to be fine with any outcome at this stage? I think Danny deserves the benefit of the doubt at the point, even if we don't get a lottery pick.
I'm enjoying following the team with the mindset that this is a full-season of pre-season games - winning doesn't matter but it's ok if they do.
Koufax said:Danny's intentions in this regard may have been revealed last week when he was on the radio and said, essentially, that this year's draft class is OK but not as great as people are making it out to be. So maybe he doesn't think it's worth tanking for. But if not now, when, Danny?
Yes, in my opinion.Eddie Jurak said:Did Danny err by not drafting the Greek kid?
He has "actual talent." IMHO folks often confuse athleticism and the ability of individual players to make plays in isolation as "talent." But knowing how to play 5 on 5 basketball is also a talent: running the offense, defensive positioning, making the right pass, taking the right shots, boxing out, etc. It's still a team game.NHbeau said:......but I really thought he'd need some actual talent before he started winning games.
NHbeau said:I'm not that astute an NBA fan. That said looking at this roster I have no clue how they are winning games. Is Steven's that good of a coach? I realize his calling card is taking "mid major" talent and winning, but damn. This isn't the NCAA, and admittedly the East is the definition of terrible but I really thought he'd need some actual talent before he started winning games. 8-12 is a unmitigated disaster if tanking is the goal.
Brickowski said:He has "actual talent." IMHO folks often confuse athleticism and the ability of individual players to make plays in isolation as "talent." But knowing how to play 5 on 5 basketball is also a talent: running the offense, defensive positioning, making the right pass, taking the right shots, boxing out, etc. It's still a team game.
Yes, that's a huge factor. If this Celtics team could shoot, they'd be 12-8 instead of 8-12.Devizier said:
For me, it comes down to shooting. That's the most important skill in the game, and the Celtics are pretty bad at that, ranking 20th in the league in eFG%.
Yes, there are some decent teams that don't shoot that well (Minnesota, Chicago) but most of the poor shooting teams in the league are also dregs: Cleveland, Milwaukee, Utah, New York...
nighthob said:
So Crawford has really improved their defense just by virtue of being able, and willing, to defend the SG spot. Crawford is rapidly shedding his reputation as an indifferent defender and pushing his trade value into net positive territory.
If this Celtics team could shoot, they'd be traded.Brickowski said:Yes, that's a huge factor. If this Celtics team could shoot, they'd be 12-8 instead of 8-12.
Not necessarily.Blacken said:If this Celtics team could shoot, they'd be traded.
He becomes a bench player, a very capable combo guard.wade boggs chicken dinner said:
P.S. edit: Crawford seems to be doing well with the ball in his hand. What happens to him when Rondo comes back?
We can also search for solutions, and there are lots of folks in the league office and among the 30 teams who find tanking abhorrent — who bristle at the idea that the league has incentivized teams to be anything but their best every single season. One detailed proposal, submitted by a team official, has gained initial traction among some high-level NBA officials — to the point that the NBA may float the proposal to owners sometime in 2014, according to league sources. Other top officials in the league office have expressed early opposition to the proposal, sources say.
The Proposal
Grantland obtained a copy of the proposal, which would eliminate the draft lottery entirely and replace it with a system in which each of the 30 teams would pick in a specific first-round draft slot once — and exactly once — every 30 years. Each team would simply cycle through the 30 draft slots, year by year, in a predetermined order designed so that teams pick in different areas of the draft each year. Teams would know with 100 percent certainty in which draft slots they would pick every year, up to 30 years out from the start of every 30-year cycle. The practice of protecting picks would disappear; there would never be a Harrison Barnes–Golden State situation again, and it wouldn’t require a law degree to track ownership of every traded pick leaguewide.
The system is simpler to understand in pictorial form. Below is the wheel that outlines the order in which each team would cycle through the draft slots; the graphic highlights the top six slots in red to show that every team would be guaranteed one top-six pick every five seasons, and at least one top-12 pick in every four-year span:
Put another way: The team that gets the no. 1 pick in the very first year of this proposed system would draft in the following slots over the system's first six seasons: 1st, 30th, 19th, 18th, 7th, 6th. Just follow the wheel around clockwise to see the entire 30-year pick cycle of each team, depending on their starting spoke in Year 1.
The system is designed to eliminate the link between being very bad and getting a high draft pick. There is no benefit at all to being bad under a wheel system like this. If you believe tanking is morally wrong, or that it hurts business by alienating fans and cutting into attendance, this is a system you could get behind.
ConigliarosPotential said:Why is tanking a "phantom problem"? The whole premise of professional sports is that you pit two teams against one another who are both trying to win; if a system rewards you for trying not to win now in the hope of winning in the future, that's surely a huge deal, isn't it?
moly99 said:Look at the Suns, Celtics, Sixers, etc. The front office personnel of the teams don't want to win, but the players and coaches do.
ConigliarosPotential said:Apart from the fact that I think sometimes the coaches are in on the secret and are encouraged not to do their utmost to win every game...why should we ever want anyone, especially including the front office management responsible for giving coaches the players they get to use, to not want to win? Wouldn't it be better if all 30 teams were always incentivised to assemble the strongest teams they possibly could?
Jungleland said:This "wheel" is such a hideously terrible idea that it's terrifying it's even being suggested. The lottery system both gives bad teams hope for the future as well as aids in balancing the good free agent destination cities with teams in places superstars are less inclined to sign in.
Think people hate the WWE-ification of the NBA now? Keep the current free agent/contract/salary cap system and then make it possible for the champs to have the number 1 pick through no wheeling and dealing or managerial skill of their own. Incredibly simple way to make the sport a laughingstock.
ConigliarosPotential said:Why is tanking a "phantom problem"? The whole premise of professional sports is that you pit two teams against one another who are both trying to win; if a system rewards you for trying not to win now in the hope of winning in the future, that's surely a huge deal, isn't it?
Sadly, the promotion/relegation concept - and surely the best incentive not to tank is to be threatened with expulsion from your league - will never work in American sports for any number of reasons, but I wonder if you could apply a variation on that concept to the NBA, like this: if you are one of the bottom three teams in the league, you don't get any ping-pong balls in the lottery. Period. The worst teams draft 4th, 5th and 6th, but you have to try at least a bit to not be completely rubbish to have a chance at one of the top three picks. (Heck, I would even consider giving the ping-pong balls from those three teams to any three random teams which make the playoffs but aren't good enough to get home court advantage in the first round, so as to incentivise middling teams to always reach for the playoffs rather than fading into the lottery.)
I feel someone has mentioned this here previously, but there's a very simple solution this problem: make all players draft eligible after one year in college, and if they decide not to go pro, the team that drafted them retains their rights. That way the draft pool is set in stone, and there's no way players can wiggle around it to try and go to a specific team. Problem solved.CSteinhardt said:A major problem with the wheel idea is that basically all top draft choice have multiple seasons when they could enter the draft. If you're the best freshman in college, Milwaukee's picking first this year, and L.A.'s picking first next year, is it worth spending another year on campus to get to spend your career in L.A.? This effect already exists with free agents, but with a predictable draft order, you'd be making it even harder for teams in undesirable markets to acquire talent.
Scoops Bolling said:I feel someone has mentioned this here previously, but there's a very simple solution this problem: make all players draft eligible after one year in college, and if they decide not to go pro, the team that drafted them retains their rights. That way the draft pool is set in stone, and there's no way players can wiggle around it to try and go to a specific team. Problem solved.