Official 2017 NBA Off Season Thread

[Al Bundy]

Sources: Charlotte is sending Miles Plumlee, Marco Belenelli and 41st pick to Atlanta for Dwight Howard and 31st pick.

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojVerticalNBA) June 21, 2017

The Celtics and 76ers have agreed to a trade that will send the #1 pick to Philly, who plan on drafting Markelle Fultz (@daldridgetnt)

— NBA Central (@TheNBACentral) June 18, 2017

The draft is June 22nd.

[KC_Connection]

Wiggins has been pretty bad in his first three years. Don't watch him enough to know how soon/whether that will change, but he certainly doesn't look like a star right now.

[RealSNR]

Originally Posted by KC_Connection

Wiggins has been pretty bad in his first three years. Don't watch him enough to know how soon/whether that will change, but he certainly doesn't look like a star right now.

"Pretty bad"

Anthony Bennett was pretty bad. Derrick Williams was pretty bad. And if you don't mind, Dion Waiters was pretty ****ing bad.

There are far better players in the NBA (and now on the Wolves), but a guy who puts up at least 20/game each season is hardly "pretty bad." Underwhelming for what was expected of him? Sure, but get the **** out of here like Wiggins is some Michael Olowokandi mother****er.

[dirk digler]

I don't get why Irving wants to be traded. He takes as many shots as he wants, he handles the ball as much as he wants, he goes to the Finals the last 3 years and wins 1 championship, makes millions of dollars yet he wants to go to the ****ing Knicks or Wolves and suck and never win shit again?

How stupid is he? Hasn't he seen his -12.8 net rating when Lebron is off the court and he is running the show? ****ing idiot...

[KC_Connection]

Originally Posted by RealSNR

"Pretty bad"

Anthony Bennett was pretty bad. Derrick Williams was pretty bad. And if you don't mind, Dion Waiters was pretty ****ing bad.

There are far better players in the NBA (and now on the Wolves), but a guy who puts up at least 20/game each season is hardly "pretty bad." Underwhelming for what was expected of him? Sure, but get the **** out of here like Wiggins is some Michael Olowokandi mother****er.

Volume scorers who do literally nothing else on court (he's a pitiful defender still too) don't count for much anymore. Ceiling these days looks much more like DeMar DeRozan than Tracy McGrady.

[KC_Connection]

Originally Posted by dirk digler

I don't get why Irving wants to be traded. He takes as many shots as he wants, he handles the ball as much as he wants, he goes to the Finals the last 3 years and wins 1 championship, makes millions of dollars yet he wants to go to the ****ing Knicks or Wolves and suck and never win shit again?

How stupid is he? Hasn't he seen his -12.8 net rating when Lebron is off the court and he is running the show? ****ing idiot...

If he really hates being a #2, you'd think he'd just wait this year out. LeBron is out of there this time next year.

[dirk digler]

Originally Posted by KC_Connection

If he really hates being a #2, you'd think he'd just wait this year out. LeBron is out of there this time next year.

Exactly. Makes zero sense.

Good news for Cavs fans it doesn't seem like they want to move him anytime soon so he is going to have to kiss and make up with Lebron. Oh the horror of going to another Finals.

[RealSNR]

Originally Posted by KC_Connection

Volume scorers who do literally nothing else on court (he's a pitiful defender still too) don't count for much anymore. Ceiling these days looks much more like DeMar DeRozan than Tracy McGrady.

He's not a terrible player. He's flawed defensively, but remember when everybody bitched their head off about the Love trade because the Cavs were getting rid of a guy who could "come in and play good wing defense off the bench?" He's only had 3 years in the league, 3 different coaches, and two years where he was immediately thrust into the lineup as THE guy. It's like a QB getting drafted by a shitty team who goes through bouts of franchise instability, and while he puts up pretty decent stats and hasn't lost the knack for showing off why a team drafted him in the first place, he has the knack of being a loser on a loser team.

If everybody thought he was a defense-first player who would slowly integrate better scoring into his toolbox as a player, he's still got the ability to do that, I'd say, particularly with the solid surrounding defense-friendly environment he'll be playing in if he doesn't get traded.

If after this year he's still losing the handle at inopportune times, making dumb jumpshot choices, and ranking near the bottom in defense rankings after this season, then sure. Call him a bust if you want.

[Miles]

Wiggins as as underwhelming or disappointing so far is quite fair but terrible is not with only 3 years in.

[Miles]

Originally Posted by dirk digler

Exactly. Makes zero sense.

Good news for Cavs fans it doesn't seem like they want to move him anytime soon so he is going to have to kiss and make up with Lebron. Oh the horror of going to another Finals.

Yeah the whole thing is weird though could just be as simple as doesn't get along well with Lebron. Kyrie - Earth is maybe flat - is maybe not the the sharpest guy either.

[-King-]

Originally Posted by dirk digler

I don't get why Irving wants to be traded. He takes as many shots as he wants, he handles the ball as much as he wants, he goes to the Finals the last 3 years and wins 1 championship, makes millions of dollars yet he wants to go to the ****ing Knicks or Wolves and suck and never win shit again?

How stupid is he? Hasn't he seen his -12.8 net rating when Lebron is off the court and he is running the show? ****ing idiot...

Maybe he wants to go to a team that isn't ran by one player?

You think it's all Kyrie's fault that the team sucks when LeBron is off the court?
Posted via Mobile Device

[-King-]

Originally Posted by KC_Connection

If he really hates being a #2, you'd think he'd just wait this year out. LeBron is out of there this time next year.

Why would any player want to stay in Cleveland? I'd want to leave too regardless of what LeBron does.
Posted via Mobile Device

[-King-]

The same people mad at Kyrie for leaving a winning team where he's a second option to go try to lead a team on his own are the same people mad at Durant for leaving a team he was leading to be a second option in order to win.

It's quite amusing really.
Posted via Mobile Device

[Miles]

Originally Posted by -King-

The same people mad at Kyrie for leaving a winning team where he's a second option to go try to lead a team on his own are the same people mad at Durant for leaving a team he was leading to be a second option in order to win.

It's quite amusing really.
Posted via Mobile Device

That approach seemed to have mostly gone away back when Lebron formed up the Miami super team.

[staylor26]

Originally Posted by -King-

The same people mad at Kyrie for leaving a winning team where he's a second option to go try to lead a team on his own are the same people mad at Durant for leaving a team he was leading to be a second option in order to win.

It's quite amusing really.
Posted via Mobile Device

It's definitely hypocrisy.

But a lot of them are Lebron defenders so it doesn't surprise me. Even he is handling it like a hypocrite.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by RealSNR

I'm not married to Teague by any means. I'm only worried about the money at this point. I can't help it as a Wolves fan, but I just got through 13 years of zero playoffs, and the best team I had to watch in that time was a Rick Adelman-coached group of Kevin Love, Andrei Kirilenko, and oft-injured Ricky Rubio. We just got through a grueling tanking process and actually came out ahead of the game. And now I worry that we're stocking up too soon. Butler, Irving, and KAT all have only two years left. Wiggins was more likely to accept staying here through an extension, and now if we can't keep one of them, are all of them going to bolt?

It'd pretty much end up being two years of competitive basketball in the Western Conference playoffs and then back to the sewer where we belong.

And I do worry that length would get to Butler or at least prevent what he's capable of doing defensively against guards.

Alternatively, if Irving ends up taking this team a step forward from Wiggins, doesn't it increase the odds of retaining KAT and Butler tremendously?

Because THOSE are the guys you need to keep. If losing Wiggins increases the chance of keeping the other two by as much as 10%, then it's a good move.

Wiggins is the best player on a 30 win team, IMO. He's not a bad player by any means - in fact I'd say he's probably a pretty decent one. But as you've noted, he's one more season away from sliding more towards 'overpriced bust' than anything. He's gonna get a max deal by virtue of his draft position and if he can't become a more efficient scorer, the team that gives him that deal is going to be worse for it.

I think there's a little divestiture aversion here. If both Wiggins and Irving were FAs and the Wolves could sign either (with neither having any ties to Minn.), I think you'd take Irving without hesitation. He's simply a better player with more upside and he's not that much older.

Now Wiggins could find his outside stroke and prove me wrong....or at least less right (I don't see a scenario where he's clearly better than Irving), but that's a 50/50 proposition at best.

Just seems to me that the best path towards true relevance for the Wolves is via Irving, KAT and Butler.

And as for how it impacts Butler with forwards defending him - like I said, the league's moving away from traditional positions anyway. Butler is going to have to deal with forwards defending him against a lot teams simply because many teams no longer utilize a true #1 and have gravitated towards stretch 3s playing what used to be a 2 (with the former 2s sliding in as combo guards). Not everybody has the personnel to do it, but not everybody has a 3 that can hang with Butler anyway. Besides, with Wiggins not being a truly dynamic scorer, I think most teams that have a 3 that can harass Butler would have him on Butler anyway with their 2 on Wiggins.