Lowe - Excerpt from Hornets article on Celtics' draft day offer

[Beat LA]

I wasn't around these parts during the 2013 Draft, so would anyone mind informing me as to what the general reaction was to Danny taking KO over Giannis? Giannis is honestly one of my favorite players in the league, so I don't look back fondly on that decision.

From what I recall, a good number of people were stumping for Giannis or Dieng, and a few for Schroder (though not too many due to Rondo being around).  The Celts moving up to select Olynyk was a bit of a surprise.

I remember being dubious of Giannis, thinking he could end up as another Austin Daye / Anthony Randolph, and feeling a little bit excited because of how productive Kelly was in college.  I remember thinking, though, that Dieng could have addressed the needs of the team better and that it would've been nice to end up with a player with the kind of upside that Giannis had.

What would have made more sense is if we had drafted like this -

2013 - Dieng
2014 - Vonleh and whoever, lol
2015 - Winslow, Hunter, etc.

At least at that point we'd have a core and a vision for the team moving forward, but why do what makes sense, right, lol ? Ugh. I'll never understand the Isaiah Thomas trade, and we might as well have kept Rondo for the year (and then perhaps let him walk or perhaps not, depending on who we could have gotten in the draft), still traded Green (if not for Prince than a first round pick in this year's draft), and finished the season with the 9th or 10th worst record, which ultimately nets us Winslow. 

[chambers]

My point is that those who are disappointed that we didn't tank for a lottery pick last year and don't look like we are primed to do so this year, would likely be disappointed in whoever we got in the lottery if we did tank for a high pick anyway. 

This sounds like fatalism to justify your own position, honestly.

Personally, I'm not disappointed by Smart or Olynyk.

I wish we had ended up with Jabari or Wiggins last year, but it is what it is.  I felt good about the pick then and I don't regret it now.  I think Smart can be a building block, albeit not a primary one.  That's OK.  You can't expect to necessarily get a franchise player at #6 in any given year.

Olynyk was a lottery pick, sure, but he was a late lottery pick in a draft that was deep on role players and very shallow on starting quality players.  I regret that Ainge chose Olynyk ahead of higher upside guys taken after him, but the pick was defensible.


My attitude has been that the draft is a very important part of the rebuild, but it's also far from a sure thing.  That's why it's important to have multiple opportunities to select in the top 10, and vitally important to make the most of those picks when you get them.

Yet history shows that teams that are perennial contenders rarely use multiple top ten picks to build their teams.

It goes without saying that bad teams are the ones who consistently get high picks.  It simply hasn't proven to be a fruitful strategy to continue to be bad to pick your way back to the top.

Look at the champions of the current millennium:

The Spurs, the Lakers, the Heat, the Celtics, the Mavericks, the Pistons, and the Warriors.

Those teams have for the most part made good use of their opportunities to pick high in the draft, but none of them have repeatedly found themselves in the bottom ten in the league for more than two consecutive years as a strategy to build their championship squads.

It seems to me that the cynical, yet extremely popular among many fans and pundits, race to the bottom to rebuild strategy is a fruitless one. 

I wish that the fans and pundits who continually and loudly tout this strategy as the best way to rebuild a franchise into a contender would see that it hasn't proven to pay off very often.

Maybe then less GMs would take such cynical approaches to rebuilding and actually attempt to build teams that are worth watching.

All those franchises managed to get NBA MVP level players (or extremely close) with their top 10 picks. Yes, they got top 10 NBA players with those top 10 picks. The Lakers and Pistons are the extreme exception to this 'championship rule' over the past what..50 years? Will we ever see a talent like Kobe go at #13 in the modern NBA of international scouting?

So how do we get our first franchise player?
It's a double edged sword.
For all the grief that Celtics fans love to give teams like Philly or Minny, they would appear to have a much higher percentage chance of garnering a top 10 NBA player on their squads. Heck, the Wolves and 76ers have a decent chance at having multiple top 10 players from the ability to acquire top 5 & 10 picks.

At the end of the day, it's the top 10 picks that win championships. This is proven. You can argue all you want and pick out the rare cases where some team had a late first rounder turn into an NBA superstar or DPOY and lead them to a title, but the fact remains.

If you want an NBA championship, chances are you have to acquire a top 10 player via the NBA draft.
Some teams can trade for a top 10 pick, others can tank and acquire that pick themselves.

Of all the the contenders in the West:
The Thunder, Clippers, Rockets, Warriors, Memphis, Spurs- they ALL have a player drafted in the top 10, who is a top 10 NBA player. Only the Rockets and Memphis have built their team around that top 10 player without picking him themselves. And even then, Memphis picked Mike Conley at #4 who is instrumental to their success and the third best player on their team.

In fact Memphis is the only championship contender in the West to build their team around players who weren't picked in the top 10. And even then they have a top 10 pick in Mike Conley as their 3rd championship piece.
And the Rockets are the only championship contender in the West without their own top 10 pick playing.

Everyone lands in the top ten at some point, both good teams and bad teams.  The bad teams--including the perpetually bad teams, of course, land there more often.

What history has shown is that the champions and championship contenders aren't the ones who land in the top ten the most often, rather they are the ones who make the most of the opportunities when they get them.

We landed in the top ten last year.  We picked Marcus Smart.  Instead of just aiming to continually land in the top ten until we land that "surefire star," I say it makes more sense to try to build on what we have going forward.

It appears that Danny Ainge agrees.

sorry I edited my post after you replied.
I'd argue that Ainge actually tried pretty hard to make us a top 10 draft pick team by trading away Rondo and Green (our two best players)...and his plan was foiled by our brilliant coach.
 I think his plan was to get into the top 10 again with our own pick this year, and then use the picks that we offered the Hornets, to try and move into the top 5. Once that plan was looking iffy, he saw a good opportunity in the Isaiah Thomas trade and took it. His back up plan was to try to trade into the top 10 this year, to acquire a guy that he thought was top 5 pick value in Justise Winslow. Unfortunately, luck was not on our side that day, or year.

[Celtics18]

My point is that those who are disappointed that we didn't tank for a lottery pick last year and don't look like we are primed to do so this year, would likely be disappointed in whoever we got in the lottery if we did tank for a high pick anyway. 

This sounds like fatalism to justify your own position, honestly.

Personally, I'm not disappointed by Smart or Olynyk.

I wish we had ended up with Jabari or Wiggins last year, but it is what it is.  I felt good about the pick then and I don't regret it now.  I think Smart can be a building block, albeit not a primary one.  That's OK.  You can't expect to necessarily get a franchise player at #6 in any given year.

Olynyk was a lottery pick, sure, but he was a late lottery pick in a draft that was deep on role players and very shallow on starting quality players.  I regret that Ainge chose Olynyk ahead of higher upside guys taken after him, but the pick was defensible.


My attitude has been that the draft is a very important part of the rebuild, but it's also far from a sure thing.  That's why it's important to have multiple opportunities to select in the top 10, and vitally important to make the most of those picks when you get them.

Yet history shows that teams that are perennial contenders rarely use multiple top ten picks to build their teams.

It goes without saying that bad teams are the ones who consistently get high picks.  It simply hasn't proven to be a fruitful strategy to continue to be bad to pick your way back to the top.

Look at the champions of the current millennium:

The Spurs, the Lakers, the Heat, the Celtics, the Mavericks, the Pistons, and the Warriors.

Those teams have for the most part made good use of their opportunities to pick high in the draft, but none of them have repeatedly found themselves in the bottom ten in the league for more than two consecutive years as a strategy to build their championship squads.

It seems to me that the cynical, yet extremely popular among many fans and pundits, race to the bottom to rebuild strategy is a fruitless one. 

I wish that the fans and pundits who continually and loudly tout this strategy as the best way to rebuild a franchise into a contender would see that it hasn't proven to pay off very often.

Maybe then less GMs would take such cynical approaches to rebuilding and actually attempt to build teams that are worth watching.

All those franchises managed to get NBA MVP level players (or extremely close) with their top 10 picks. Yes, they got top 10 NBA players with those top 10 picks. The Lakers and Pistons are the extreme exception to this 'championship rule' over the past what..50 years? Will we ever see a talent like Kobe go at #13 in the modern NBA of international scouting?

So how do we get our first franchise player?
It's a double edged sword.
For all the grief that Celtics fans love to give teams like Philly or Minny, they would appear to have a much higher percentage chance of garnering a top 10 NBA player on their squads. Heck, the Wolves and 76ers have a decent chance at having multiple top 10 players from the ability to acquire top 5 & 10 picks.

At the end of the day, it's the top 10 picks that win championships. This is proven. You can argue all you want and pick out the rare cases where some team had a late first rounder turn into an NBA superstar or DPOY and lead them to a title, but the fact remains.

If you want an NBA championship, chances are you have to acquire a top 10 player via the NBA draft.
Some teams can trade for a top 10 pick, others can tank and acquire that pick themselves.

Of all the the contenders in the West:
The Thunder, Clippers, Rockets, Warriors, Memphis, Spurs- they ALL have a player drafted in the top 10, who is a top 10 NBA player. Only the Rockets and Memphis have built their team around that top 10 player without picking him themselves. And even then, Memphis picked Mike Conley at #4 who is instrumental to their success and the third best player on their team.

In fact Memphis is the only championship contender in the West to build their team around players who weren't picked in the top 10. And even then they have a top 10 pick in Mike Conley as their 3rd championship piece.
And the Rockets are the only championship contender in the West without their own top 10 pick playing.

Everyone lands in the top ten at some point, both good teams and bad teams.  The bad teams--including the perpetually bad teams, of course, land there more often.

What history has shown is that the champions and championship contenders aren't the ones who land in the top ten the most often, rather they are the ones who make the most of the opportunities when they get them.

We landed in the top ten last year.  We picked Marcus Smart.  Instead of just aiming to continually land in the top ten until we land that "surefire star," I say it makes more sense to try to build on what we have going forward.

It appears that Danny Ainge agrees.

sorry I edited my post after you replied.
I'd argue that Ainge actually tried pretty hard to make us a top 10 draft pick team by trading away Rondo and Green (our two best players)...and his plan was foiled by our brilliant coach.
 I think his plan was to get into the top 10 again with our own pick this year, and then use the picks that we offered the Hornets, to try and move into the top 5. Once that plan was looking iffy, he saw a god opportunity in the Isaiah Thomas trade and took it. His back up plan was to try to trade into the top 10 this year, to acquire a guy that he thought was top 5 pick value in Justise Winslow. Unfortunately, luck was not on our side that day, or year.

My point was about this coming year.  All indications are that Ainge has built a roster that is not designed to land us a top ten pick in next year's draft. 

Rather it looks to me like he is attempting to build a competitive roster that will help develop the talent that is already in place. 

[jpotter33]

You know reading the article, I still don't understand why people kept feeling that the Cavs were in chill mode, because every game was pretty close.

According to several people here the games weren't even close either, i.e. their observations didn't fit with their preconceived notions of what was going to happen in the series, so they warped the semantics of the word "close." 

[Celtics18]

You know reading the article, I still don't understand why people kept feeling that the Cavs were in chill mode, because every game was pretty close.

According to several people here the games weren't even close either, i.e. their observations didn't fit with their preconceived notions of what was going to happen in the series, so they warped the semantics of the word "close." 

You should have seen it around here in the off season of 2012.  Word was we were never really in the Conference Finals series against the Heat that went to seven games. 

[jpotter33]

I wasn't around these parts during the 2013 Draft, so would anyone mind informing me as to what the general reaction was to Danny taking KO over Giannis? Giannis is honestly one of my favorite players in the league, so I don't look back fondly on that decision.

From what I recall, a good number of people were stumping for Giannis or Dieng, and a few for Schroder (though not too many due to Rondo being around).  The Celts moving up to select Olynyk was a bit of a surprise.

I remember being dubious of Giannis, thinking he could end up as another Austin Daye / Anthony Randolph, and feeling a little bit excited because of how productive Kelly was in college.  I remember thinking, though, that Dieng could have addressed the needs of the team better and that it would've been nice to end up with a player with the kind of upside that Giannis had.

What would have made more sense is if we had drafted like this -

2013 - Dieng
2014 - Vonleh and whoever, lol
2015 - Winslow, Hunter, etc.

At least at that point we'd have a core and a vision for the team moving forward, but why do what makes sense, right, lol ? Ugh. I'll never understand the Isaiah Thomas trade, and we might as well have kept Rondo for the year (and then perhaps let him walk or perhaps not, depending on who we could have gotten in the draft), still traded Green (if not for Prince than a first round pick in this year's draft), and finished the season with the 9th or 10th worst record, which ultimately nets us Winslow.

[jpotter33]

You know reading the article, I still don't understand why people kept feeling that the Cavs were in chill mode, because every game was pretty close.

According to several people here the games weren't even close either, i.e. their observations didn't fit with their preconceived notions of what was going to happen in the series, so they warped the semantics of the word "close." 

You should have seen it around here in the off season of 2012.  Word was we were never really in the Conference Finals series against the Heat that went to seven games.

Ahh, the ole Bosh injury excuse, eh? I love that those same people forgot that we had many more injuries to our guys in Bradley, Green, Wilcox, and JO. With how well Bradley was playing and his ability to shut down/severely limit Wade that year, I still think we would've won that series and the championship if he wouldn't have had to have shoulder surgery.

[Beat LA]

I wasn't around these parts during the 2013 Draft, so would anyone mind informing me as to what the general reaction was to Danny taking KO over Giannis? Giannis is honestly one of my favorite players in the league, so I don't look back fondly on that decision.

From what I recall, a good number of people were stumping for Giannis or Dieng, and a few for Schroder (though not too many due to Rondo being around).  The Celts moving up to select Olynyk was a bit of a surprise.

I remember being dubious of Giannis, thinking he could end up as another Austin Daye / Anthony Randolph, and feeling a little bit excited because of how productive Kelly was in college.  I remember thinking, though, that Dieng could have addressed the needs of the team better and that it would've been nice to end up with a player with the kind of upside that Giannis had.

What would have made more sense is if we had drafted like this -

2013 - Dieng
2014 - Vonleh and whoever, lol
2015 - Winslow, Hunter, etc.

At least at that point we'd have a core and a vision for the team moving forward, but why do what makes sense, right, lol ? Ugh. I'll never understand the Isaiah Thomas trade, and we might as well have kept Rondo for the year (and then perhaps let him walk or perhaps not, depending on who we could have gotten in the draft), still traded Green (if not for Prince than a first round pick in this year's draft), and finished the season with the 9th or 10th worst record, which ultimately nets us Winslow.

Okay, what have I done wrong now, lol ?

[jpotter33]

I wasn't around these parts during the 2013 Draft, so would anyone mind informing me as to what the general reaction was to Danny taking KO over Giannis? Giannis is honestly one of my favorite players in the league, so I don't look back fondly on that decision.

From what I recall, a good number of people were stumping for Giannis or Dieng, and a few for Schroder (though not too many due to Rondo being around).  The Celts moving up to select Olynyk was a bit of a surprise.

I remember being dubious of Giannis, thinking he could end up as another Austin Daye / Anthony Randolph, and feeling a little bit excited because of how productive Kelly was in college.  I remember thinking, though, that Dieng could have addressed the needs of the team better and that it would've been nice to end up with a player with the kind of upside that Giannis had.

What would have made more sense is if we had drafted like this -

2013 - Dieng
2014 - Vonleh and whoever, lol
2015 - Winslow, Hunter, etc.

At least at that point we'd have a core and a vision for the team moving forward, but why do what makes sense, right, lol ? Ugh. I'll never understand the Isaiah Thomas trade, and we might as well have kept Rondo for the year (and then perhaps let him walk or perhaps not, depending on who we could have gotten in the draft), still traded Green (if not for Prince than a first round pick in this year's draft), and finished the season with the 9th or 10th worst record, which ultimately nets us Winslow.

Okay, what have I done wrong now, lol ?

Why Vonleh over Smart? Smart has already proven he's a capable NBA player, Vonleh hasn't.

And would you really rather had kept Rondo all year than have Crowder, IT, and the Dallas pick, just for the sake of maybe being worse?

[Beat LA]

You know reading the article, I still don't understand why people kept feeling that the Cavs were in chill mode, because every game was pretty close.

According to several people here the games weren't even close either, i.e. their observations didn't fit with their preconceived notions of what was going to happen in the series, so they warped the semantics of the word "close." 

You should have seen it around here in the off season of 2012.  Word was we were never really in the Conference Finals series against the Heat that went to seven games.

Ahh, the ole Bosh injury excuse, eh? I love that those same people forgot that we had many more injuries to our guys in Bradley, Green, Wilcox, and JO. With how well Bradley was playing and his ability to shut down/severely limit Wade that year, I still think we would've won that series and the championship if he wouldn't have had to have shoulder surgery.

Hey, that Bosh injury was huge, but I agree that if we had Bradley that we would have beaten them (or at least had a chance to do so until Wade, Battier, Chalmers, or Haslem, to name a few, took Rondo out again ), as we'd kicked the crap out of them earlier in the season once AB started for the first time.  I wonder how Jimmy Butler would have fit on that team.  Never mind - Doc never would have played him. *facepalm*

[chambers]

My point is that those who are disappointed that we didn't tank for a lottery pick last year and don't look like we are primed to do so this year, would likely be disappointed in whoever we got in the lottery if we did tank for a high pick anyway. 

This sounds like fatalism to justify your own position, honestly.

Personally, I'm not disappointed by Smart or Olynyk.

I wish we had ended up with Jabari or Wiggins last year, but it is what it is.  I felt good about the pick then and I don't regret it now.  I think Smart can be a building block, albeit not a primary one.  That's OK.  You can't expect to necessarily get a franchise player at #6 in any given year.

Olynyk was a lottery pick, sure, but he was a late lottery pick in a draft that was deep on role players and very shallow on starting quality players.  I regret that Ainge chose Olynyk ahead of higher upside guys taken after him, but the pick was defensible.


My attitude has been that the draft is a very important part of the rebuild, but it's also far from a sure thing.  That's why it's important to have multiple opportunities to select in the top 10, and vitally important to make the most of those picks when you get them.

Yet history shows that teams that are perennial contenders rarely use multiple top ten picks to build their teams.

It goes without saying that bad teams are the ones who consistently get high picks.  It simply hasn't proven to be a fruitful strategy to continue to be bad to pick your way back to the top.

Look at the champions of the current millennium:

The Spurs, the Lakers, the Heat, the Celtics, the Mavericks, the Pistons, and the Warriors.

Those teams have for the most part made good use of their opportunities to pick high in the draft, but none of them have repeatedly found themselves in the bottom ten in the league for more than two consecutive years as a strategy to build their championship squads.

It seems to me that the cynical, yet extremely popular among many fans and pundits, race to the bottom to rebuild strategy is a fruitless one. 

I wish that the fans and pundits who continually and loudly tout this strategy as the best way to rebuild a franchise into a contender would see that it hasn't proven to pay off very often.

Maybe then less GMs would take such cynical approaches to rebuilding and actually attempt to build teams that are worth watching.

All those franchises managed to get NBA MVP level players (or extremely close) with their top 10 picks. Yes, they got top 10 NBA players with those top 10 picks. The Lakers and Pistons are the extreme exception to this 'championship rule' over the past what..50 years? Will we ever see a talent like Kobe go at #13 in the modern NBA of international scouting?

So how do we get our first franchise player?
It's a double edged sword.
For all the grief that Celtics fans love to give teams like Philly or Minny, they would appear to have a much higher percentage chance of garnering a top 10 NBA player on their squads. Heck, the Wolves and 76ers have a decent chance at having multiple top 10 players from the ability to acquire top 5 & 10 picks.

At the end of the day, it's the top 10 picks that win championships. This is proven. You can argue all you want and pick out the rare cases where some team had a late first rounder turn into an NBA superstar or DPOY and lead them to a title, but the fact remains.

If you want an NBA championship, chances are you have to acquire a top 10 player via the NBA draft.
Some teams can trade for a top 10 pick, others can tank and acquire that pick themselves.

Of all the the contenders in the West:
The Thunder, Clippers, Rockets, Warriors, Memphis, Spurs- they ALL have a player drafted in the top 10, who is a top 10 NBA player. Only the Rockets and Memphis have built their team around that top 10 player without picking him themselves. And even then, Memphis picked Mike Conley at #4 who is instrumental to their success and the third best player on their team.

In fact Memphis is the only championship contender in the West to build their team around players who weren't picked in the top 10. And even then they have a top 10 pick in Mike Conley as their 3rd championship piece.
And the Rockets are the only championship contender in the West without their own top 10 pick playing.

Everyone lands in the top ten at some point, both good teams and bad teams.  The bad teams--including the perpetually bad teams, of course, land there more often.

What history has shown is that the champions and championship contenders aren't the ones who land in the top ten the most often, rather they are the ones who make the most of the opportunities when they get them.

We landed in the top ten last year.  We picked Marcus Smart.  Instead of just aiming to continually land in the top ten until we land that "surefire star," I say it makes more sense to try to build on what we have going forward.

It appears that Danny Ainge agrees.

sorry I edited my post after you replied.
I'd argue that Ainge actually tried pretty hard to make us a top 10 draft pick team by trading away Rondo and Green (our two best players)...and his plan was foiled by our brilliant coach.
 I think his plan was to get into the top 10 again with our own pick this year, and then use the picks that we offered the Hornets, to try and move into the top 5. Once that plan was looking iffy, he saw a god opportunity in the Isaiah Thomas trade and took it. His back up plan was to try to trade into the top 10 this year, to acquire a guy that he thought was top 5 pick value in Justise Winslow. Unfortunately, luck was not on our side that day, or year.

My point was about this coming year.  All indications are that Ainge has built a roster that is not designed to land us a top ten pick in next year's draft. 

Rather it looks to me like he is attempting to build a competitive roster that will help develop the talent that is already in place.

Oh I agree with you about this year.
He's realized that Stevens is too good, and our players have another year of experience. We are too far in the middle road to tank now. Of course we could get unlucky and have Thomas and Smart go down with injuries but we are vveeerry deep even then.

We can rely less on our own draft position because we have Brooklyn and Dallas to take care of that for us- so now is the time to make Boston an attractive free agent destination. If players can see us make the 6th or 7th spot in the East with Isaiah Thomas, David Lee and Amir Johnson and some young guys, word will keep spreading about Brad Stevens' genius.
He's going to be a massive draw card for us and it's one of the best moves Ainge has ever made in hiring him.
In the mean time, we have to develop our young guys and hope those Brooklyn/Dallas picks get lucky for us.
Who knows, if we got really lucky one of those Brooklyn picks could end up being top 5 in the lottery in a deep draft.

Hypothetical:
Ainge will be waiting for Jimmy Butler to get fed up with Chicago when he and Rose don't get along. Butler will demand a trade, and Ainge will be able to send a treasure chest of young guys and draft picks.

We'll then have the toughest defensive back court in the NBA with Smart, Rozier, Butler and Bradley coming off the bench. Right in time for 2016-17 free agency and an exploding cap. One of our Brooklyn picks will end up in the top 5 and we'll get another stud on a rookie scale contract.
Just a dream

[tarheelsxxiii]

In a nutshell, the same argument with the same players taking the same sides, both sides are wrong (due to inevitable extremes), but you can only become involved in the "debate" when you attack others and/or become known for a wildly extreme viewpoint.

[Celtics18]

In a nutshell, the same argument with the same players taking the same sides, both sides are wrong (due to inevitable extremes), but you can only become involved in the "debate" when you attack others and/or become known for a wildly extreme viewpoint.

I don't get the "attacking other posters" comment.  Up until your post this debate seems to have remained fairly civil. 

[Beat LA]

I wasn't around these parts during the 2013 Draft, so would anyone mind informing me as to what the general reaction was to Danny taking KO over Giannis? Giannis is honestly one of my favorite players in the league, so I don't look back fondly on that decision.

From what I recall, a good number of people were stumping for Giannis or Dieng, and a few for Schroder (though not too many due to Rondo being around).  The Celts moving up to select Olynyk was a bit of a surprise.

I remember being dubious of Giannis, thinking he could end up as another Austin Daye / Anthony Randolph, and feeling a little bit excited because of how productive Kelly was in college.  I remember thinking, though, that Dieng could have addressed the needs of the team better and that it would've been nice to end up with a player with the kind of upside that Giannis had.

What would have made more sense is if we had drafted like this -

2013 - Dieng
2014 - Vonleh and whoever, lol
2015 - Winslow, Hunter, etc.

At least at that point we'd have a core and a vision for the team moving forward, but why do what makes sense, right, lol ? Ugh. I'll never understand the Isaiah Thomas trade, and we might as well have kept Rondo for the year (and then perhaps let him walk or perhaps not, depending on who we could have gotten in the draft), still traded Green (if not for Prince than a first round pick in this year's draft), and finished the season with the 9th or 10th worst record, which ultimately nets us Winslow.

Okay, what have I done wrong now, lol ?

Why Vonleh over Smart? Smart has already proven he's a capable NBA player, Vonleh hasn't.

And would you really rather had kept Rondo all year than have Crowder, IT, and the Dallas pick, just for the sake of maybe being worse?

The reason I was for Smart or Randle was because I hadn't seen a video of Vonleh which I later came across and had me like (that's also the last time I'll ever put all my stock into draft express videos, lol . They're too negative, imo.).  Smart is okay, but nothing in his highlights really gave off the same impression.  Here, have a look at this -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYXa1_nb_Dk

OH MY GOD . An 18/19 year old power forward who already has better post moves, with either hand, than 90-95% of guys in the league, plus he can rebound, defend, pass, shhot (even out to the 3 point line, as we saw in the summer league) and handle?  Wow.  You know what would have been even better, though?  If we had traded for Vonleh before the draft.  Charlotte clearly had no idea in what they had in him, imo, as evidenced by their reason for trading the guy - because they couldn't move Cody Zeller.  Seriously.  Unbelievable.  Give them ET, Sully, and KO for Vonleh and their second round pick at 39, which they traded to Brooklyn, anyway, leaving us with Vonleh and Smart, plus the guys from this year's draft.  Noah had some good games at the end of the year, btw, when they actually gave him the time.  Check this out -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMjWnbHACRk

Crowder is a good player, but giving him a 5 year deal was ridiculous, imo, but I hope that I'm proven wrong.  It would have been better to have signed Glenn Robinson III, who just inked a 3 year deal with the Pacers.  Doh!  God I love and hate Larry right now, lol . Alternatively, Crowda could just have been replaced with an undrafted free agent.

I'm not sure about the Dallas pick, and I'm not an IT fan.  He's just too much of a defensive liability, imo, as was seen in the playoffs, and he excels at hero ball.  Great (sarcasm) . We could have gotten a better player from, again, this year's class of undrafted free agents , imo.

All in all, and whether Rondo would have stayed or not, I guess I'm looking more at the big picture.  Wouldn't you rather have a young core of Vonleh, Winslow, and Smart, instead of whatever this 'roster' is right now?  At least we'd have a vision of what kind of team we want to make moving forward, and at that point we could start to shoot for making the postseason this year.  I'm not advocating for a 76ers approach, here, but I just feel like it's best long-term if we first have the necessary talent in place, and the last two drafts were loaded.  I know, I'm nuts .

[tarheelsxxiii]

In a nutshell, the same argument with the same players taking the same sides, both sides are wrong (due to inevitable extremes), but you can only become involved in the "debate" when you attack others and/or become known for a wildly extreme viewpoint.

I don't get the "attacking other posters" comment.  Up until your post this debate seems to have remained fairly civil.

I don't see how. I pointed out a pattern, I have no horse in the race, and I tend to agree most with your "side" fwiw.. .meaning I wasn't referring to you