The group you think is better? It won 24 games.
The group you think is worse? It won 48 games. And it has the higher draft pick.
Thanks for playing, please try again.
The thanks for playing comment yet again, which is witless, was bad enough the first time you said it.
PP is better than any player we have now. Big Al would smoke our bigs. I think we have better depth now. I think we were deliberately tanking, perhaps your not old enough to recall that year? The east is pretty watered down nowadays. They had several teams contending here and there that were decent, more so than today. There was no walk through the playoffs like the Cavs had this year. I doubt our team today would win 48 games back then.
But the tank was on, Ainge tried it and we got burnt.
We have heard teams are calling about some guys that is classic GM speak to raise their value.
Sully, Zeller, Young, rooks = No value or very little value - Mickey and Rozier have the most.
KO - some value but not that great of value, dependent on scenario and place.
Amir, Jonas and ET = Value for teams looking for veteran help
AB, Crowder and Smart = AB has some value, Crowder as well but Smart is shooting his value down
IT = star but if you deal him, you lose your only one
I included some of the free agents because they could be signed and traded. Of them JJ, Amir and ET have the most value.
Point is, the pick is not as good as we hoped. The sum of our parts is less than our record on the court. Eja, original post was stating that who wants these guys? We have to sweeten up any deal with picks because our players are perceived as effort guys by most of the league. AB, Crowder, Smart and IT are the exceptions and if you lose too many of them then we take a step backward not forward.
Do you really think free agents look at our team, and think I am the one guy who can put them over the top? If you do your naive. We lack shooting, have a hard time scoring and need rim protection and a low post option. We are not terrible but we are slightly above good, but not elite in any way.
I am a big time Ainge supporter. I think we are in a better position than we would have been in PP and KG just retired here. But it is what it is, we have a team of misfits ( which was fun as heck to watch) or mismatched parts which we cobbled into a decent team but were exposed in the playoffs. And please do not say we do not match up well with ATL, that is an excuse, if you do not match well then your lacking some players. We did make progress. Ainge has some ammo to make deals. What we disagree about is the quality of that ammo. I think Eja is correct, our ammo is not as pristine I would like. Ainge usually adds to the team, in a way that makes us better. He thinks out moves that help us, even if they are not big but he does not make dumb moves that often. I trust him.
I actually think Ainge will shake it up a bit and try to get some scorers and shooters and a big or two. Some will be through trade, I could see him packaging one of guards of value for a big.
I could also see us signing Bazemore, Batum or Fournier level wing. AB's value is not likely to get higher. We really need a solid big, and another scorer without taking on a defensive liability or a guy who needs another guy beyond him to compensate for his problems like we had in Sully. I think Okafor is a larger improved version of him. Noel makes sense if you have a stretch four with him but it would be fun to see him get lobs from IT. I could see us rolling with Crowder and Jonas at the four and trading for Noel and signing a wing.