Yes, another pro tanking thread. Lets look at recent NBA history for some facts.

[lightspeed5]

im so tired of the anti-tankers saying 'we dont know for sure that they will be any good'

yes we do. we knew how good lebron was before he came into the league. this is close to lebron level hype for a reason.

theres 2 legit options in the league, tank and get a good draft pick because you know youre not a contender, or contend with multiple stars and a superstar.

Or you can become the atlanta hawks, which is a middling team stuck in NBA purgatory making boring moves for psuedo-stars that will get them nowhere. oh cool, they have paul milsap now. are they going to win a championship? no, they made that move to please season ticket holders. i dont care about ticket holders, i want to win a championship. Tank, get a star, and continue to develop for the final piece to the puzzle.

[Celtics18]

Like I said, go back and name me some teams other than Detroit that won a title without their own lottery pick.

  You're claiming that most title teams have a top 10 pick on their team that they drafted. So do most nba teams, including most lottery teams. So if you have a high draft pick (that you made) on your team you're much more likely to be in the lottery than the finals. It's a fact that very few people would dispute.

I'm not claiming anything. History proves it. And for some reason you're taking it out of context because you want to argue for arguments sake.
The argument isn't just about a top 10 pick, its about drafting a stud with that pick. For the 5th time I'll agree that you aren't guaranteed anything with every top 5 or 10 pick.
Just as important as drafting a true franchise stud is surrounding him with the right talent- niw that may be through the draft or via free agency but history proves that having that franchise level/top 10 NBA talent on your team already gives extra incentive to attract top tier free agents. This may be due to Bird Rights when these franchise players come up for free agency or it may be the management that is controlling the teams destiny has proven or shown their ability to put a contender on the floor. Those are probably two of the key factors, but without drafting your own elite/top 5-10 NBA player your contending/ title percentages are significantly lower than otherwise.
Again, history proves this.

  History proves that if you have a top 10 pick on your team that you drafted then you're likely to be a contender or an also-ran or a bottom-feeder. Nothing more. It's true that drafting a Shaq/TD/LeBron will make you a contender, it's also true that players like that don't come around very often and the chances of drafting one of them are slim.

exactly, deep drafts happen once per decade, which is why we tank for the 2014 deep draft.

I haven't bought the hype yet.  It generally takes at least four or five years after a given draft before you can adequately assess how good a certain draft class it is, not the year before that draft happens. 

Also, if the draft is indeed as crazy once-in-a-lifetime deep as many of you are claiming that it's guaranteed to be, then  Danny should be able to get someone really good at 15 or 16.

whats your obsession with wanting to make the playoffs with gerald wallace and humpries on this team?

we dont even have a team assembled, we got a kid that rondo got in a fight with (whos paid 10 mill last season to be DNP-CD by the nets), another guy who got tangled up with KG and 3 years past his prime, 2 kids who chucks up shots for a living, and 2 players coming off major surgery. its not a team, its a collection of assets. the peices were not assembled or made to fit together, theyre simply here because they have value and we're starting on a clean slate.

My wanting to make the playoffs has very little to do with whether or not Kris Humphries and Gerald Wallace are on the team.  I happen to think that Rondo, Bradley, Lee, Green, Wallace, Sully, Bass, Olynyk, and Humphries is a talented enough team to make a run at the playoffs.  I want them to play to win every night.  I think that if they do, and the new, young coach coaches to win every night, that we have a shot at the playoffs.

Of course it's a team.  It also happens to be a collection of assets.  I have never thought the two mutually exclusive, and I have never thought that "rebuilding" means that you shouldn't try to win as many games as you can while doing it. 

My goal for this team is 35 wins.  Anything less than that and I will be disappointed.  I'm hoping for seven to eight more wins than that, though, and a trip to the playoffs, though.  Not only do I think it will be good for our young guys to get the experience, but it will be good for me (and some others, I'm sure) as a fan.   

[Celtics18]

im so tired of the anti-tankers saying 'we dont know for sure that they will be any good'

yes we do. we knew how good lebron was before he came into the league. this is close to lebron level hype for a reason.

theres 2 legit options in the league, tank and get a good draft pick because you know youre not a contender, or contend with multiple stars and a superstar.

Or you can become the atlanta hawks, which is a middling team stuck in NBA purgatory making boring moves for psuedo-stars that will get them nowhere. oh cool, they have paul milsap now. are they going to win a championship? no, they made that move to please season ticket holders. i dont care about ticket holders, i want to win a championship. Tank, get a star, and continue to develop for the final piece to the puzzle.

"Tank, get a star" isn't a plan.  Maybe Andrew Wiggins is the next Lebron James.  Maybe.  Let's say we put the odds at a generous 50/50.  To have the best shot at that 50/50 chance at the next Lebron James, we'd have to be the very worst team in the league.  To do that, the tank would have to be of epic proportions; sit Rondo out for the season, don't bring Sully back, let Jeff Green rest some ailment for at least 30 games, ask coach Brad to finish games with Pressey, Brooks, Kris Joseph, Olynyk, and Melo on the floor. 

Even if we do all that and manage to claw our way to about eighteen wins and the worst record, we only have a 25% shot at getting the player who has a 50% shot of being the next Lebron James. 

My probability skills aren't what they used to be, but those don't look like great odds. 

Guess what, the lottery is there for a reason.  So that teams don't blatantly and shamelessly tank. 

Who knows?  Maybe we get really, really, really lucky and finish with the 14th worst record, and hit the jackpot on that .5% (or whatever it is) chance of the number one pick. 

Now, that would be cause for celebration.  It might even help me get over missing the playoffs.

[lightspeed5]

im so tired of the anti-tankers saying 'we dont know for sure that they will be any good'

yes we do. we knew how good lebron was before he came into the league. this is close to lebron level hype for a reason.

theres 2 legit options in the league, tank and get a good draft pick because you know youre not a contender, or contend with multiple stars and a superstar.

Or you can become the atlanta hawks, which is a middling team stuck in NBA purgatory making boring moves for psuedo-stars that will get them nowhere. oh cool, they have paul milsap now. are they going to win a championship? no, they made that move to please season ticket holders. i dont care about ticket holders, i want to win a championship. Tank, get a star, and continue to develop for the final piece to the puzzle.

"Tank, get a star" isn't a plan.  Maybe Andrew Wiggins is the next Lebron James.  Maybe.  Let's say we put the odds at a generous 50/50.  To have the best shot at that 50/50 chance at the next Lebron James, we'd have to be the very worst team in the league.  To do that, the tank would have to be of epic proportions; sit Rondo out for the season, don't bring Sully back, let Jeff Green rest some ailment for at least 30 games, ask coach Brad to finish games with Pressey, Brooks, Kris Joseph, Olynyk, and Melo on the floor. 

Even if we do all that and manage to claw our way to about eighteen wins and the worst record, we only have a 25% shot at getting the player who has a 50% shot of being the next Lebron James. 

My probability skills aren't what they used to be, but those don't look like great odds. 

here we go again with the "wiggins is the only good player in this draft," "if he doesnt become lebron james its not worth it"

those are fantastic odds for a team that will not be a contender. 20% shot of getting lebron james jr to pair with rondo? oh you lost out in the lottery? ok here's the 2nd spot in the draft, now you have the 2nd coming of paul pierce/carmelo anthony in jabari parker as a consolation prize. oh you lost out on the top 2 picks, heres the man child julius randle. you lost? heres aaron gordon.


Do you want to be the Hawks, or do you want to be OKC? judging from the commentary on here, a lot of anti-tankers would like to sign the pseudo-stars, the josh smith's and the millsaps and jeffersons and monta ellis' of the world and become the hawks. a team that wins games but never contends because they dont have a superstar. you dont draft superstars with pick #16, nor do you attract superstar free agents to a cold white town with no night life. you cant trade for a superstar until you gather young assets with actual value and hope the stars align.

[LooseCannon]

Do you want to be the Hawks, or do you want to be OKC? judging from the commentary on here, a lot of anti-tankers would like to sign the pseudo-stars, the josh smith's and the millsaps and jeffersons and monta ellis' of the world and become the hawks. a team that wins games but never contends because they dont have a superstar. you dont draft superstars with pick #16, nor do you attract superstar free agents to a cold white town with no night life. you cant trade for a superstar until you gather young assets with actual value and hope the stars align.

I think only one of those players is in any way desirable (Millsap).  And I think Sullinger plus a boatload of draft picks might be close to enough assets to trade for a superstar, with guys like Brooks and Melo as pseudo-assets who can be thrown in to make the other team feel like they might be getting something else useful.

[BballTim]

Like I said, go back and name me some teams other than Detroit that won a title without their own lottery pick.

  You're claiming that most title teams have a top 10 pick on their team that they drafted. So do most nba teams, including most lottery teams. So if you have a high draft pick (that you made) on your team you're much more likely to be in the lottery than the finals. It's a fact that very few people would dispute.

I'm not claiming anything. History proves it. And for some reason you're taking it out of context because you want to argue for arguments sake.
The argument isn't just about a top 10 pick, its about drafting a stud with that pick. For the 5th time I'll agree that you aren't guaranteed anything with every top 5 or 10 pick.
Just as important as drafting a true franchise stud is surrounding him with the right talent- niw that may be through the draft or via free agency but history proves that having that franchise level/top 10 NBA talent on your team already gives extra incentive to attract top tier free agents. This may be due to Bird Rights when these franchise players come up for free agency or it may be the management that is controlling the teams destiny has proven or shown their ability to put a contender on the floor. Those are probably two of the key factors, but without drafting your own elite/top 5-10 NBA player your contending/ title percentages are significantly lower than otherwise.
Again, history proves this.

  History proves that if you have a top 10 pick on your team that you drafted then you're likely to be a contender or an also-ran or a bottom-feeder. Nothing more. It's true that drafting a Shaq/TD/LeBron will make you a contender, it's also true that players like that don't come around very often and the chances of drafting one of them are slim.

exactly, deep drafts happen once per decade, which is why we tank for the 2014 deep draft.

  If you look at the "super deep" 2003 draft, 80% of the teams with top 5 picks didn't win a title with the player that they drafted and the other team needed to have superstar franchise players join their teams to have that group avoid a shutout.

[Moranis]

Like I said, go back and name me some teams other than Detroit that won a title without their own lottery pick.

  You're claiming that most title teams have a top 10 pick on their team that they drafted. So do most nba teams, including most lottery teams. So if you have a high draft pick (that you made) on your team you're much more likely to be in the lottery than the finals. It's a fact that very few people would dispute.

I'm not claiming anything. History proves it. And for some reason you're taking it out of context because you want to argue for arguments sake.
The argument isn't just about a top 10 pick, its about drafting a stud with that pick. For the 5th time I'll agree that you aren't guaranteed anything with every top 5 or 10 pick.
Just as important as drafting a true franchise stud is surrounding him with the right talent- niw that may be through the draft or via free agency but history proves that having that franchise level/top 10 NBA talent on your team already gives extra incentive to attract top tier free agents. This may be due to Bird Rights when these franchise players come up for free agency or it may be the management that is controlling the teams destiny has proven or shown their ability to put a contender on the floor. Those are probably two of the key factors, but without drafting your own elite/top 5-10 NBA player your contending/ title percentages are significantly lower than otherwise.
Again, history proves this.

  History proves that if you have a top 10 pick on your team that you drafted then you're likely to be a contender or an also-ran or a bottom-feeder. Nothing more. It's true that drafting a Shaq/TD/LeBron will make you a contender, it's also true that players like that don't come around very often and the chances of drafting one of them are slim.

exactly, deep drafts happen once per decade, which is why we tank for the 2014 deep draft.

  If you look at the "super deep" 2003 draft, 80% of the teams with top 5 picks didn't win a title with the player that they drafted and the other team needed to have superstar franchise players join their teams to have that group avoid a shutout.

Yeah but the Cavs management was awful.  Starting with letting Boozer go and continuing on through Lebron's entire time there.  Bad move upon bad move.  The only good thing they did was draft and keep Varejao.  And all that said, they made the NBA Finals and were winning 60 games a year.  That is a true contender, not some middling team with no shot at winning.  Before Melo Denver hadn't been to the playoffs in 8 seasons, they were there every year since going from 17 wins to 43 wins in Melo's rookie year.  Their problem, like Cleveland, was they couldn't figure out how to get a real second star there, with their only real attempt being Iverson (which set that franchise back a long time).  As for Bosh, he isn't a franchise player and never was.  He is a good second star though and if you paired someone with his talent with someone of say Rondo's talent, you could win a title with both of them. 

The other thing with those three teams, is none of them have history and none of them are places free agents want to play in.  Cleveland, Denver, and Toronto may not be Milwaukee or Minnesota, but they aren't much better either. 

[lightspeed5]

Like I said, go back and name me some teams other than Detroit that won a title without their own lottery pick.

  You're claiming that most title teams have a top 10 pick on their team that they drafted. So do most nba teams, including most lottery teams. So if you have a high draft pick (that you made) on your team you're much more likely to be in the lottery than the finals. It's a fact that very few people would dispute.

I'm not claiming anything. History proves it. And for some reason you're taking it out of context because you want to argue for arguments sake.
The argument isn't just about a top 10 pick, its about drafting a stud with that pick. For the 5th time I'll agree that you aren't guaranteed anything with every top 5 or 10 pick.
Just as important as drafting a true franchise stud is surrounding him with the right talent- niw that may be through the draft or via free agency but history proves that having that franchise level/top 10 NBA talent on your team already gives extra incentive to attract top tier free agents. This may be due to Bird Rights when these franchise players come up for free agency or it may be the management that is controlling the teams destiny has proven or shown their ability to put a contender on the floor. Those are probably two of the key factors, but without drafting your own elite/top 5-10 NBA player your contending/ title percentages are significantly lower than otherwise.
Again, history proves this.

  History proves that if you have a top 10 pick on your team that you drafted then you're likely to be a contender or an also-ran or a bottom-feeder. Nothing more. It's true that drafting a Shaq/TD/LeBron will make you a contender, it's also true that players like that don't come around very often and the chances of drafting one of them are slim.

exactly, deep drafts happen once per decade, which is why we tank for the 2014 deep draft.

  If you look at the "super deep" 2003 draft, 80% of the teams with top 5 picks didn't win a title with the player that they drafted and the other team needed to have superstar franchise players join their teams to have that group avoid a shutout.

so other GMs are worse than danny. whats your point