Idea: Wallace/Humphries/Lee/picks for Lin/Asik/Montiejunas

[kozlodoev]

It's only "pretty amazing" until you realize Doc is playing him 35+ minutes a game. On a per-minute basis he's been pretty much the same guy for his entire career, he has low basketball IQ, and his team defense has always been considered suspect. Oh, and did I mention he can't shoot or pass?

If Deandre Jordan and Omer Asik are so bad... I'm really curious how many centers you think are "good"? Maybe 5 in the entire league?

I said that (a) Asik's defense may be overrated, and (b) Jordan is not worth $11 million, and his awesome stats are somewhat padded by the fact that he leads the league in minutes per game at the center position.

How you got from this to anyone being "so bad" is beyond me, so I don't really know what to tell you.

You are saying that Deandre Jordan (50th highest paid player in the league) and Asik (75th) are overpaid, even as young guys who signed their contracts recently. To me that implies that they are not even top-10 at their position. So I wonder how many centers you think are worth $11M/year and why that number should be so small?

Asik is 27. He's in the prime of his career and certainly not a young guy. He won't get much better than he already is. He'll be making $15 million next year. I don't think I whether or not he's overpaid even merits a discussion, but I'd like to once again point out that I only said that there is room for discussion about whether his defense is elite.

DeAndre Jordan is slated to make $11 million this season. For comparison, here is a sample other centers making similar amounts of money: Duncan ($10 mil), Noah ($11 mil), Horford ($12 mil), Nene ($13 mil), Bynum ($12.5 million). And other "bigs" making similar amounts of money this season: Ibaka ($12.5 mil), Josh Smith ($13.5 mil), David West ($12 mil), Millsap ($9.5 million), Ryan Anderson ($8.5 million).

I don't particularly feel any of these players are overpaid (except perhaps Nene and Bynum, given their injury issues). Also, I think most of them are players I'd rather had instead of Jordan.

As for whether he's top-10 in his position... the fact that there is a pile of other bad contracts in the NBA doesn't make Jordan's contract any better.

[byennie]

Asik is 27. He's in the prime of his career and certainly not a young guy. He won't get much better than he already is. He'll be making $15 million next year. I don't think I whether or not he's overpaid even merits a discussion, but I'd like to once again point out that I only said that there is room for discussion about whether his defense is elite.

DeAndre Jordan is slated to make $11 million this season. For comparison, here is a sample other centers making similar amounts of money: Duncan ($10 mil), Noah ($11 mil), Horford ($12 mil), Nene ($13 mil), Bynum ($12.5 million). And other "bigs" making similar amounts of money this season: Ibaka ($12.5 mil), Josh Smith ($13.5 mil), David West ($12 mil), Millsap ($9.5 million), Ryan Anderson ($8.5 million).

I don't particularly feel any of these players are overpaid (except perhaps Nene and Bynum, given their injury issues). Also, I think most of them are players I'd rather had instead of Jordan.

As for whether he's top-10 in his position... the fact that there is a pile of other bad contracts in the NBA doesn't make Jordan's contract any better.

Asik has a back-loaded deal. He doesn't make $15M/year, he's on a $25M/3 year deal. Fair point on Jordan's contract.

I got the impression you were pretty low on both of them, if that's not the case then I misread you.

[kozlodoev]

It's amazing to me how little people can agree on Asik. I recommend anyone who thinks Asik is not a top-10 center in this league read this:

http://www.sbnation.com/nba/2013/10/15/4830936/omer-asik-defense-video-breakdown-houston-rockets

Not particularly impressed by the article.

The video of Asik's "defensive prowess" is pretty much an endless string of big men forcing up poor shots and trying things that they're clearly not suited for (Timmy D trying to take people off the dribble, really?!).

The example of "pick and roll switch defense" is pretty much giving up a wide open three to the guard, and living with the results. Shot missed, so great defense?!

Is Asik an above-average, perhaps very good or excellent defensive player? Sure. Is he elite? Nah, I tend to have higher requirements for this.

[kozlodoev]

Asik has a back-loaded deal. He doesn't make $15M/year, he's on a $25M/3 year deal. Fair point on Jordan's contract.

Asik does have a backloaded deal (same with Lin). But this still means that whoever trades for him is grossly overpaying for his services (also means Houston got a real bargain last season ).

[Rondohara]

That could be a good trade for Houston, if I'm them I'm think about unloading those 2 poison pills contracts. But they won't be getting Lee and Wallace, not a chance. And there isn't any advantage for us if we can't unload Lee and Wallace, so no deal.

[byennie]

[quote author=kozlodoev link=topic=68423.msg1583016#msg1583016
Is Asik an above-average, perhaps very good or excellent defensive player? Sure. Is he elite? Nah, I tend to have higher requirements for this.
[/quote]

OK, sure - but I'm not sure what good it does to subjectively distinguish between "excellent" and "elite".

I'd say he's one of the top 5 defensive big men (center or power forward), if we need to be that precise.

[byennie]

Asik has a back-loaded deal. He doesn't make $15M/year, he's on a $25M/3 year deal. Fair point on Jordan's contract.

Asik does have a backloaded deal (same with Lin). But this still means that whoever trades for him is grossly overpaying for his services (also means Houston got a real bargain last season ).

Overpaying, yes. Grossly? It's gonna be less than $10M total by the time he goes anywhere, and the guys going out would have been paid anyway. Something like a 3 year $30M extension would be reasonable IMO.

[kozlodoev]

Is Asik an above-average, perhaps very good or excellent defensive player? Sure. Is he elite? Nah, I tend to have higher requirements for this.

OK, sure - but I'm not sure what good it does to subjectively distinguish between "excellent" and "elite".

I'd say he's one of the top 5 defensive big men (center or power forward), if we need to be that precise.

To me, an "elite" defender is someone who affects the entire possession: defends post-ups, defends pick-and-rolls, defends the weak side, is a constant threat to block/alter shots, boxes out defensively. I'm not even sure how to explain it, exactly, just having an overall impact on the game defensively as opposed to playing good defense, if that makes any sense. It's a fairly exclusive group of players, in my mind. Guys like Duncan, Howard, Garnett, Mark Gasol, and perhaps Chandler are good current examples. Ben Wallace and Hakeem are good examples from the past.

[kozlodoev]

Asik has a back-loaded deal. He doesn't make $15M/year, he's on a $25M/3 year deal. Fair point on Jordan's contract.

Asik does have a backloaded deal (same with Lin). But this still means that whoever trades for him is grossly overpaying for his services (also means Houston got a real bargain last season ).

Overpaying, yes. Grossly? It's gonna be less than $10M total by the time he goes anywhere, and the guys going out would have been paid anyway. Something like a 3 year $30M extension would be reasonable IMO.

He's paid $15 million next season. If he's traded this season, the new team is on the hook for that entire salary while getting very perhaps half a year at the considerably discounted salary from the first two seasons of the contract.

So yes, perhaps slightly less overpaid if traded midseason ($12 million vs $15 million per season, on average). But still too much money for a player who's probably worth the average value of his contract ($8 million per season).

[byennie]

You're right, next year. I misread.

But it still seems like quibbling over a few $M. $12M is what he's worth but if a team pays him $17.5 for a season and a half it's grossly overpaying? The difference is $5.5M and that's assuming he's worth *exactly* $8M and not say, $9M. Money is cheap enough in the NBA than teams regularly send $3M cash just to sweeten a deal that they like. You can send out a few million more than you take back. And so on.

The backloading was designed to make it hard to match his offer as a restricted free agent. It's not going to scare away a team that values him now.

[kozlodoev]

You're right, next year. I misread.

But it still seems like quibbling over a few $M. $12M is what he's worth but if a team pays him $17.5 for a season and a half it's grossly overpaying? The difference is $5.5M and that's assuming he's worth *exactly* $8M and not say, $9M. Money is cheap enough in the NBA than teams regularly send $3M cash just to sweeten a deal that they like. You can send out a few million more than you take back. And so on.

The backloading was designed to make it hard to match his offer as a restricted free agent. It's not going to scare away a team that values him now.

You're misunderstanding me. Paying him $17.5 million for 1.5 seasons is paying him roughly $12 million per season.

I'm not assuming anything _exactly_ (7, 8, 9 million may all be fair contracts; $12.5 million probably isn't). I just don't think that he's worth more than a healthy Kendrick Perkins (and a healthy Kendrick Perkins is probably worth his current contract). I hope that makes sense.

And no, money is not longer cheap in the NBA (especially since the last cap changes), and salary money is quite different from cash considerations sent in a trade -- the latter are are not subject to luxury tax.

[byennie]

You're right, next year. I misread.

But it still seems like quibbling over a few $M. $12M is what he's worth but if a team pays him $17.5 for a season and a half it's grossly overpaying? The difference is $5.5M and that's assuming he's worth *exactly* $8M and not say, $9M. Money is cheap enough in the NBA than teams regularly send $3M cash just to sweeten a deal that they like. You can send out a few million more than you take back. And so on.

The backloading was designed to make it hard to match his offer as a restricted free agent. It's not going to scare away a team that values him now.

You're misunderstanding me. Paying him $17.5 million for 1.5 seasons is paying him roughly $12 million per season.

I'm not assuming anything _exactly_ (7, 8, 9 million may all be fair contracts; $12.5 million probably isn't). I just don't think that he's worth more than a healthy Kendrick Perkins (and a healthy Kendrick Perkins is probably worth his current contract). I hope that makes sense.

And no, money is not longer cheap in the NBA (especially since the last cap changes), and salary money is quite different from cash considerations sent in a trade -- the latter are are not subject to luxury tax.

The $12M was meant as $8M * 1.5 years, because you said $8M was what he is worth. Who said anyone was going to go over the luxury tax for him? Teams can send roughly $10M outgoing for him not including any other players in the deal. They are unlikely to change their cap number next year by more than a couple million, which also happens to be within the amount of cash Houston is allowed to simply pay out in the trade.

Now you're saying $9M might be a fair contract, but $12.5M isn't, even if it's only for 18 months. That's drawing a ridiculously fine line to make your point when there would certainly be other players and numbers to factor in.

[LooseCannon]

It's only "pretty amazing" until you realize Doc is playing him 35+ minutes a game. On a per-minute basis he's been pretty much the same guy for his entire career, he has low basketball IQ, and his team defense has always been considered suspect. Oh, and did I mention he can't shoot or pass?

If Deandre Jordan and Omer Asik are so bad... I'm really curious how many centers you think are "good"? Maybe 5 in the entire league?

I said that (a) Asik's defense may be overrated, and (b) Jordan is not worth $11 million, and his awesome stats are somewhat padded by the fact that he leads the league in minutes per game at the center position.

How you got from this to anyone being "so bad" is beyond me, so I don't really know what to tell you.

You are saying that Deandre Jordan (50th highest paid player in the league) and Asik (75th) are overpaid, even as young guys who signed their contracts recently. To me that implies that they are not even top-10 at their position. So I wonder how many centers you think are worth $11M/year and why that number should be so small?

You're in here shooting down ideas about how Asik and Jordan are pretty "good" so I don't think it was a crazy leap. Yes, I acknowledge that you didn't *literally* call them "bad".

DeAndre Jordan is intentionally overpaid.  Golden State signed him to an offer sheet that they were hoping was so big that the Clippers wouldn't match, but the Clippers did match it.

[LooseCannon]

I'm not assuming anything _exactly_ (7, 8, 9 million may all be fair contracts; $12.5 million probably isn't). I just don't think that he's worth more than a healthy Kendrick Perkins (and a healthy Kendrick Perkins is probably worth his current contract). I hope that makes sense.

He's a much better rebounder than a never-been-injured Perkins would have been.  I'd argue he is a better defender.  Could Perkins make up the difference on offense?

[kozlodoev]

I'm not assuming anything _exactly_ (7, 8, 9 million may all be fair contracts; $12.5 million probably isn't). I just don't think that he's worth more than a healthy Kendrick Perkins (and a healthy Kendrick Perkins is probably worth his current contract). I hope that makes sense.

He's a much better rebounder than a never-been-injured Perkins would have been.  I'd argue he is a better defender.  Could Perkins make up the difference on offense?

Perkins posted defensive rebounding rates of 21, 24, and 26 (post-injury)  in the seasons when he was 24, 25, and 26 years old. I focus on DRB since most of his work came in a Celtics system that specifically deemphasized offensive rebounding. At the same stage of his career, Asik posted 22, 25, and 31.

Asik is probably the better rebounder, but not by as much as you suggest. It's all academic at this point but there is an argument to be made that if Perkins were healthy in his age 26 season, and didn't have to subsequently lose weight to alleviate the pressure on his surgically repaired knee, they would have been equal rebounders.

Also, I see them as somewhat similar defensive players --  Asik perhaps with better mobility, Perkins the better shotblocker of the two.

Perkins also had a little better post moves and hands. Overall, though, they're largely the same player -- and it's worth noting that on a per-minute basis, Asik's best season is very similar to Perkins' best season.