« Reply #396 on: April 07, 2016, 01:50:48 PM »
People love to bring up OKC as a comparison. Well, the Thunder had a three-year rebuild where they only outright tanked for one year. After year three, however, they had Durant, Westbrook, Harden, Ibaka and Jeff Green. After tanking as hard as they could for three years, Philly doesn't have anyone as good as Durant. They don't have anyone as good as Westbrook. They don't have anyone as good as Harden. They don't have a wing player as good as Green. They have a couple of bugs who might be better than Ibaka but who can't play together. And then they have a bunch of question marks.
Well said.
Well said, but misguided. The jury is still out on embiid and saric. Philly has a strong chance to end up with either Simmons or Ingram. There's a 45% they will also have pick 4 or 5. There's also a pretty reasonable chance they will move Okafor for an equal talent at a different position.
On a scale of 1-10, how shocked would you be if the Brooklyn pick ended up 5th and ainge traded all of our 2016 picks for Okafor ? Knowing what he offered for Winslow and the reality that we don't actually have roster spots for all those picks would you honestly be all that surprised ? Something like 5, 16, 26 and 31 for Okafor. Philly replaces their undrafted d-leaguers with some tangible prospects.
And this is why I've consistently said that the team would let the tank ride until the offseason and re evaluate in the summer. Do they have a Durant and Westbrook yet? No probably not, but they might have a full lineup of big name prospects within a few short months. This is what the majority of this forum (and apparently some Philly fans) fail to understand.
The majority of the folks on this board understand what Philly has done perfectly fine. You are the one in denial.
Three years into the most aggressive and longest tanking effort in league history, Hinkie had led the franchise to a point where its future is STILL entirely dependent on a large number of things that might, could, possibly, potentially, maybe happen at some undefined point in the future...as long as nothing else bad happens.
Under the standards of the Hinkie-defenders, what NBA GM can ever be criticized? Even Billy King did what he did to try and win a title and most people thought there was a good chance it would work.
Mike
It took Ainge about 4-5 years. Think back to 2007. Ainge had been GM since 2003. By the spring of 2007, how many Celtics fans had turned on Ainge, how many considered him a thorough failure? A lot. What kind of future did it look like we had? Promising, if the ping pong balls went our way. When they didn't, what kind of future did it look like we had? The day after the lottery, was Ainge's stock as a GM higher, lower, or the same as Hinkie's stock was as of yesterday?
I'd say it was higher. Maybe not by much but it was higher. Despite the woes of '06-07, Ainge's track record was already better that what Hinkie has/had.
Obviously, there was a HUGE letdown in those days right after the '07 lottery failure and I remember people around here being in scramble mode about what to do next. Shawn Marion? Rashard Lewis? Maybe trade Pierce.
However, they still had some young assets that they were developing (Jefferson, Allen, West, G. Green (some thought)) that people felt good about & they still had Pierce, which is a big trump card on anything that Philly currently has on their roster. Plus, they still had the #5 pick.
Ainge took over a team with two all-stars. Philly was in rough shape when Hinkie started this process.
It could still fail, but I'm still very interested to see how the process turns out in a few years. Phase 1 is clearly over. Now they need to start building a team with all those golden eggs.
I'm not sure Phase 1 is really over. They could very well have two top 5 picks this year which would be a result of Phase 1.
I'm also not so sure I'll consider anything there to be golden eggs yet.
The phase where they do everything in their power to shamelessly lose is definitely over. It was going to be over anyways, though. The team literally didn't sign a single vet this previous summer. They filled the roster with d leaguers to maximize the tank. At this point with the influx of talent from the draft, saric and possibly embiid, they would be wise to start building a winning culture. No more intentional losing.
That is a bit of stretch, Philly added 2 undrafted players McConnell and Wood. Wood was cut (though was just brought back on a 10 day contract) and McConnell doesn't look too bad. They also added Landry, Stauskas, and Marshall. All guys getting decent minutes on other teams the prior season. The top 5 minutes leaders for Philly were all on the team in the 14-15 season and #'s 6 and 7 are Stauskas and Okafor (Okafor would be a lot higher if he didn't miss so many games as he is 2nd in mpg). They should have re-signed Smith, but they thought they were getting a replacement in Marshall who was injured longer than they thought (same with Wroten). Had Philly started the year with Marshall and Wroten healthy, there is a good chance they don't start nearly as badly and they don't take near the heat they did and perhaps Colangelo is never brought in.
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