Yeah.
Truthfully if I actually wanted the team to lose on any given night, I wouldn't even watch.
Culture of winning or tank?
- Thread starter str8line
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Truthfully if I actually wanted the team to lose on any given night, I wouldn't even watch.
Jesus that hasn't happened in quite a while....
The Fresh Prince
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I remember way back when, when we had a team who's best players were Andrei Kirilenko, Raja Bell, and Carlos Arroyo. We won 42 games that year, and it drew attention from players across the league so much that we had Kenyon Martin considering signing with us.
Of course, we went with the better choice and got Boozer, but we also got Memo.
There's guys out there that will see the winning, positive culture and want to buy in if we do excess expectations and become a Cinderella storyesque team.
There's always the chance that Brooklyn has loads of chemistry issues and has a very bad year. I think this teams culture, and chemistry, and playstyle is too good to tank.
Of course, we went with the better choice and got Boozer, but we also got Memo.
There's guys out there that will see the winning, positive culture and want to buy in if we do excess expectations and become a Cinderella storyesque team.
There's always the chance that Brooklyn has loads of chemistry issues and has a very bad year. I think this teams culture, and chemistry, and playstyle is too good to tank.
So basically, you would be happy with having a solid team that makes the playoffs every year but doesn't necessarily have the high-end talent to win a championship? That's exactly what we've had the last 6 years. Wasn't the whole reason why we blew up the roster and started a re-build because being a good team but not a great team wasn't good enough anymore? Didn't we all want more? Aren't we trying to build a roster that can be a true championship contender? I don't want to half *** this rebuild, I'm all in on being bad in the short term if it helps us win a championship in the long term.
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And shutting down Robinson (as they should have for any number of reasons).
Handlogten's Heros
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We drew attention because we could offer the most money. We had a **** ton of cap space. Booze we got cuz he swindled a blind guy to get out of his contract. We didn't get that done because we competed honorably.
Our prize for that winning culture was Kris Humphries... instead of a shot at Dwight... other guys in that draft Okafor, Deng, Iggy, Ben Gordon, Shaun Livingston. Not a ton that get me too excited but all would have helped more than Kris and we still would have landed Booze/Memo.
Handlogten's Heros
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I'm cool with the Jazz approach for 20 games... as it does give the young guys a good culture starter kit and it will increase the trade value of all the vets if they continue to play well. We also should be like 6-14 the first 20 even if we are solid. At that point you get whatever deal you can to offload some of the vets imo.
The Spurs didn't tank to get Duncan. Their best player got hurt, didn't play most of the year, and their other good players fell off a cliff in production.
On the flip side, the team that did tank for Duncan, the Celtics, didn't get him.
Agreed. Then if we do offload some of the vets, we can have the best of both worlds. We can compete, play hard, and establish a culture while simultaneously losing a ton of games because we don't have enough talent/experience to win many games.
You have a lot to learn about being a sports fan. Overreaction is our only response to everything.
Handlogten's Heros
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Still probably lands us 5th or 6th best odds... but at least there is a chance.
Didn't he do a back or have shoulder surgery or something? They also won the 1st pick with something like a 2.9 percent chance didn't they?
The Fresh Prince
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I mean we did have a bad season after that anyways, but eventually made the Western Conference Finals, but that's beside the point. You don't have to solely rely on the draft to build a contender.
To my knowledge Al Jeff, Jameer, JR Smith, Tony Allen were drafted late in the draft. You can find talent outside of the lotto.
And we also have a load of draft picks to use to our dismantle. It would be great to lose most of our games this year and get rewarded with a high lotto pick, but it isn't the end game if we exceed expectations and are a play-in team this season. There's other methods outside of the draft to build a contender.
Well I'm no professor in "Tanking" but there are different types of tanks..
There's the natural tank, there's the "man-made" tank, then there's stuff in between.
Natural Tank - is when your best player(s) goes down for the entirety of the season.
Man-Made Tank - situation I believe we're in right now when we make a conscious decision to trade most/all of our best players and be bad for 1-3 years.
Then there's stuff in between where your best player only goes down for half a season, but you shut him down for the entire season, trade out some players for picks during the season. I don't think it matters how you tank, it's the result you're looking for. Getting great talents that you could have for years to come.
Take that 2011/12 season for GSW. They already had Curry. The year before then went 36-46, but declined to 23-43, just bad enough to snatch the 7th pick from us which they selected Harrison Barnes. Curry, Klay, Barnes became their promising big 3. (Plus Draymond who they got in the 2nd round)
In 2011/12 you could argue they had the Natural Tank going with Curry being injured, but they also played Klay very sparingly down the stretch to get bad enough to dip down and snatched the pick to get Harrison Barnes.
Overall they were bad enough for a number of years to grab Curry, Klay, Draymond, Barnes - the CORE to their team and look where they are now.
2008/09: 29 - 53 - Drafted Steph Curry
2009/10: 26 - 56
2010/11: 36 - 46 - Drafted Klay Thompson
2011/12: 23 - 43 - Drafted Harrison Barnes & Draymond Green
2012/13: 47 - 35
2013/14: 51 - 31
2014/15: 67 - 15 - Won NBA Finals
And by the way - the majority of the CORE they had during the bad years are still with them today.
I think that is a GREAT blueprint and one that I believe Ainge is trying to replicate with the Jazz with the current rebuild.
The Fresh Prince
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What I think a lot of you are not putting into consideration is if we made a team meant to bottom out then we aren't going to reap any benefits in 2024. We have 0 draft picks that year, so even if we do get a nice pick in 2023 with our pick, we aren't going to draft anybody valuable beside them the year after.
We have 3 first round picks this year. We're bound to draft somebody valuable with one of those picks.
We have 3 first round picks this year. We're bound to draft somebody valuable with one of those picks.
With all due respect, I'm kinda over "solid squad"s. This franchise has been very good at that, little less and little more.
Having all-time great luck at drafting isn't a plan. Good thing they weren't above tanking either. Did nothing to their longterm culture and it is one of the most egregious cases in recent memory.
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