This is the dilemma when you look at the entire context. KAT is incredible gifted offensively and is very unique. But he’s also got some big flaws and you can ask the question how much he impacts winning. Half our assets come from trading away Gobert, who does affect winning. How would we have viewed Gobert for KAT? My concern is that we’re viewing things like the guy at the casino “I won $400 today!” but neglects how much they walked in with and how much they lost elsewhere. But, hey, on that one spin of the roulette wheel he won $400. On the flip side of this, beggars can’t be choosers. We’re not going to be able to cash our picks in on Amazon for exactly the guy we want, thus playing into Danny’s “opportunistic” approach with varying results (see Collins, John). We may be looking at guys like LaVine and DLo and less guys like Giannis and Doncic, so it’s not like we can be super picky about passing on someone like a KAT or similar. And getting KAT would be a win, in a vacuum, like the dude at the craps table, but the net effect may have been that dude walked out of the casino -$300.
In 2001, Olden Polynice opted out of the last year of his deal with us worth $2.2M ($7.3M equivalent in todays cap dollars). He failed to secure a contract and spent the next two years out of the league, before he was able to play 12 total minutes with the Clippers in 2003-2004. We have a number of picks and time will tell, but I don’t believe we fully understood the uniqueness of our position before blowing it up, despite some big flaws and limited assets at the time.
The reality is that guys like KAT are the guys we can attain. It may not be reasonable to think we’re getting a unicorn at some point in the future. Do I think KAT gives us the foundation for contention? No. But that’s where we’re at.
