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Predict the Rudy Gobert trade

The Sixers not only tanked for high lottery picks, they also were happy to let players red shirt their first year. It happened with Noel, Embiid and Simmons. Sixers were extremely well set up to compete at the highest level, but they were unfortunate with Markelle Fultz, and they mishandled Jimmy Butler.
They had a comedy of errors, the WORST luck, and we’re forced to bring in the ****ing Colangelos so the original architect never got to finish his product.

Still ended up with a former MVP, a current MVP candidate, a young stud… and will have a semi-legit chance to win it all if Harden is good. They were also a bad bounce away from making it to the East finals and maybe winning a title.

Here is what it took to mess up their tank…

Fultz busts his shoulder up and forgets how to shoot in the weirdest set of events ever.

They trade Mikal Bridges for a guy who almost dies when he has an allergic reaction to sesame seeds.

They give up a haul to get Tobias Harris so they can pay him a ton of money and decide it’s better than keeping Jimmy who could have been the answer to all their issues.

Flubbed up the Okafor pick. Nerlens is never good or healthy for them.

Their all nba forward guard has a mental block and refuses to shoot. Ends up sitting out and forcing a trade.

Also their GM gets caught up in a Twitter burner scandal and is openly mocked.

They stacked the deck enough that they still are a top 6-7 team because if you get a few things really right at the top of the draft it will carry you.
 
Everyone acts like we are guaranteed to get the #1 pick next year if we tanked. What if we got the 4th pick and they ended up being subpar? Then what? Another year of sucking and hoping we get a good player in the draft? How many years is that going to go on for?

It's true that a team needs to have enough draft picks that they can afford to miss on half of them. That's why OKC is stockpiling picks. There's no way they have roster spots for all the picks they have, but it gives them the ability to maneuver in the draft, draft for upside and just walk away if the player doesn't pan out. For every Donovan Mitchell, there's a Dante Exum and Trey Burke. For every Rudy Gobert, there's an Enes Kanter and Derrick Favors.

The ideal "Process" isn't to be bad for 4 or 5 straight years. The ideal process is to do what Boston did, or what the Jazz could do this offseason, and that's flush out all of your existing players and load up on assets all at once. If the Jazz traded out both Mitchell and Gobert this offseason, they could have 3 lottery picks in this draft and possibly 2 more in the next draft. That's 5 lottery picks with the expectation that 2 will hit. Then you've got two All Star-caliber players on rookie-scale in the same age range to build with.

Ainge drafted Smart, Brown, Tatum, R. Williams, G. Williams and Pritchard. But he also drafted James Young, RJ Hunter, Romeo Langford, Guerschon Yabusele and Ante Zizic.
 
The other team the Jazz should look at as a rebuild model is New Orleans. They moved a disgruntled star player who couldn't carry the team to the playoffs, who demanded a trade, demanded his trade destination, and who quit on his team. They tanked one year, got the #1 pick, and traded the disgruntled star for a haul that included a #4 pick, two former #2 picks in Ingram and Ball, Josh Hart, plus 3 more 1st-round picks that they're still suckling on today.

They're now pretty stacked with CJ McCollum, Brandon Ingram, Herb Jones and Zion Williamson. They're about to add the #8 pick in this draft (courtesy of the Lakers), which could be Mathurin, Daniels, Duren, AJ Griffin, etc. They'll be a playoff team next year and still have another nice pick, plus a pick-swap coming from the Lakers. This is despite the fact that they've gotten nothing to show for Ball and Zion so far, while picks like Jaxson Hayes, Kira Lewis and NAW didn't pan out for them.

Then they've got another haul coming courtesy of the Bucks thanks to the Jrue Holiday trade.
 
New Orleans traded AD and got a haul. They traded Jrue and got a haul. They made the right trades and they did it opportunistically. They saw that the team they had wasn't good enough, so they pivoted and viewed their star players as trade assets to cash in when the moment was right.

For better or worse, this is the position the Jazz are in, and New Orleans is the model to follow.
 
It's only better to hold out if you'll actually get better offers. You torpedo your own ability to tank by not trading guys before the season. Huge failure if either Gobert or Mitchell are on the roster game one.
 
We don't trade him and rebuild better around our two states and we pick up Herb Jones, Ingram, maybe a few other players, plus some picks. We have to give up the name and wear boring jerseys. But it's worth it.
 
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