The East 3rd seed is now the East 2nd seed, and the West 8th seed is now the west 9th seed. The reason the West only won 49 with their 3rd seed. OF COURSE the East had injuries, it just wasn't nearly as much as the West. FFS you are arguing that Fultz was a big injury loss.

Are you really arguing that the West isn't monumentally tougher than the East?

West is definitely tougher but last year due to injuries the Cavs were able to get through the playoffs. At the same time, the east isn’t that weak anymore when teams are healthy. Maybe since lebron is gone the raptors will matchup better in the playoffs going forward. Indy has some young players who are getting better. Bucks upgraded their coach and Giannis is sick. Like I think the Celtics and sixers are much better positioned than most the east going forward but I don’t think lebron is a long term monumental shift in power unless kawhi comes over due to lebrons age. While the east loses its best player, the Celtics and sixers are not even close to the top of their maturity curve for most of its young assets.

West has a lot of good teams but some are fake good like Portland or potentially Minnesota. But going forward the warriors, lakers, rockets, Jazz, pelicans all have nice teams and Denver might join the fray soon but the spurs are on the downslide same thug with the clippers. Will have to see how good Phoenix and the mavs are long term. Okc is also in a weird spot where they’re stuck.

Edit* stupid pick not embedding.

LOL@being coached by someone picked 31 spots after you in the same draft. I assume Lebron going to get Walton out of LA.

On phone & thread is locked, but this is a pretty fun post from aejones from 6/28/16:

Doug McD is a good deal at $7 per year, he is also white which figures into things for Indiana because free agents arent knocking down their door.

He can play and they get his peak years; could be worse

+1

this

How are Portland and Minnesota fake-good but Indiana and the Bucks are on the rise? Indy signed Dougie Mc***ets and MIL just emptied the clip on Ilyasova. Portland's team is still quite young even if their average age is misleading, and Minny's best player is 23 plus they were killing it before JB went down. Also, do you really think SAS is going to be on the "downslide" considering they'll be the same team a year older but with whatever they can get for Kawhi or Kawhi himself?

I think you're framing the conferences in a light that supports your argument, but the numbers don't agree. Do you really think Indy/MIL/WAS/MIA hold a candle to POR/UTAH/MIN/DEN/NOP/SAS/LAL?

nodding.jpg

icwudt

Turns out that everyone lol'd Mozgov (& Noah) signings heartily. Except THAKID. He was under the impression that Mozgov was a "beast".

Apparently he was 75th of 76 centers in RAPM the year before signing that deal.

Also, the west is much better than the east. All other opinions are wrong.

I have a plan to turn the Cavs way around in 2 summers. Because of the above they have so much more incentive than any other team in the league to take on toxic 2 year contracts. And there are lots of them and no one wanting to trade for them.

So obviously you start with testing the market for Love trying to trade him ASAP, but potentially trying to leave it for the deadline after hopefully rehabbing his value some. You trade Nance and Korver now. They are cheap enough and help enough teams it should be easy.

Now you have to start getting more creative. You hit up the Magic and offer Clarkson and filler for Biyombo and assets. They need some off the dribble guard play and Biyombo is now 3rd on the depth chart. This also opens up playing time and time with the ball in his hands for Sexton for the Cavs.

Then you hit up Washington and trade Tristan for Mahinmi, Smith and assets. This both improves the Wizards and gives them badly needed space under the tax this summer.

Then you hit up the Thunder. From the Kyrie trade the Cavs have a trade exception that the Patrick Patterson contract fits into real nice. He’s gonna cost them like 20 million in real money next year and 5.5 in cap space the year after. You’d be able to stockpile some seconds for that.

Then you’re left with JR and Hill. Both make a ton this year, with small guarantees next year. With Hill you can keep till the deadline too and rehab his value. Maybe with the ball in his hands more and more time since injury he’ll look a lot better at the deadline. Anyways you survey the land. You see Parsons, as an obvious target to take back, if the Rockets think those 2 can contribute better to a playoff run you can save them some tax money this year and tons of money next year by figuring out a Randerson deal you consider that, and you can look at the Suns. The Suns seem delusional. They seem to want to go from crawling and drooling on themselves, to running this year. They also have a PG slot wide open and want cap space next summer. What kind of assets could you get back from them in a Knight for Hill trade? He also fits perfectly next to Booker and with a 1-4 switch heavy scheme. The Bucks have Delly and Henson on bad 2 year deals you hit them up. Maybe the Lakers don’t trade Deng for Kawhi and don’t stretch him either. Maybe the deadline comes around and you can get back something nice to take on Dengs money? If you don’t trade either Hill or Smith you’ll have the cap space from their small guarantees next summer to take on more **** salary anyways.

Now in 2 summers you have Sexton, at least 2 top 10 picks and all the assets from these moves and the cleanest cap space in the league. You can go a lot of different ways at that point.

Cavs could score but how good was their defense?

Edit: Besides Korver the Cavs shooting wasn’t that good in the playoffs when they weren’t playing Toronto.

Fivethirtyeight has Lakers winning 52 games as is currently.

So Lebron, javale, lance worth 16.9 games. (51.9 actual total)

Lebron probably worth 22, Lance -3

has there been a case in any major pro sport where an elite player is as radio-silent as Kawhi is right now? seriously, we haven't heard anything actually from his mouth about this whole thing - not one single quote from his mouth - and it is just so bizarre.

plz i hope the eff that he strongarms the spurs into some poopoo platter of randle/hart/1st rounders, if for no other reason than stopping the warriors from this balcony dynasty

that's a money ball post

The posting couldnt be any worse right now

This actually seems right if Lebron plays 38MPG, probably closer to 50 if he takes it easier this year. Sad part is that's probably a 6 seed.

Deng had by far the worse season of his career entering his 30's when they gave him that deal.

You won't get any assets at all for Clarkson/Byumbo swap.

Not sure about TT/Mahimni either.

Agree with your general premise to tank the next 2 years and try to get whatever assets you can for anyone on the roster while taking back bad contracts though.

Cap space doesn't matter. No superstars are going to go play in Cleveland now.

Cavs need atleast a 5 year rebuild, they should hire hinkie & try to get a good coach for the long term future of the Cavs.

K.Love is the only guy that gets you anything of use on the roster, just trade him to the Suns for Tyson Chandler, Bender + filler & a protected pick as tis the best you can probably do, maybe Pacers can give you something similar as well.

This is a good post, but every year about 8% of the trades that "make obvious sense" happen because of 1. delusion (most common, by far) and 2. personal relationships (some obvious, some behind the scenes)

That is a hilarious post, great find