Speaker 1: What is up, Fellowsikos, I am Dan for Valley, coming
at you with the one, the only, the certified, fantabulous
mister Grant Hughes. As members of Team hashtag Accountability, we
are here today. We are gathered here today to regrade
the twenty twenty four NBA off season for every Western
Conference team. We already did the East. Go back and
check it out. The link will be in the pod
and YouTube description. I believe. So we went through that,
We're gonna go through the West. Now, we have not
done our report cards for the twenty twenty five offseason yet.
We refuse to, at least as of now, until those
four restricted free agents, you know, wrap up their damn business.
That's what we're waiting for, everybody, Grant, before we get started.
How that are you?
Speaker 2: I'm just waiting for Cam Thomas to end the off season.
That's I really.
Speaker 3: We've talked about four guys, but it's really just him, right,
Like is he gonna take the qualifying offer?
Speaker 1: No? You know what?
Speaker 2: I like?
Speaker 3: Are you waiting around and like hoping that just like, oh,
I just need closure?
Speaker 1: Like I have sort of I have wondered a little bit, why,
like U ta and Brooklyn hasn't maybe tried like Brooklyn
saying well, let's just renounce Thomas and go give an
offer sheet to Quentin Grime. So I thought about that
a little bit.
Speaker 3: But that's but that's on brand for you, because that's
like your favorite thing, like the fucking with other teams
with offer sheets.
Speaker 2: Love it, really, you really love it.
Speaker 1: And we used to be a proper country where NBA
general managers to get out off for sheets to other
teams as our face to fuck with them. Mean you
know who was the team that used to be the
captain of it themselves?
Speaker 2: Yes, Sean Marks is still the same guy, by the way.
Speaker 3: I mean, I guess maybe he's evolved, or maybe we've
all realized that, like.
Speaker 1: Actually he's drafted four guards.
Speaker 3: Maybe well he's evolved into some very different thinking. We'll
see how that plays out.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Uh no, I I do miss the days.
Speaker 3: I do miss the days of the Alan Crab Shenanigans
and uh so on and so forth.
Speaker 2: But uh that'll end when it ends. We're talking.
Speaker 3: We're going further back though, because we're gonna talk about
regrading our grades from last offseason. And I kind of
wanted to put a finer point on what we're doing here,
which is to say, like it's really just re emphasizing
kind of some things we touched on, but let's like
really hit a couple things in terms of the criteria. One,
every team has different goals and we're doing our best
to I don't know, guess what those goals are. Sometimes
it's obvious, right, like contenders are trying to contend, rebuilders
are rebuilding. It's the mushy middle that gets like trickier.
And so as we're grading how moves worked out, what
we're really kind of doing is is answering the question
of how closely did this team's moves align with its
goals as nearly as we can tell what those goals are.
And then if we don't agree with like what a
team was trying to do, just on a base level,
it's probably gonna hurt the grade because if we think
you should be rebuilding and you're making short sided moves,
even if those short sided moves are like okay, well
that was a decent value, like you're gonna top out
at a pretty low grade because we just don't agree
that that's what you should have been doing. On a
macro level, so that's one and then two, Like, I
think maybe we can discuss this, but I think the
main focus of this is more process than result. So
like that made last edition Sixers grade really tricky because
we like the ironically talking process, Like we like the
process of what the Sixers did in the moment, the
results were terrible and we really had an issue like
trying if I didn't I just gave them an F
because I guess I fixated on the results.
Speaker 2: But you know, we are.
Speaker 3: More process oriented. I guess, like, was this a good
move in theory in light of what this team was
trying to do at the time, right, And if a
guy suffers a catastrophic injury that ruins that transaction, Like, well,
I don't know, bad result, but I at least am
going to try to be more process focused. I don't
know how you feel about it, but you can weigh
in on that or let me know. Is there any
other sort.
Speaker 2: Of criteria that we need to lay out more clearly
before we start.
Speaker 1: Well, I think the process is important. I think it's
also we have to have knowledge what would the alternative
route have looked like? And I think this is going
to apply a lot to the current Denver Nuggets off
season for me or I've been fairly critical or I
should say skeptical of the MPJA for Cam Johnson trade,
and like I still sticking points with it, like you
could have negotiated to get Zeke Nagy and there would
be one of my sticking points. But when you start
to go through the list of like what else could
Denver have done? Once it's twenty thirty two first round pick,
it doesn't seem like the Bulls weren't going to give
you Kobe White, and that just kind of that fixes
one problem, but then it creates another when he's headed
to free agency so after this year. And then the
other thing is I do kind of focus a little
bit on well, like what happened they did this what
But you mentioned you're not too focused on the results,
but like it kind of matters that in this instance
we talked about with the Lakers, the Max Christie deal
that ends up being used to acquire Luka Doncic. I
don't know how to and the Lakers off season in general.
I don't want to get too deep into it because
this is part of it, but like we were pretty
critical of them not being more aggress they ended up
like had they traded some first round picks, maybe they
wouldn't have been able to get Luka Dancic. No, I
don't think that they were sitting there waiting for Lukadancic.
They even seemed surprised by that. But I do think
that matters too. It's to like, maybe what did the
orf the Warriors. They signed some of these guys and
then Kyle Anderson's able to be put into the Jimmy
Butler trade, or we we ironically criticized them for not
being more aggressive going after Paul George. Right, oh yeah,
by not doing that it turned into the helped them
turn into the Jimmy Butler trade. So that's not everything,
But I do because they're not sitting there saying, well,
we're not gonna go after Paul George because we know
he's gonna be injured and we know we're gonna get
Jimy Butler for much less. So's it's a tough balance,
but I think it's important to at least discuss.
Speaker 2: I'm I agree with that.
Speaker 3: I'm a little less comfortable, like assuming I know what
the roads not taken might have been. I think that
is absolutely a factor and there are some cases like Denver,
like you brought up, where it's like, I think it
is fair to consider like opportunity costs things and like
other options that you decided to forego in favor of
the thing you did. I will weigh that a little bit.
But I'm gonna try harder to just kind of look
at assuming they canvassed all their options at the time
and or were aware of, like what else they might
have been able to do reasonably. I'm gonna assume that,
like they decided this was the best choice, and from
a process based perspective, do I agree with that, you know,
in the moment, and then maybe factor in the results
of like how did this turn out? But I'm not
going to sign a percentage to it. But it's like
ninety ten or eighty twenty process versus result and somewhere
sprinkled in there by the way, these are subjective, like
we don't have a rubric for.
Speaker 1: This well, but the rubric is a C is average.
People get or met expectations. People always get mad that
their team got to see and in some instances we're
here for the debate. I just don't like the rage
over like how like C has met expectations and so
if you expected them to do less than that and
they were able to do more, outline it in the
comments or our discord. Go links to the podcast YouTube description.
We'll read it, maybe respond to it. But like it's
not like a C isn't really an insult. Now if
they're being downgraded from like an A to a C, like,
then we have the discussion. I think the final note
here would be we didn't we great, we did these grades.
I think it's September. It was September fifth, twenty twenty four,
So we will note the moves that weren't part of
the grade. We're gonna throw the transactions that we reacted
to last year, and then at the end of it,
going through the big stuff if there was anything notable
like in the Timberwolves's case, shocker, the Karnthy town's trade
had not gone down yet when we were grading, so
that will be a part of it. I think that's
it on my notes. How about yourself, I'll call it there.
Speaker 2: I think I think that's a sufficient preamble.
Speaker 3: Also, though, no, sorry, just getting last thing. We're gonna
like work big to small. We are focusing the grades
mainly on the the big moves have the biggest influence.
I feel like that's intuitive, but want to try to
lay that out up front.
Speaker 1: All right, we begin not alphabetically. It's separated by division.
I have no idea who's first. The Dallas Mavericks. I
can take us through some of the big stuff. They
traded Ariel huck PORTI I think that's an f right there.
So they did the Tim Hardaway junior trade that ended
up they had to give up seconds. They got Quentin
Grimes back, the best player in the deal, then used
him to get Caleb Martin. That's a weird transactions of events.
Naji Marshall for part of the mid level. We love
that deal in real time. We both really liked the
Klay Thompson deal. They signed him for three years and
fifty million dollars. They had Spencer Dinwiddie on a one
year minimum as well, and then getting Brandon Williams on
a two way ends up being pretty big when you
looked at what he did last season and how they
needed him to kind of fill those holes after the
Luka Dancic trade. So we will reveal what our grades
were and are going from towards the end but Grant, like,
how do you square away all of this knowing what
the Mavericks then did during the season just by blowing
it all to hell?
Speaker 3: I mean, the the the Dickhead analysis is basically like,
these are incredible moves because they're all pretty good, and
we know that they're capable of really stupid decision making,
which they did later, that's not really gonna factor. And
I don't know, I think this team and the Lakers
are both kind of like what do we do with them?
Because the Luca trade just like wasn't foreseeable coming down
the pike and just totally redefined their seasons, and so
I kind of have to divorce the Luca. I think
I'm viewing these moves like the Mavericks did at the time,
which I think was how does this build a good
supporting cast around Luca who took us to the finals
like two months ago, or like what you know at
the time.
Speaker 2: Basically, so we.
Speaker 3: I'll be honest, like, well, I listened back to this
and I was kind of surprised we were as high
on it as we were.
Speaker 2: We love the nause Marshall.
Speaker 3: I think maybe that had a big, big part to
play because there was like, oh, you're losing Hardaway and
you're losing Derek Jones, Junior Ken Naji Marshall just replaced
both of those guys potentially for part of the mid level.
I think I think that's still like a smart signing.
I also think that the Klay Thompson deal like looks
a little worse from a result standpoint, because he did
basically just have like his worst season since he was
a rookie. But he was still like a good shot
it fine, like shot it great for anybody else, shot
it fine for him and filled the role they they
needed him to fill at three years fifty, that's totally fine.
And then Josh Green, who you know, you know my
stance on Josh Green, hated to lose him, but like
he was a zero for you know, he didn't do anything,
so it didn't cost them much. Overall, this is still
a very good offseason. I think if we can just
divorce the whole, like, well, Luca's not in the middle
of it anymore.
Speaker 2: Do you agree with that? Like, are you still pretty
high on it?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I I am still very high on it. I
think Clay, you could make the cases arguably more important
now because of just their need for spacing when it
looks like how they're gonna use Cooper flag the Kyrie
Irving injury. That's I just think the deal is fine,
Like it's not a moveable. What I also liked about
that trade, which you rather indifferent to or skeptical of,
I thought they did great to get off of Josh
Green's coat.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, you know, one of these days, I'm gonna
give up the ghost on Josh Green. That day was
not September whatever, twenty twenty four. I was still very
much in on Josh Green.
Speaker 2: At the time.
Speaker 1: I don't The thing that I'm getting tripped up on
is just the order of operations with Tim Hardaway Junior
and Seconds becoming Quentin Grimes becoming Caleb Martin is just
so bizarre but looks like a disastrous acquisition slash. That
contract isn't great. We loved remember when he didn't he
went to the Sixers and we applauded them for that.
This isn't Cody Martin where it's been a few years
since he's been available, so that could still they have
a lot of rangey defenders on this team right now.
And so whether or not you agree with the direction
now I think matters. But their offseason that they had
last summer doesn't actually look worse. Even if you want
to figure out what are they doing right now, there's
nothing that hamstrings them long term. You look at Klay
Thompson and say, well, if your window is Cooper Flag, yeah,
that's weird. But the MAVs still fans right The MAVs
also right now still fancy their window as right now
like the Nico Harrison still cringy that. Oh. I think
MAVs fans are understanding the plan now is as if
the plan was to get lucky in the lottery. So
even if you want to take into account what happened
with Luca, I don't think that changes how you viewed
this off this last offseason at all.
Speaker 2: I just don't think.
Speaker 3: I just don't think you can factor in anything about
Luca trade. I think I just it's too there's too
many like that introduces too many variables and it complicates
things too much. I think maybe we could jump to
how we've changed their grades. So you had them at
an A plus, I had them at a day I
should say too. Part of that was like the Mavericks
didn't exactly go into the off season looking like a
team with a lot of flexibility or options, right like,
So that is a huge We should have maybe mentioned
that earlier. That's a huge component. Oftentimes we're grading a
team on the basis of, like what it did with
the resources available, and it looked like the MAVs did
not have much in the way of resources at the.
Speaker 2: Time, So that's part of it. You've gone down to
an A minus.
Speaker 3: I went from A down to a B plus, still
highly favorable grades. I think, if anything, I'm knocking it
down because Thompson was a little worse and because the
Grimes thing was just a weird series of transactions that honestly,
if they just kept Quentin Grimes and like he'd been
Sixers Quentin Grimes, this would the grade wouldn't have changed
for me, No.
Speaker 1: It wouldn't have, but I think he he would have
been more useful on this team. And Ka Kayla mar
is just redundant in a bunch of ways. I did.
I didn't dig them for this, but we were high
on the fact that they extended Nico Harrison last summer.
I would like to point out.
Speaker 2: Maybe maybe that's an f maybe we need to scrap
everything we just.
Speaker 1: Said, Would you like to take us through the Houston
Rockets off season? YEP.
Speaker 2: Drafted a pod favorite, Read Shepherd at number three. That
was a big one. They traded number four.
Speaker 3: This may seem small, but they traded number forty four,
who became Pela Larson for AJ Griffin, who became not
an NBA player anymore.
Speaker 2: We like pel.
Speaker 3: Larson, AJ Griffin, wish him the best, but he's out
of the league. Brought back Jeff Green, picked up Jayshon
Tate's option. Aaron Holliday, no big deal there, Jonathan Williams,
Nefali Dante, and Jack McVeagh. A bunch of two ways there.
So this really kind of comes down to Shephard. And
then there were some transactions we did not grade that
I think probably need to be heavily factored in. And
I will address my regrade when we get to it,
because I actually forgot I didn't think about the off
season signings that were not factors. Alprin Shangoon and Jalen
Green both got their extensions, so maybe we can talk
about those individually as we get to them. But we
loved their off season. We were both high on them.
I'll just spoiler it. We're still high on them, and
I'm gonna have to amend my grade to reflect that
we both had A minuses.
Speaker 2: You moved up to an A, I moved to a
B plus.
Speaker 3: I think in light of Shangoon and Jalen Green, who
again we're getting too far into the results, but that
the process of that Jalen Green contract, which was from
the moment it was signed, everyone agreed designed to be traded,
got traded and got you Kevin Durant. So I if
I were re regrading my regrade, I would be up
there with with you at an A instead of a
B plus.
Speaker 1: I think in this case though, the results would be
important because had we graded the Jayalen Green extension, we
would have said that's an overpay in a vacuum. And
they turned it around and helped it helped get Kevin Durant,
and it didn't drum up your opportunity cost much because
the number ten pick you would have had a hard
time fitting. They had to get rid of Cam Whitmore
afterwards because they didn't think they had playing time. They
ended up selling low on him. But like it almost
when you look at well, they had to send out
other salary to make the money work anyway, and Brooks
makes sense it the Jahn Green contract ended up not
costing them at all, so that's big. But what I
would point out is so five years, one hundred and
eighty five million for Opera and Shangoon, the scale, the
way that they gained it perfect. They are like the
only team that seems to negotiate with their high profile.
They're doing it right now with Kevin Durant. They did
it with Jabari Smith junior Alpernheng Gun. Honestly, last summer
more than this summer, had a case to be considered
a max player. Oh yeah, and this extension, even with
him kind of having a down efficiency year, it doesn't
look any worse. If anything, Just kind of knowing what
we expect from other guys or seeing what other guys'
money are getting, it makes you feel better about it.
So I just home run off season by them. And
by the way, part of this for me, and I'm
not kidding, is just the Red Shepherd pick. There's nothing
that has happened that makes me all like they should
have taken player ads. No, I think Reed Shepherd was
the pick. I think he's going to be the best
player from that draft class, and I think he proved
a lot of that at least moments in Summer League.
And maybe I'll have egg on my face there, but
that also contributed to me. That's what's fun about the
regrades too, is it's tough to grade the pick of
rookies in the moment, even if you think they were
all alternatives. We don't have a real NBA sample size
now with Reed Shephard, we still kind of don't. But
that's also what's a little bit fun about regrades is
you're taking a look back at, oh, this is who
they selected where what were their alternative avenues?
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I agree with all that.
Speaker 3: I really liked the reputation of the Rockets getting established
last summer as a team that is not going to
rubber stamp Max's I.
Speaker 2: Think is really interesting.
Speaker 3: I don't know how it factors into a grade, but like,
I think it's good in the sense that it did
probably give them the ability to tell Jabari Smith Junior,
like hey man, like Alpern Shang Gun didn't get it,
like this is this this is a good deal for
you relative to that, So take and it's like we
love the Jabar Smith extension this summer. I wonder if
that becomes a potential negative down the line where teams
or players are like, well, if I go to Houston,
I'm gonna have to fight for every dollar. Like that's
that's not ideal long term, but I think for purposes
of the grade, like you just can't view a I
don't know if it's below market, but it's certainly a
below Max uh signing for Shanoon and Green really like,
I think there are a lot of teams that would
have just yeah, here you go, five years, Max, you
got you know, you're both, you're both good young players.
You could get this somewhere else maybe, and they just
rubber stamp it. So kudos to the Rockets for I
don't know, holding strong.
Speaker 1: I guess yeah, there's a lot of masterclass team building
going on for them over here. We move on to
the Memphis Grizzlies. This is this was this was tough.
Regrays normally aren't that hard for me? Grant this one
was hard for me. Yeah, So taking taking us through
the major business, drafted Zach Idiot number nine. Drafted Jawn
Wells at number thirty nine. They traded number fifty seven.
This matters. I promise Olrich Shamsha for camp Spencer. He
signed a two way. He's actually someone I would just
keep an eye on or not. Yeah, they traded Zira
Williams and Dallas' twenty thirty second to Brooklyn for d'achite.
He was waived Lukenard one year, nine point three million
dollars after having fourteen point eight million dollar team option declined,
and they sign Jay Huff to a two way. Now
we know has been traded Indiana. It looked like he
was gonna have they had injuries. It looked like he
was gonna have a moment, and then he kind of didn't,
sort of faded. We weren't fans of the offseason. It
was and I think you in retrospect, this was a
team that still won forty eight games. They didn't use
their non text preimer level exception. They made it that
the trade deadline.
Speaker 3: That by the way, sorry, not using the mid level
was a huge factor in us.
Speaker 2: Yeah, dinging them. That was like a because of what
you just said.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they still won forty eight games, But like this
was a team that was coming off the season from
hell and was supposed to be Like I don't know,
are they going to be top three four in the
West and you didn't use the mid level? We at
us you were went in on them for it, and
I was with you, but like that that is the
I think may if you had to boil it down
to one reason that we were so hard on him,
like that was it they did not use the mid
level to improve a roster that like you guys are
going for it right like that jaws healthy whatever, like
you know, we thought, uh, surely he can't, you know,
like that was that's so that speaks to like kind
of the criteria we laid out, like if you have
if you're in a certain position as a team and
you don't use all the available resources to like get
to the goal that you should be going for, that's
gonna hurt. So anyway, that that was the reason mainly
that we were so low on.
Speaker 1: Them, and I it's well, and I think that becomes
the question now, did they take the correct approach in
not capslock going for it? When one you look at
what happened to their season, two what happened in the
rest of the Western Conference, and then three what they
ended up doing this Again that's two results based but
it's look at what even their off season became to
where it's we weren't sure about Zach Edy and we
know he's injured, but he was good. Jalen Wells we
probably had no priors on. He was my rookie of
the year.
Speaker 3: Like I like, that's a I mean as much as
almost anything else here, probably more so the fact that
he was a starter on a good team all year
and a huge as a role player role, but it
was an important one at thirty nine. Like that's I mean,
they saw something nobody else did and they have to
be credited for that.
Speaker 1: And even look the Cam Spencer thing, again, that's not
something that we would have had strong priors on, but
this is just like it's it's a potential hidden gem
for them. Just when you look at what he's able
to do, and he shot forty six point five percent
on seven point two to three point attempts per game
when he was was that the summer league numbers that
I had, Yeah, during summer League'm sorry, I don't Why
have those shot it down? And just the type of
volume and the way he was firing off of it
and the things that maybe he could even do as
a playmaker maybe want to tighten his handle. But but
like I'm just saying, like they got mind really excellent
value out of trading ould Rich Shamshe and but now
I look at this team and it's okay, Like I
guess that it's easy to say it looks like they
got good value for what they did. But does that
excuse them for not doing more? Is the thing that
I struggled to grapple with.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I think that's right.
Speaker 3: I mean, ultimately we both moved their grade up quite
a bit, but that is partly because it started very low.
Speaker 2: You went from an F to a B minus. I
went D plus to C plus.
Speaker 3: And if you're watching, it's really the guys on the screen,
it's really Wells and Edie, Like they essentially got two
starters in the draft, one of which was the thirty
ninth pick. I mean, you know, the we go back
and we struggle with, like how heavily do we wait
the draft, especially last year since just like such a
crap shoot, And everyone agreed that, like, I don't know,
there's like fifteen guys that are probably about equal at
the top of this thing after the first couple of picks,
So maybe this is a results based but they identified
two guys that could play major roles and they did that.
So I mean, from a process perspective, I think that
still is pretty laudable.
Speaker 1: They I still just and the reason I think they
don't like, well, why is it an a then when
you're looking at the value they mind, it's just they
were a team that was supposed to do more, could
have done more, and even something like you should have
explored the Marcus trade market probably sooner because that you've
gotten with maybe not giving off a first round pick
and a straight salary dump.
Speaker 2: Sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we move on to our next team is
grant the New Orleans Pelicans. You want to take us
through their greatest hits?
Speaker 3: Yeah, the team that we, we and everyone else spent
the whole summer saying, oh, they don't have a center.
They don't have a center. They drafted Eve mecI at
twenty one and he became a center for them. They
let's say, they don't care about the second round swaps.
If you're watching this, you can follow along. We're just
trying for the listening audience to the hit. The big
numbers picked up pose Alvarado's two million dollar team option.
The biggest item of all traded Dyson Daniels, Larry Nance,
E J. Liddell, Cody Zeller Lakers twenty five first, twenty
seven first the lead, which is the least favorable of
Milwaukee New Orleans top four protected for de Jonte Murray
Daniel Tice was the other center they kind of snagged later.
Nothing else of huge, Sorry Dan for you. Javonte Green
got a one year minimum deal, so aplus.
Speaker 1: Still in THEBA by the way.
Speaker 2: Still playing.
Speaker 3: So I don't really, I mean, we were pretty down
on this, and that's before.
Speaker 1: While being high. Sorry, I was down on them, while
being way too high even for in the moment on
the Dejonte marriage.
Speaker 3: Well right, so to have been down on them and
like I get yeah from a prom. Here's here's where
the process based thinking gets tricky. Is it's like, I
don't know on just at the at the moment the
trade was okay. The fact that you're, you know, you
just who's gonna have foreseen that Dyson Daniels was gonna
turn into what he did, Like I don't know, like
it that's that's such a such a an out it
feels like an outlier result that like you can't. You
just can't have expected that. I don't think I I
can't claim to have expected Daniels to be like number
two in defensive Player of the Year. So uh, I
didn't like the trade so much, but like the fact
that it worked out so poorly, we are just like,
I don't know, I guess you just have to factor
that in somehow. I'm not sure really what to what
to do with that that exactly.
Speaker 1: And there's also the other thing here is that the
whole brandon Ingram situation probably the resolution it reached, Like
we gave them praise for not just relenting and paying him,
but then it took way too long for it to end.
And if you were a team, it's just they constantly
seem caught between trying to win now without properly or
fully committing to it. And last year was an extension
of that. I think the Dejenttey Murray trade might have
signaled that, oh they were kind of leading in one
direction and injuries throw that awry. But even then it's
just the center position needed more proven depth. Then like,
let's go out there with the Daniel Tyson. We're gonna
rely and Eves me see who ends up panning out.
So it's fine. This afseason was just all over the
place and it's tough to look back on. I think
you removed the Dejontay Murray injury from the equation. The
Dice and Daniels breakout coupled with the value of what
those picks look like now is just it or the
one pick I should say the other was one. It's like, okay, whatever,
like that's that's rough stuff. That's like just to sort
of say the least there. And so I I and
one of the players I liked. They just didn't play enough.
And I'm curious now they have so many centers. Well
Makovic even get minutes this year. The answer is probably no.
Who knows there, But uh, we were not surprisingly grant,
we killed them a little bit, and I don't know
if there's reason to pull back.
Speaker 3: D pluses, then D plus is now for both of us.
We did not factor in the Trey Murphy extension, which
is a pot like I like that deal four for
one twelve, but I think just in light in light
of how badly the Murray trade turned out, I think
that more than offsets it. The Murphy signing, like and
and mec is probably the other big hit, but like,
how big of a deal is that really? So they
just ended up having to stay stay put at the
D plus because just you know, the couple good things
did not counterway the disaster of the Murray trade.
Speaker 1: mecI seems like he was an excellent fine in that spot.
And then I love the Murphy extension too. I think
that was a great piece of business. But that's good
enough for a lateral grade there. Then we move on too.
I think this is the San Antonio Spurs are up
and they are my team, so I will take us
through their big business they this was their off season
was fascinating, the sense that I think people wanted them
to do more. They traded number twenty six, number fifty
six and two other second rounders to this is the
Denver Nut. What am I a grand Oh my god,
I'm on the wrong team. I'm reading the wrong teams.
Speaker 2: San Antonio on the screen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I have the wrong team on my screen that
I'm looking at. I apologize everybody. They drafted stephanas number four.
They traded number eight. It was Rob Dillingham to Minnesota
for a twenty thirty swap. Top one protected and a
twenty thirty one first rounder. Other big business here. They
traded Devonte Graham in a second to Charlotte. They signed
Chris Paul one year ten point five million dollars, had
Mamu on a one year minimum deal, and they guaranteed
champennee salary. We love him. Around these parts. They did
not have any major pieces of business correctly that we
missed out on, so we were like, I think the
discussion at that point was kind of should they have
done more? Given how good Victor Wembinyama was. It was
nice to have Chris Paul as a veteran, but were
they too future focused at the moment? And it turns
out I don't know if they were saving part of
their power specifically for a dearon Fox trade, but they
made the right call by taking the more measured approach,
which we had agreed with in real time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think a lot of the.
Speaker 3: A lot of the uncertainty about like the whole when
when or when are we gonna go type of thing
around wembin Yama that persists I think even even now,
because clearly he's great.
Speaker 2: He was incredible.
Speaker 3: He was a top five MVP guy for me before
he got hurt last year. So it's like green light, right,
and the Spurs haven't completely gone that way. But I mean,
if you just look at these moves in isolation, I
think Castle at four that's a win. You identified the
guy that won Rookie of the Year and you picked
him after three other players came off the board. So
from a process perspective, like I think you clearly get
a little bit of a bump there. The Dillingham, well,
it wasn't really Dillingham, but the number trading number eight
to Minnesota for a swap and a twenty thirty one
first rounder. Do you agree that, like kind of whatever
you think about when the Spurs should be going for it,
Like that's just a good decision just to get two
first round assets.
Speaker 1: Based off everything we know about Rob Dillingham right now. Yeah,
it's an unequivocal yes, yeah, just.
Speaker 3: That that has to look better and maybe Dillingham becomes
good enough to where that's an interesting discussion. But at
the moment, a twenty thirty swap and a twenty thirty
one first rounder, like that's just worth more than a
number eight pick. I think, even if even if that
number eight pick had been like in a rotation for
most of the year, so that's another win.
Speaker 2: The rest of the thing feels.
Speaker 1: Like sorry, but by the way, they used one of
those picks they used the twenty thirty one first round
or as part of that Darren Fox trade.
Speaker 2: There you go.
Speaker 3: So I mean, well that makes it even more interesting
because you're you're using that asset for like, Okay, there's
our win now bump. But I feel like everything the
Spurs do is just based on I don't know, they
almost kind of take everything case by case, like is
this a good enough you know, they're just gonna be opportunistic,
like yeah, yeah, we'll take Fox for this price. I
don't know, it doesn't really fit into like a we're
going forward in twenty twenty nine kind of you know,
they're not that tied to any particular approach.
Speaker 1: I don't.
Speaker 3: It seems like to me, which is I don't know.
I guess there's room to criticize that as like, well,
you're not being you know, goal oriented enough. But like
I like the the optionality it gives them and how
opportunistic they can be. So we let's see, I'm looking back. Yeah,
we were both like pretty high on this. It was
a bee for you and a be for me. We've
both moved up. You went to A minus, I went
to B plus. I think I would say too that
the Chris Paul decision was was a smart one. He
played every game every last year, like I mean, and
he was I think he was helpful to the young guys,
so correct thought process there and it worked out probably
better than You can't expect Chris Paul to play eighty
two games?
Speaker 2: Are you kidding me? Like? That's just that that's a
huge win.
Speaker 1: That's the most like Spurs development is having an age
ninety or Chris Paul will come in and just play
in every game. I also, I know this couldn't have
factored in because had they kept number eight, I don't
think we assume Rob Dillingham wouldn't have been their pick.
But like that decision, knowing what player went there, it
makes the decision look better because of what ends up
happening in this draft lottery where now we're what the
Fox and Harper and Steph Castle, So it makes that
trade look even better from that perspective, I agree. Next
up is now we have the Denver Nuggets, whose transactions
I was bravely reading during this Antonio's first section, they're
your team.
Speaker 3: If you cared, Oh, okay, Reider, then I mean you
had so much practice at him, I thought you'd want
to take another pass at it.
Speaker 2: Let's see.
Speaker 3: So, yeah, this is fairly relevant. They traded number twenty six,
which was Ryan done for and number fifty six, which
is Kevin mccullor junior, a twenty six second and a
twenty thirty one second for Doron Holmes a second. This
is a very much results base thing because he got
hurt immediately and missed the season. I think that's a well,
that's an interesting one if if this isn't part of
the grade. But I just want to ask, like, if
you had known that Ryan Dunne was going to have
exactly the season that Ryan Dunn had last year, would
you rather have had him than Holmes forget all the
other assets?
Speaker 1: No, on this, I don't know. I guess you could say,
well that it would insulate them against really feeling like
they had to pay I won't say Aaron Gordon. Let's
say Peyton Watson, but he doesn't do what this team needs,
which is they would need more of an offensive punch.
I think from that position, and I like the idea
of what still even following me achilles injury. Of course
he was good in summer League. I like the idea
of what Holmes could provide, but that's still a TVD
in it if you're doing it right now, it's what
we know what Ryan done. And I even like Kevin
mcculluor Junior, but it's just like, these are two non
shooters and the Nuggets need shooting, and they have shooting
now and potentially in a big.
Speaker 3: Yeah, sorry to get us on a tangent there, but
I just think that so anyway, like I think what
we land on is we almost can't grade that yet
just because Holmes hasn't played, and from a process perspective,
it like it made sense only mostly small time moves. Otherwise,
they traded Reggie Jackson. They signed Russell Westbrook to a
minimum deal. He did opt out or he didn't pick
up his player option for for this season, so they
got a one year rental there. Dario saraz got two
years ten point six million. Uh, atrocious, then atrocious now
even though he's not on the team anymore. Well, yeah,
that you can't, but they hold on. I know where
you're going, But you can't have known that was gonna
get you. Yonas valentiunis you can't. You don't get the same.
Speaker 1: I just like to point out it didn't take a
second round pick or more. I think they would have
had won to trade anyway, like it didn't. They didn't
have to use that to wipe him off. So sure,
what's that meme? I see this as an absolute win.
They played the long game grand yeah, two time.
Speaker 3: They're thinking they're the like the Third Eye Timeline DeAndre
Jordan got a vet minimum. Vlacko Chanchar got a minimum.
Some two ways happened what we did not take into
account because it hadn't happened yet. Jamal Murray four for
two oh eight and Aaron Gordon three for one oh four. Uh,
that kind of cancels out. I guess when we don't
love and when we I mean Aaron Gordon is worth that.
Speaker 1: I think I think he's probably worth that. But do
you you think it was either smart or not smart?
I guess I don't want to say stupid of them
not to have him decline his play, because they've kind
of kicked the can down the road of being expensive
and I guess you could argue that, I get it
would have enabled them to do things this offseason. It
would have been more complicated. Maybe you're not looking to
get Cam Johnson back and a Michael Portergriert. Just how
do you square away all that? Because now he's just expensive?
Where all right, this makes you cheaper in the short term,
but you've just made yourself more expensive over the longer term.
Speaker 3: I think the other thing is they let CACP go
for nothing that we haven't really we haven't fixated too
much on like who got away but for Denver. So
just to get back to the core of what we're
talking about, Denver's trying to win a championship, the moves
it made, and the decisions and the moves it chose
not to make KCP leaving even though he sucked in Orlando.
Speaker 2: Just from a process perspective, we hated this because like
what are you doing?
Speaker 3: Like how are you not? Just this needs to be
a full go for it situation. You need to be
thinking boldly like I just so we gave them an
f both of us because these moves all feel just inconsequential, unambitious.
I think probably because I wasn't factoring in the Murray
and Gordon stuff, I think I probably should come up
from an F but I don't know I could. I
might be able to get there with you on the
D minus that you came up to, because you're coming
up from an F minus. That's a big jump for you.
So maybe you should be talking about how much we
hated their process. But it's hard for me to get
much higher than like a D minus if I even
get there, just cause I don't know, Like none of this,
none of this looked to me like a team that
was like, we're okay, let's get it.
Speaker 2: We've got the best player in the world.
Speaker 3: We have to do everything like this team should be
operating like the Bucks have with the Honest where it's
just like, wow, that was insane that they tried to
do that. It may or may not work, but credit
them for trying, and Denver just has never operated that way.
Speaker 1: I think you also can make the case that KCP,
because he was firing on defense lest year, would have
been better at he state in Denver. And even regardless,
it is about asset management to an extent. You didn't
turn into a sign and trade if you thought you
weren't going to keep him. Should there have been explorations
of trading with the deadline that probably would have been
reacted too poorly because you're trying to win a championship.
I find myself I probably could have bumped them up
higher knowing the shark, which is a low bar. The
Schars deal didn't kill them. I liked Deron Holmes, but
the Russell Westbrook addition. I know that he played a
lot of minutes, and people believe he played relatively well,
But there just moments where it was why did you
subject yourself to this experience? And it happened a bunch
in the playoffs and the other thing I'm having a
really tough time with. I. Ultimately, just to circle back
to my comments on the Aaron Gordon extension, it probably
ends up being net neutral. I think there would have
been something in hindsight to maybe redistributing some of the cost,
like it would have been higher this year but lower
in some of like the out years. It would have
made this offseason tougher. So did Jamal Murray extension. Why
couldn't they have negotiated harder? I've come at it from
the perspective of they couldn't spend that money on anybody else.
You know what, though, grant we've seen it this summer.
No one else was given Jamal Murray that money.
Speaker 2: That's the thing.
Speaker 3: And it's like that so that was Forgima, by the way,
That's what I mean. Oh yeah, it's not a like,
well we don't know what, we don't know type of
thing or like what would have been out there. I
think I think it's very fair to say there were
not Like there weren't teams. There's one team this offseason
that was capable of giving Jamal Murray an annual value
that he got on that extension, and like the Nets
wouldn't have done that, Like so just because they.
Speaker 1: Had Michael Porter Junior's money on them, Yeah right, they
got the other guy that's overpaid.
Speaker 3: But you know what I mean, Like it is it
is fair to say what you just said, like they
didn't need to go this high this soon.
Speaker 2: Maybe it pisses off Yokic.
Speaker 3: Maybe there's a behind the scenes thing where he's like
you give him what he wants, like this is the
second best player I played?
Speaker 1: Which case glad?
Speaker 2: In which case?
Speaker 1: Do it?
Speaker 3: But we don't know that, And like Yokich, if anything
has just been up and down forever, saying like I.
Speaker 2: Don't, I don't.
Speaker 3: That's not like something I think about or have influence over,
believe that or not. But like Murray wasn't getting anything
close to this, He just wasn't. Like the injuries and
are one thing, but the dearth of money elsewhere in
the league is the biggest one.
Speaker 2: Like, you didn't have to do this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's I don't think it was a great offseason.
It doesn't look as bad in hindsight, I think because
of what they were able to do with Shari and
Jonas Funciunas and then what we know CACP looked like
in Orlando. But I do think team context had a
lot to do with that. As we already said, let's
get right past the grade image because I left to
Cam Thompson, Cam Johnson graphic in there and he was
not a part of the Denver Nuggus last year, Grant
did you know that? But we move on to the
Minnesota Timberwolves. Tim Connolly. He came back for twenty four
to twenty five with an opt out for twenty five
twenty six. That was big at the time because of
the ownership fluctuation. We weren't sure what was gonna happen.
Chris finch Head coach, got a four year extension. They
made They were the other side of the Rob Dillingham trade,
the twenty thirty swap with top one protection and the
twenty thirty one first for Rob dilling Ham at number eight.
They drafted Terren Shatton junior at number twenty seven, which
looks like it might have been a friggin steal we
did have, so I want to note this. The Rudy
Gobert extension happened at the start of the regular season,
so it can't be part of these grades technically, but
we did not graide the cat trade, which was just
functionally speaking Don Hedevincenzo Julius Randall first round pick that
turned in barg a for Karl Anthony towns Man. Wrapping
my head around this offseason in hindsight, I think the
one thing I feel confident in saying, is there some
moves that I might like a little better. I'm probably
I'm definitely higher on the Town's trade than I was
because I skewered them for it when we reacted to it,
but also I'm much lower on the Rob Dillingham trade,
because our defining question, our central question while we were
talking about them, was you don't make this move if
you aren't planning or believing that he's immediately ready, right,
And they didn't treat him like that. Maybe because he
wasn't ready, he didn't really show enough to assume he was.
That was predictable. There was a lot of people that
were like, well, it's obviously like this is what he's
gonna do. He didn't do that, and the Wolves it
took them a while to find their footing. I'm not
saying as a result, but that's something that absolutely matters
in the context of all this.
Speaker 3: I think if you're gonna be charitable to the Dillingham decision,
it's to say the Wolves knew that he wasn't gonna
be ready, but liked the package of skills he had
enough to sort of view him as like, Okay, Conley
has like another year or two and in you know,
like talking like in twenty six, twenty seven, Dillingham's gonna
be our starting point guard.
Speaker 2: He's gonna be awesome.
Speaker 3: Even that, I feel like is flawed logic and a
bad process, because who knows what any team is gonna
look like in two or three years and you're ready now,
and you have a glaring need at this position that
you think this rookie is gonna fill. I think it's
just it was just a mistake to assume that Dillingham
was gonna be capable of that. And you can't give
up two first round assets for a guy that, just
like I just realistically can't be ready to fill the
role that you need him to fill to justify that trade.
So that drops them for me. That was a bad process.
The Cat trade, I think kind of to me felt
like if he and I hemden Hawd and went back
and forth on who I liked it better for at
the time, and I still kind of feel that way.
Speaker 2: So I'm just gonna call that like a neutral, you know.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 3: And the Dillingham grade is the Dillingham move is what
actually hurts them. I think it drops her grade for me.
Speaker 1: Which is actually, isn't that wild they traded Karl Anthony Towns.
I think the move that impacts their grade the most
is regrade the most is not.
Speaker 3: That, Yeah, which biz are, It's just it's it's Randall
kind of gave them the secondary creation that Cat kind
of didn't and Dillingham couldn't, so in a way they
addressed kind of that the need a little bit.
Speaker 1: I know this isn't a perfect analog, but when you
look at the Gobar extension, the new nas Reed deal,
the current Julius Randall deal and that or the new
Randal deal and then the current Devincenzo deal, it kind
of seems like we could boil this down to the
wolves saying and throw bearing A in there if you
want bearing Jay. Sorry, they decided that instead they could
have had two of Karl Anthony Towns, Rudy and nas Reed,
or this route where they have nas Read, Rudy, Dante,
Devincenzo and Julius Randall. Right, just financially speaking, when you
look at how the money lines up a little bit,
I don't know if that's like I think I'd probably
prefer the former to where where I would rather have
like the four guys than maybe just the two or
whatever it may be. But at the same time, I
still think Karl Anthony Towns is like clearly the best
player off that bunch. Yeah, it's so bizarre.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I get it. Like I think there's logic too.
We like multiple smaller salaries as opposed to this giant
one for cat and and I do think it's fair
to credit the Wolves with understanding if we get this
giant number off our books, it just gives us like
a little more maneuverability. And maybe that's how we keep
nase Red because we know his free agencies coming up,
and maybe that's how we add You know, there's definitely
defenses for it. But again, if you are a Timberwolves
team that is trying to do better than the conference finals,
do you really want to give up the best player
in the deal? Like so, I don't know, it's it's again.
I don't know that I've landed any more firmly on
one side or the other a year on.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that trade. We might have to revisit it like
next year again too, because I think people have painted
it as a win win when right now I'm more
of like, no, it's like more TBD versus TBD.
Speaker 2: Kind of feels like, yeah, I think that's right.
Speaker 1: Would you like to take so I had we both
had bes or no, I had to be you to
B minus. I moved them down to a C plus.
Just the Dillingham thing is what is what drove it
for me and you you bump them down to a
C plus as well, So same page there, although like
are we giving enough weight? I think it's just Arren
Shannon Junior ended up playing a few more minutes than
Jail and Clark last year, so it's I know he
had a great summer league again, but we need to
see what he still does. I think it's gonna end
up being good, but I don't know he's not enough
of getting him at number twenty seven isn't enough you
Those are your last best trade chips that you forked
over for Dillingham and he hasn't shown that he is
worth them yet.
Speaker 3: Right, I think that's fair And like, I don't know
how we're trying to not weigh the draft too heavily.
So it's like a twenty seventh pick, even a good
one is kind of like I.
Speaker 2: Don't know, you're just rolling the dice.
Speaker 1: Will be different if he's coming, if he won Rookie
of the Year last year, Like, yeah, that definitely changes
the complex of the great.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we did credit Memphis for Jalen Well, so got
to stay consistent.
Speaker 1: Would you like to take us through the Thunder's transaction.
Speaker 3: Sir, Yeah, let's start with the drafted Nicola Toopic, who
do not play at number twelve. We like him, but uh,
I don't know from a process perspective, love it because
we're good enough that we don't need the guy to
actually play.
Speaker 1: So let's he simplified their rotation. They didn't have to
worry about playing him. That's top not good move.
Speaker 3: Traded Josh Giddy for Alex Caruso. Stellar results there, just
the process was just as good. You needed someone that
could play in a finals, and Giddy probably couldn't have
gave up five seconds for Dylan Jones. Got Isaiah Harten
signed for three years in eighty seven million. There's a
team option on the third year of that. Just the
hits keep coming. Isaiah Joe four years and forty eight.
Aaron Wiggins five for forty seven basically turned Lindy Wahs
a third into aj Mitchell, who was fucking awesome.
Speaker 2: Until he got hurt.
Speaker 3: I just and then and then signed Mitchell to the
to a two way. I think they later canverted him.
So we loved it at the time. It's like what
no notes? Everything worked right? Like what didn't work? Is
any anything?
Speaker 1: It's I think you could say, did Aaron Wiggins and
or Isaiah Joe wind up playing smaller rows roles? Excuse
me than you would have preferred? And it's those contracts
are just so digestible, and both of those players would
be I would argue in twenty teams's top seven or
eight rotations of the league.
Speaker 3: Sometimes they're in this team's top seven or eight, you know,
depending on the week, like they're it just depends like
like yeah, like there's so we had them as a
plus's you added some extra pluses. I don't believe in that.
I feel like I don't. I don't believe. I don't
you don't have any grading integrity because a plus plus
plus isn't a grade. So I just loved it as
an A plus.
Speaker 1: Do you know what's funny? We're gonna move on here
a second. We were just this offseason was just so
certifiably great that we spent most of that thunder segment
last year. That was a three hour podcast, by the way,
so just go back and and listened to drum up
the algorithm Jews for us. We just argued over who
would close more games, whether it was Truso or hard
and side like that was the only thing we talked about.
Speaker 3: Basically, well, there wasn't there was no there was nothing
to criticize like and there still isn't it.
Speaker 2: So, I mean, one of the best off seasons wee.
Speaker 1: If you have an argument against Okase's offseason last year,
I would love to hear it, slash read it.
Speaker 2: These are all gonna come in from Australian ips. All
the criticism will will be from down under.
Speaker 1: We run at Portland Trail play man last off season
was so much more interesting than this off seas now
realizing that now, but the Portland Trailblazers. They drafted Donovan
Clinging at number seven. They traded a number fourteen, which
became Bub Carrington Malcolm Brogden at a twenty twenty nine. First,
it'll be the second most favorable from Portland, Boston, Milwaukee
to Washington for Denny Avdia. They traded number forty, which
was Ohsoegadaro for number fifty two, which was Quinton Post,
which they then traded for cash. So that's minus minus move. Yeah,
are you willing to include extra mindus.
Speaker 2: On that I am in special circumstances.
Speaker 1: I am picked up Delano Banton's team option. They had
Devonte Graham at the minimum and we did not miss
any major transactions on there and correct double checking, no
we did not, So we were most of this was
spent and rightfully so there were some Donovan Klingon questions
and so I actually want to start there because I
know you said we shouldn't factor too much of the
draft picks. I was so out on Donovan Klingon. This
was not unpredictable. He came in and was fantastic defensively
for them. There's a lot of questions offensively he did
he end up making All Rookie I know we had
him on an all rookie team, doesn't matter. He was
in the conversation. He played that well. And then the
other thing too, is we were trying to wrap our
heads around the Denny Afdia trade because you see a
team give up a twenty twenty nine first round pick
and they're the Blazers and they're still in the middle
of a rebuild, in the early middle of a rebuild,
and you start to Okay, afdi is young, he's on
a nice contract, but that contract might not be extendable grant,
So like, is that a trade that matters. It ends
up looking that move in hindsight. I also think because
clearly Malcolm Brogden, we wondered, oh, did he have like
any second round picks multiple value? No, he didn't. Washington
just let him come off the books. Yep. So, and
I like bub Carrington, but Denny Havdia is by far
and away the best asset in this deal and was
fantastic for sixty seven percent of the season.
Speaker 3: No, I think Klingon did make the All Rookie team.
By the way, I think Klingon is still tricky just
I mean from a process perspective, they had forty seven
centers on the team and we flagged this at the time.
It's just like is he gonna play? That was a
big thing, and like, so, okay, maybe this portends they're
gonna trade all these guys to clear room for him.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 3: So I don't think the questions we had were unfair.
It just turned out that he delivered on like literally
everything that you could have hoped that he would given
the type of player he is. So, I mean, it
just turned out it turned out to be the right pick.
Speaker 2: You know, That's fine. The Avdia trade is still I
think I think I'm with you. I love Avdya.
Speaker 3: I think he's a really good player, super underrated, not
enough people know about him, and he was a star,
like you said, basically for the entire second half and
maybe more than that. From a process perspective, you're giving
up a really late lottery pick and a first even
though it's not like a super useful asset. Like I think,
maybe this is where it gets foggy, because Portland was
pretty good last year, so like, I don't know shit,
does this make sense because Avdia was part of the
reason for that, but also like the reason they were
good is because they're young guys got good and and
drove the winning down the stretch. And Avidya is kind
of like in the middle of the veteran versus super
young Scoot Shade and Sharp kind of group. But so
I think ultimately Island where you do, which is that
Avdia is just the best player in this deal, the
best asset in this deal by a lot and even
if you may not be able to extend him, like
he really matters for a Blazer's team now that I
think even even a year ago was like we're gonna
be pretty good because if you don't think that, you
don't make the Carrington trade. So I think they get
credit for like seeing what was maybe possible and getting
Avia on board. So we I mean we were high
on them, you know. Anyway, relatively speaking, we both had
him at a B minus.
Speaker 2: You went to a B plus. I went to a bee.
Speaker 3: Just Clinging worked out in the Avvia trade. That's I mean,
those are the main things, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And the one thing I just wanted to add
about Clinging because you mentioned about them having a trillion rosters, uh,
centers on the roster. But oh man, we have a
trade to report grant. But well, we're gonna finish our
Blazers talk first.
Speaker 2: It must not be a big one.
Speaker 1: Uh it's Heywood, Hi Smith? Ser Okay, are you okay?
Speaker 2: I mean I thought he got hurt.
Speaker 1: He did, but so really quickly. I think it almost
shows like kind of like how they took Jan Hanson anyway,
even though they had cling in. There's a level of
respect to be had, Like if you identified that you
think is either the best player or someone that can
really impact your team, and you took clingon anyway, I
think that there's merit to be had there, But yeah,
it's the it's the Avia trade, and maybe there's some
questions about it down the line. But we also talked
about in that segment Grant, we said, couldn't you just
see this team being like a league average or better defense?
They finished seventeenth and we're like top ten for a
good chunk. So ye, we called their depth, we called
their defense a plus. Stuff from us is all I'm saying.
That doesn't change breaking news on a trade that we
could just talk about since we're here. The Miami Heat,
per Shamserani, I have traded Hayward high Smith and a twenty
thirty two second round pick to the Brooklyn Nets for
a twenty twenty six second round pick. Now my reaction
to this, I like Hayward high Smith. I'm just sort
of wondering, like, is this injury worse than weeks? He's
not the type of player that I would have thought.
His deal is so cheap that you have to include
a distant second round pick. I know you're getting one back,
but this just like, why didn't they get the second
round pick without including Is his injury that bad? I
thought he was only out for eight to twelve weeks.
Speaker 2: Well, what's he making six or seven million something like that?
It was because he signed two for eleven.
Speaker 3: Do the Heat need to move exactly that much money
off the books to do something bigger? Like is that
I don't have the cap sheet up in front of me.
That's my first thought is like, oh, what's well, why
would you come out of the tax?
Speaker 2: Okay, there it is. That's actually what it is. I think.
Speaker 1: But that's like a useful So I guess you're really saying,
when you're looking at Miami's roster, you really trust I
mean you have Looking defensively, you have Wiggins, Davion Mitchell,
though he's not really a wing. Maybe this means that
they really have faith in Pellet Larson yeah, Souse, Yeah, okay,
I would say, and maybe Brooklyn thinks they can flip
him because he's the type of player that a contender
might want once he's healthy. At the deadline, I would
have thought, I would have thought that you could have
gotten I guess he's injured, so it's rough, but I
would have thought you could have gotten a finished like
a plus one in the second round pick department for
Hayward Heighsmith.
Speaker 2: That's what I would have thought.
Speaker 1: We could continue regrading though. Just so there's there's the
off season bomb everyone was waiting for. Do you want
to take us through?
Speaker 3: The Utah Jazz, speaking of Bomb, drafted Cody Williams at
number ten.
Speaker 2: Sorry, Also, I believe.
Speaker 1: Summer League made me believe we're back, so back, we
are so sick.
Speaker 2: You know what.
Speaker 3: You kind of have to dig in because you were
so high on him. I think, I think you can't.
You'd be a fraud if you gave up this early.
Speaker 2: Even as bad as I.
Speaker 1: Know that, I say, I think Reed Shepherd is gonna
be the best player in the draft. And I came
to that conclusion partly because Cody Williams was number one
on my big board and it just wasn't working.
Speaker 2: He quickly proved that he would not take on that title.
Speaker 3: That's the final bad thing I'm gonna say about Jalen
Williams brother. So I only good things from now on.
The Jazz also kind of offset that because they got
Isaiah Caller at twenty nine, and he, I mean took
over a starting job basically by the end of the season.
Put as much stock in that as you want to.
Given where Utah was competitively but still and then got
Kyle Kyle Philipowski a number thirty two, like even better,
he was the best.
Speaker 2: Of the Jazz's rules.
Speaker 1: He was the best offensive rookie, right. I guess Jared
McCain had he stayed healthy. But who else was a
better offensive rookie than Kylee?
Speaker 3: I mean yeah, just from I don't know of like
ceiling wise, if I just based on last year, it
was him. I think it's just so to get him
in the second round. Great talent identification and great willingness
to take on a guy who everybody was like weirded
out by his off court story. Got Drew Eubanks two
years nine point eight million, traded Chris Dunn. That was
a sign and trade for Russ, who they bought out.
Losing Chris done doesn't really matter to them, but the
upside he provided for another team will affect their grade.
LORI markin and this is kind of the big one.
Didn't trade him even though that was kind of one
of the big subplots of the offseason is where's he
gonna go?
Speaker 2: How long are they going to wait to resign him?
If they do so?
Speaker 3: They renegotiated and extended his deal his salary went up
to forty two point two million last season and then
got four one ninety five on top of that was
not tradeable based on the timing of when he signed
it last season. Is tradable now for whatever that's worth.
Gottzphema Kailak for four years fifteen million that I think
covers the bulk of Johnny Juzang four years eleven million.
Speaker 2: One of those is guaranteed.
Speaker 3: Interesting structure there, But that's about it for Utah. I
don't know, Like I think most of our grade here
was the market in stuff and the draft, which we
definitely liked, just because Collier was a guy that was
a super highly ranked prospect until he had a rough
college season, So I was in on that. You like
Cody Williams a lot. I liked him just fine.
Speaker 1: Thanks for reminding me, Yeah, Dan, did you do.
Speaker 2: You remember Cody Williams?
Speaker 3: What you thought about him, just anything in particular? So
you gave them a C plus. I went B minus.
We have both dropped those grades. I did it mainly
because the market in thing just doesn't look better today,
and I think there were foreseeable reasons why that would
be the case. But I'll turn it over to you
to explain what you thought about it.
Speaker 1: I think that's part of it. I'm ultimately just because
because I think they got good value out of Collier
and Philipowski. I'm multiply okay with it. And they also
made like one of the things that we harped on
rightfully so was they need to be bad enough. And
it's funny we went through we Grant I both relistened
to this by the ways three hour podcasts, and we
talked about, well, this is how many teams we know
are gonna be better. They're gonna end up being like
fifth in the lottery. That's what we said. Well, I
think nail to stuff again from us, but we said
they needed to be bad to get that top level prospect.
They ended, No, you couldn't have predicted it. Ace Bailey
would still be there. You couldn't even predicted their spot.
They did that, they took the steps to do that,
and so now did that have anything to do with
their transaction process. Maybe not. But like one of the
things that people hemmed and hot over was did renegotiate
and extending market and imply something else or would he
do too much for them to maybe not play someone
like Philipowski yet points or I think that deal does
look worse though in hindsight is the trade value they
could have gotten for him, even as an expiring contract,
exceeds what they could probably get for him right now.
But it's not so far below water that he can't
come out of it. And so this almost feels like
I'm dinging them for it. But I also it doesn't
sound like the offers for him were like I would
need to see. It's like the offers with the I
hate to continue bringing this up, they're like a pinata
for us, but the bulls. We know that there were
two first round picks on the table at some point
for Alex Caruso. They didn't take that. We don't know
like there wasn't some four first round pick offer that
we heard about for Larry market In. But if there's
I can't sit here and argued, Oh, that contract looks
a lot better now that it did this time last year.
Speaker 3: And I think again trying to stick with like what
was knowable or like what could you have surmised at
the time, it like market In was coming off just
I mean, actually he's not coming off his best season,
but it was like, I don't know if he's gonna
stay at that level, Like, isn't he maybe more valuable
with a smaller number that you could kind of work
into any kind of deal. And then also like, again
they did end up being bad enough, but the deal
for him, assuming you thought he was gonna play all year,
which maybe they were like, oh, we're just gonna shut
him down and get fine for it whatever, Like this
deal doesn't make sense in the context of we're trying
to get as bad as we can because he's your
best player, and you just brought him back and then
you bumped his salary up to this crazy number that
now is like probably tradeable for I don't know, even value,
but you're not like you're not getting the Godfather offer
anymore for Marketing at this rate, and all of that
I think was like something you could have seen potentially
or as like a likelihood even so I dropped him down.
I do think like overall, I feel like mission accomplished.
Their record was terrible, but like the Marketing deal just
doesn't square and looks worse now in a way that like, yeah,
I'm not surprised.
Speaker 1: We move on too. Our next team is the Golden State,
your Golden statere we go, Flip it around, flip the
cap around, get it done. All right, here we go
Golden State Warriors. They traded quite Post for Wendy Waters
the third, but they got Quinton Post backs.
Speaker 2: They got him back a plus what a roller coaster.
Speaker 1: Signed the Anthey Mountain for one year twelve point eight
million dollars. That was the non tax payer mid level
Kyle Anderson they got for three years twenty seven million.
It was a sign and trade. It was part of
the folding to of the Klay Thompson going to Dallas,
and they ended up shipping him out. Of course, Buddy
healed acchoired via sign and trade for Dallas' twenty thirty one. Second,
he had only two years of his four year deal guaranteed.
That was nifty Steph Curry signed a one year extension.
So he's now in the books for through two thousand
and six and twenty seven. Do we miss any other
big pieces of business? Oh, the Moses Moody extension was
not on here. And then Post Quinton Post signed his
two way after we did the grades, just for just
for grant, you know, just.
Speaker 3: To keep as much quintin post content in the in
the loop as possible.
Speaker 1: So how do you feel about this now? Grant we
gave it. We were pretty favorable on what they did.
We talked a lot about because the mumblings going around
was they tried to get marketing, they try to get George.
We can't pay for them to go harder after Paul George.
At the time, I did not age well, but they
kept themselves flexible and they made their roster better. We
talked a lot about the defense one year later. How
do you feeling about this?
Speaker 3: I think it was I think you can go down
the list and view, now, look like this is not
the roster that ended the season. But I think I
think you can argue that it was kind of by
not by design, Like I don't I wouldn't say that,
like they had the crosshairs on Jimmy Butler.
Speaker 2: All they knew they.
Speaker 3: Were gonna flip a bunch of guys in Wiggins for Butler,
like that was the plan. I think they liked this roster.
They liked the depth, they liked the defense, and they
got great results with it.
Speaker 2: Early in the season.
Speaker 3: Remember, all we talked about was the depth and Buddy
healed can't miss, Like he's like dramatically outperforming Klay Thompson
in a similar role like all the.
Speaker 2: Like, it looked very good.
Speaker 3: Melton got hurt, healed, cooled off, Anderson just kind of
generally wasn't helpful, and then they packaged up some contracts
and turned.
Speaker 2: It into Jimmy Butler.
Speaker 3: So like, I think it worked pretty well as like
a strategy for the full season until injuries and like
some regression, and then they pivoted because they left themselves
that out by not going and doing a Paul George
thing or a marketing thing. They had all these movable deals,
they didn't give up a bunch of picks in a
superstar trade, and they do go get Jimmy Butler. So
I think it looks pretty good from like a just
preserving optionality standpoint, Like they didn't over commit to risky stuff.
Maybe that was for you know, not for lack of trying,
but they didn't make that crazy deal. And then they
ended up getting Butler, I think for a good price,
and he turned them into like a very like capable,
like dangerous playoff team until Steff got hurt. So like,
I don't know how you move this grade down, not
saying we are. But I don't know what the argument
would be for moving it down.
Speaker 1: I think you could just say, well, could they have
predicted any of this? And I think to some extent
saying that George and Marketing had a down season even
though we didn't predict it, it wasn't unpredictable and so
they deserve credit for that. And by the way, it's
also remember when the Pacers simn Bruce Brown in that contract,
they were able to use him in the Paschal Siakam
deal they wind up using They couldn't have predicted DFAML
would get injured, but he wound up being on a
deal that they moved to get Dentis shruter, and they
also ended up moving Kylie Anderson in addition to Dentnis shooter.
But like it's part of getting their like they're Jimmy
Butler Transaction Tree. That's those are deals that they signed
that remained immovable. We're at least digestible enough to get
things done. And the whole thing is is if you're
the Warriors, it's not in that case identifying necessarily a
specific opportunity, but remaining flexible enough to capitalize on whatever
opportunity should arise and picking the right one. They apparently
either passed or didn't go hard enough after Again, we
were wrong or I was wrong, I should say, I
think I was a little bit more critical of them
than you were. We were wrong on that, like they waited,
and that proved out to be the smart move. So
I moved my grade up and it was a pretty
easy decision for me. I went to I had them
at a B. We both had a B. I put
them at an A. You put them at an A
minus because you're a hater.
Speaker 2: That's right, Yeah, No, it's I think you have to.
They just have to be moved up.
Speaker 1: I don't.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 1: Also, we joke turning the number fifty two pick in
some variation into Quentin Post. Yeah, that's he's he might
start for them next year.
Speaker 3: So my my affinity for Quinton Post is only like
ten percent, a bit like the other.
Speaker 2: The other ninety percent.
Speaker 3: Is sincere and I mean it, and I'm thinking about
getting a tattoo. No, I just think, I yeah, like
we we're not gonna overweight the draft, but like, I mean,
that's just a home that's a home run, Like just
to get someone that does anything in the fifties. Although
even though they traded him and traded him back, like
that's kind of funny.
Speaker 2: But they knew that that's a faculty. They knew, they
saw it.
Speaker 1: They know, greatness, we continue our job through the Pacific Division.
We're gonna to eat some crow on this one. Take. Yeah,
here we go to those Clippers. All right.
Speaker 3: So the Clippers signed Tyleru five year, seventy million. That's
probably that's right around the going right for coaches now,
drafted Cam Christy at forty six. James Harden Big News
to year seventy million. He has since opted out and
signed another.
Speaker 2: Two year deal.
Speaker 3: They got Derek Jones three years for thirty. They traded
Russ and a bunch of stuff for Chris Dunn, win
Ken Porter Junior two years four point eight. He's on
the Bucks now, but Toom two years nine point six
Bamba on a minimum if eats the Zoobots three years
fifty eight point six million. I don't know if this
was done at the time. I don't feel what it was.
Speaker 1: It was. We were recorded, like, yeah, yeah it was.
Speaker 3: And then let I mean, maybe the thing that's not
on the screen if you're watching, did not bring back
Paul George, and we absolutely destroyed them for that, we
were both equally guilty. I made the preserve of the asset.
I made argument. I made the if you know that
multiple teams, the Warriors and the Sixers are willing to
pay him this, by definition, you should pay him that
and then trade him for something because you've got an
You understand what his market value is because other teams
have established it.
Speaker 2: You brought up the like, if you.
Speaker 3: Are willing to do this with Kawhi, why aren't you
willing to do it with Paul George.
Speaker 2: The same deal was on the table. We just from
every angle, we just absolutely murdered him.
Speaker 3: And we both gave the Clippers an F and they
did not turn out to perform like a team that
had an F off season.
Speaker 1: And it was nothing they did was dumb luck. I
think you can still make to preserve the asset. Like
the whole extension negotiation process, to me, knowing the information
they had on Paul George, were they gonna guess that
his season would look like what it did in Philly?
I don't think so, But they seem pretty adamant about
going their short term route, and we were saying why
even trade for James Harden if there was a chance
that you were gonna let Paul George walk. You apparently
had a very specific timeline in mind. It was risky,
make no mistake, but you ended up making it work.
And I think the merits of the Zobots ex and
everyone who's watching on YouTube ig nore. I forgot to
change the graphic on a Clipper side. Bradley Bual is
in there. It's fine. I mean they wouldn't have been
in a position to get Bradley. All roads lead to
Bradley Beal, so a home run off season for them,
and like that Zubot's extension. I actually was just writing
about the most underrated players over the half decade, and
this is it's some like you take into account stats,
but I honestly believe like Zubots was number one for me.
He just last year he got some defensive recognition, but
last year felt like the first season at any point
in his career that he ever got even close to
the amount of expect that he reserves. To have him
on that extension where you're paying your starting center, what
is that in terms of the salary cap like ten percent?
Nine percent eight percent, it's nothing.
Speaker 2: Do you think so we both you went to an
A plus, I went to an A. Do you think
what else would you like them? Well, here's what, here's.
Speaker 3: Here's the thing, my my hesitance, hesitation. I guess, uh,
how much of what happened with the Clippers last year
was like like I don't know, like James Harden was
an All Star again for the first time in like
four or five seasons, and like Kawai kind of had
a pretty standard Kawhi season. But zubots it's not a
late career leap, but it's a leap a time in
his career that's kind of like, well, that's we were
surprised that he I was surprised that he reached the
level that he did. The defense was incredible, Like, it's
just the only reason I don't go a plus is
I think some of this was just like such like
a high like a ninety ninth percentile outcome from like
a luck perspective. So they're just enough of that in
there to where the process was great. They're getting an A.
But I can't go all the way to A plus
just like, first of all, because the thunder exists, and
I don't want to cheapen the A plus by giving
a similar grade to the Clippers, But do you know
what I mean, Like I think some of this, some
of this was a little lucky. Like again, like they
were in a position to know what Paul George's health
future might look like better than anybody, and so maybe
they were just they just bet right.
Speaker 2: But also like Paul George had.
Speaker 3: The season from hell, and I don't know, like if
he had if he had had a fringe all star season,
is this is you know, I don't know. It just
there's some amount of results based luck involved here to
the point that I'm not ready to get there with
you on the A plus.
Speaker 1: It's it's funny about the how to wait results versus process,
But I just don't the results matter of course we have.
Speaker 2: That's the thing.
Speaker 3: It just makes this tricky because this is the bottom
line league, right, Like your record is what matters.
Speaker 2: That is the definitive result.
Speaker 3: But I just think if we're grading like they're thinking,
it's was great, it's getting an A.
Speaker 2: But there's just that like.
Speaker 3: Harden really like I did not like I can't believe
you had the season you had last year. I was
like pay Paul George. Let Harden go like, don't that's
I mean?
Speaker 2: I was wrong. I was very wrong.
Speaker 1: Well that that's a weird take to have when they
clearly didn't have like another floor general.
Speaker 3: I didn't care. I was just that low on Harden.
This wasn't a lot of thought that.
Speaker 1: I think you just like made the strongest argument of
you moving up to an A plus.
Speaker 2: Maybe I did. We should probably move on before I
keep continue arguing with this though.
Speaker 1: We're onto the Los Angeles Lakers, and they fired Darvin Ham.
They hired JJ Reddick a four years, thirty two million
was the estimate on his contract. They drafted Dalton Connect
at number seventeen. They drafted Bronni James at number fifty five,
and game a three year guaranteed deal, Max Christy four years,
thirty two million dollars deal with a player option on
the final season. We were not happy about that. Lebron's
signed a two year uh att one oh one point
three to five million dollar deal, had a player option
that he did not use because the Lakers don't fucking
want him anymore. Apparently that's that they did not do
any major piece of business after that. And look That
was part of why we didn't love their offseason. We
thought that they could stand to be more aggressive. They
were on Lebron James's and Anthony Davis's timeline. The center
position was a wreck, aside from Anthony Davis, who we
all know doesn't want it, Like just the backup five
thing was a mess. It felt like they needed two
more wings, but they were patient and it paid off
for And it wasn't just a Luca trade like they
traded for Dorrian Finney Smith fairly early on. So if
they had given up other stuff or made other moves,
would they have been able to do that. This was
a tough one for me because we were not fans
in real time.
Speaker 2: Grant, no, we were not.
Speaker 3: I think it's easy to forget now, but I think
like one of the defining narratives of last offseason was
the discussion, and we had this discussion on that pod.
I think, of of the Warriors and Lakers, who deserves
the most criticism for not going all in for it?
And we actually landed on the Lakers, which is part
of the reason we gave them an f They just
you got Anthony Davis, You've got Lebron. We also I
at least I constantly pointed out, like there's no way
they both play as often as they did the year before,
so you neat now maybe you're drawing dead if one
or the other gets hurt. Anyway, So if there's some
I don't know, you could counter with that, but like
you gotta go now because these guys are old and
injury prone, and just like what are you doing if
Lebron's on your team and you're not going for it?
So I stand by the f because they really didn't
go for it, I think, And if the Luca thing,
you're right, like, had they gone for it, you don't
get Luca. They didn't know they were gonna get Luca. Like,
there's just there's no way that's a factor in there.
I don't know, in them being kind of circumspect and
their spending and there in their trading. I just I'm
not going I'm gonna need to see like a report
that proves they knew that was a possibility down the
line before. I credit them for keeping the powder dry.
So that said, the Reddick higher looks good. And on
the lesser scale, you mentioned the Finney Smith move, like
that being patient got them that guy that maybe they
you know that that was a smart one.
Speaker 1: They weren't gonna sign anybody as good as doing Finny Smith,
I guess was more so my point like that was
true too so and also the Max Christie deal ended
up like being really really good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I think even if you don't trade him,
I think he's just he's better than that money.
Speaker 2: I give it if you believe in his.
Speaker 3: Upside, which I which I do. So f's to start
for both of us. You moved them to a C.
I went to a D, so we both moved up.
I still just in like, I don't know from a
process perspective, I don't understand being like super careful. They
got Lebron at a discount he took like too many
of you know what a plus good job guys it.
Speaker 1: Was they made. You're right about that. It easily could
be lower. But I go back and there's moves I liked,
And then there are moves that when you look at
the results, they could not have predicted the Luka Doncics thing,
So you don't know how to wait that. And there
are moves that are just bad or non moves that
look questionable or I think that the secondary big rotation,
let's say, is the most egregious thing of it all,
but like it just felt you look back at. I
don't think the offseason stood out particularly for the reasons
that we were expecting it to. They still came in,
they won almost fifty eight up fifty eight, almost fifty games.
This was a tough one for me. I see where
you're coming from to where it's you didn't know you
were gonna be on the Luca timeline, so you should
have done more to go all in on Lebron and ad.
I also don't know what opportunity they passed on, Like
when we were talking we identified some, but when they
go and get Dorn Fanny Smith after that, that seemed
like a more appealing road to travel down of the
things that we we were talking about. Zack Lavine, we
were talking about straight young.
Speaker 2: I forgot about that. I was really trying to get
Zack Lavine to the Lakers. I don't know why.
Speaker 1: So it's just like we were talking about that. Oh,
because they do something while keeping Austin Reeves, and not
only they do something, they got Dory Dory Finny Smith
and Luca and Austin Reeves is still on the team. Yeah,
you would have told me that happened. Uh So, it's
the process definitely questionable. I'm not denied like they stumbled
into that because you could easily say, hey, they didn't
do anything, and had they traded that both of their picks,
they wouldn't been able to get Luca. There was just
that was the single most surprising trade in NBA history.
Speaker 3: Right, it's an A plus result and it's just like
you lucked into it because Nico Harrison only talked to
Rob Polinka like, I don't know how you've that's not
a process thing.
Speaker 1: We are going to wrap up this exercise, Grant, not yet,
because we have two teams left and I can't count.
You want to take us through the Phoenix Suns.
Speaker 3: All right, so the Sun's Uh boy, this feels like
a million years ago. They fired for Vogel and then
they hired Mike Budenholzer paid him ten million dollars a
year and he is not the coach anymore. So they
also traded that. This is the flip side of the
Denver trade. They get Ryan Dunn and Kevin mccallor for
Doron Holmes, and they also got a second two seconds
trying to Royce O'Neil got four years and forty two.
Tyas Jones got a minimum, Bull Bull got a minimum.
Plumb lea minimum, Morris Monte Morris a minimum, Damian Lee
a minimum, a Kogi two year, sixteen million.
Speaker 1: Uh, that's all the.
Speaker 3: Big stuff, right am, I forgetting anything? So we this
is an instructive thing. A lot of minimum signings we
were good with. We liked Royce O'Neal getting sort of
an inflated number because oh, that's tradable. They're creating assets. Also,
they got a Gudaro in a trade for a couple
of like late second rounders. Basically we like Igudaro could
not have known he was going to be something at
the time, so we were fairly high on them. You
gave them an A. I gave him a B plus
and uh, the lesson is, don't pay attention to minimums.
Speaker 2: Uh, don't hire Mike Budenholzer and.
Speaker 3: Uh that's kind of it, right, Like it's just the
minimums didn't work out. The chemistry of the Stars, which
is not an off season grade thing, just never made
any sense. I don't know, like we've I went to
a D you went to a D plus. What if
you had to fixate on one thing, what was the
biggest reason you dropped their grade?
Speaker 1: Buttonholzer, that's a that's a really bad move. The fact that,
like we liked the move at the time, but if
there was like to hire someone even if you can't
say it was totally unpredictable because we've seen stuff go
awry in Phoenix and on Kevin Durant's teams before. But
the other thing here is we liked that they it
seemed like they were able to get so much done
when they just did not have the tools to do it.
And I think you can even look at the ties
Jones of it all, it's just well, what was the
point of getting him, Like, what was just the pointment
the way you used him, or what the type of
sense he made on your team? What was the point
of getting him? So they did they didn't make. But
none of those moves are detrimental because of just the
low opportunity cost of them. I think you could also
Ryan Dunn was a find and so maybe they could
go down to like a C minus or something. But
I really think there's honestly, I don't know that you
could overstate just how bad it is that you hired
a new head coach and had to get rid of
him immediately. Whether that was predictable or not, that is
cataclysmically awful.
Speaker 3: And I mean we didn't or I didn't predict because
I remember saying, look like at the very least what
we know about Budenholzer, like the playoff track record is
what it is, but like he's going to install systems
on both ends, this thing is going to be organized.
Like that's kind of what he does, is like he'll
get things functioning on both ends during the regular season,
and that did not happen at all. It was highly dysfunctional,
and in hindsight, given the way things fell apart in Milwaukee,
I mean like it was kind of like the Suns
didn't have a ton of options.
Speaker 2: I can't even remember who I would have preferred.
Speaker 3: They'd hired, but like there was a little more risk,
and the budenholes were higher. I think even in the
regular season. Then maybe we thought and maybe the Sun
and the Suns maybe should have foreseen some of that,
because like the Milwaukee thing ended as badly as it
can end, and just like, well, no, he's he's he's
gonna be great. Like, I don't know, that feels like
pretty flawed logic in hindsight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just again, even if you couldn't like the
whole theory of this team just never even came close
to cole lacing, and you effectively took this shouldn't be
part of the grade. But you took two shots with
Frank Vogel and Mike Punelser. You missed both times. Yep. Insane.
Now we're gonna wrap things up with your sacra mento. Kings. Uh,
they did some stuff. Mike Brown got a three year
and thirty million dollar extension. He now coaches the Knicks.
They drafted Devin Carter at number thirteen. They traded Sasha
Vazen Gov wanted out of the NBA, Davion Mitchell number
forty five, who was Jamal shed and Portland's twenty twenty
five second for Jale McDaniels. Just one of like the
under the radar got awful trades that.
Speaker 2: Were really bad.
Speaker 3: Any one of those assets for McDaniels would have been
a miss right alone, all of them.
Speaker 1: Malik Monk for they did it for financial reasons, but
spare me, Malik Monk four year, seventy eight million dollars
as a player offs on the final season win OBH
twenty nine. Damar DeRozan got three years seventy three point
nine million, only a ten million dollar partial guarantee one
year three. That was a sign and trade that cost
them Harrison Barnes, Chris Duarte, a twenty thirty one first
round swap, a twenty twenty five second rounder, twenty twenty
eight second rounder, and cash signed Alex Lynn. They had
Jordan McLoughlin, Isaac Jones they signed, they signed as well,
and he's still on the roster. We there was we
were okay with this offseason, but we had questions about
DeRozan's fit, whether he checked enough of the boxes that
they had problems with. We lamented the backup center situation.
They did go and address that at the trade deadline,
only to undo it al season. Where are you just
you're looking back at this and here's before I throw
it to you. The two things that I think really
stand out to me. I don't think we can grade
the Devin Carter pick just yet. There's no one. There
were some players drafted after hims, like, oh, that would
have been better, like what they've done now, it's too soon.
He was injured for last year. But like Mike Brown,
that negotiation, we noted it was awful in real time,
the way it was leaked, how it was they were
at a stalemate. This is all we're offering. And I
like Vivek and the way he negotiates with coaches, and
just the way he've used this roster and even the
people he puts in place. It feels like he's pulling
puppet strings and then he all of a sudden dislikes them.
It's just it's a mess, like top to bottom, just
a mess in the front office structure there, the leadership
structure off the court. If you had any inkling, as
Vivek that you were going to get rid of Mike Brown,
or you could envision a point. I know coaches don't
count against the cap. You do it in the off
season where you were negotiating the contract, rather than upheaving
your entire team in the middle of the year and
then allowing too much of the blame to fall on
de Aaron Fox Visa via the rumor mill. The other
thing that just stands out here, and this is more
of a macro thing, the Marta Rosen deal looked fine,
yeah when you were doing this in no but when
you were doing this in real time and now there
is no move that they inarguably won, you could make
the case they lost basically every single decision that they
made last summer. That is bonkers ineptitude. I just that's
I they're poor fans. You went from this light to
beam era to now you then shot that beam right
in your fans's eyes, and which good for them, they
won't have to watch these games anymore. This is just
like I it was the Marta ros and thing, like, yeah,
they kind of needed a player who did that, but
they needed so much to just triple down on this
look and then liked Aaron Fox, that trade doesn't come
out of nowhere, that there was something going on behind it.
To not address that over the off season, that's another
loss here to me. Anyway.
Speaker 3: I know, I think I think the Brown I don't know, Mishandling.
Does Deern Fox ask for a trade if if Mike
Brown uh one stays on as coach or if he
moves in the off season and like a Saner you know,
like more functional, like like like a normal franchise might do.
Like you said, I don't know, do you follow up
do the Kings? Are the Kings better off without Fox
as he ages and gets more expensive? I don't know, Uh,
but you certainly had to trade him from a position
of weakness, and I think that's kind of the key, right,
Like all of this led to in one way or another,
you losing your best player, a player that like everybody
liked uh in Sacramento, and you had to deal him
following a trade demand that like wrecked your potential return.
DeRozan is, like we we agree, like I we neither
of us, I think are huge fans of what DeRozan does,
especially like in terms of contributing to a winning.
Speaker 1: Team, especially to this team, this type of team.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it doesn't doesn't fit wrong play, but like the
price was fine like that that's okay.
Speaker 2: I think I think.
Speaker 3: Maybe the lesson going forward to learn is even if
the price is pretty good, you have to focus on
the player type and just like does he is he
going to be helpful here? And I think the King's
totally like he's adding DeRozan and later Levine, who's.
Speaker 2: Not an off season acquisition.
Speaker 3: But like, just to further the point, the Kings just
like have the market cornered or like, are I don't know,
elite at targeting the wrong kinds of players to like
get where they think they want to go. They just
and DeRozan is a perfect example of that.
Speaker 1: Here's the other thing too, The price for Derozen officially
wasn't fine. You don't give up control of a distant
first round pick if you have any inkling that the
d Aaron Fox situation is gonna go on.
Speaker 2: Okay, sure, yeah, I agree. I agree with that. I agree.
Speaker 3: And then maybe another failing we can attribute to them
is not knowing that Fox was kind of like clearly
at a point where he was at least thinking about
it future. Right, You don't just suddenly wake up in
January and decide, you know what, things are kind of
messy here, like like certainly you should have known that
Fox had his antenna up way before this. So yeah,
it's I don't know, let's do you have anything else
to add? We should just jump to we we go ahead.
Speaker 1: We kind of now just have proof. And I know
this is delving into this off season a little bit,
but like they don't when they need to carve out money,
and I have to imagine it's Vivek like he was
owning the team when they did that all that shit
to get Rondo, right, he was still thinking.
Speaker 3: So at that point, I think, so the Kenny like
Kenny Thomas and sixers and like gave up two first
so they can sign Rondo.
Speaker 1: Now, smaller scale here, but like the Azankoff Davey and
Mitchell number forty five pick thing just to get Jalen
McDaniels and like save money that way. And then this
summer all for Dennis Shrewder another just like yeah, I
go from Valley again. Smaller scale, but we now kind
of just have evidence that when they need to create flexibility,
they have no idea what the fuck they're doing.
Speaker 3: I look and like we can just grade owner. We
can just grade Vivek because like the Kings have been
a disaster with like a tiny blip of success for
his entire tenure, and he's the only constant now because
they've changed executives and coaches one hundred times like that.
It's just he's he's it. He's the reason the Kings
are the way they are. So B minus for u
C plus for me. Last summer you bumped them to
an F. I went down to a d uh. And
maybe I'm being generous just to offset my typical overly
critical nature towards the Kings, but just like a pretty.
Speaker 2: Big failure and now looking at.
Speaker 3: Where they are today, like in terms of what their
outlook is for the next five years, good look like
I don't know if there's there's not many teams that
maybe the Sixers like that have fallen as much as
the Kings have in that sense, right Like, It's just
it's bleak as hell now, And like a year ago,
there was still some hope that yeh, I don't know,
maybe there'll be eighth or ninth in the West. Now
it's just like this seems going nowhere for a long time,
and it.
Speaker 1: Was It's just they made me yell. I was trying
to keep a measure approach. When I always yell about
one team when we do some type of grades, I get,
I get all yelly and screamy, but I just the
Martin Rosen thing is just what can you get value
for him when you I don't think his deal looks terrible.
But it's not like teams are gonna be barreling down
the door to go out and get him right now.
I just this was it ends up being that. It
really it all comes back to the d Aaron Fox thing,
Like I know the Mike Brown stuff is weird there,
but if there was, just if you didn't know that
you had Daron Fox locked down. Basically most of these
offseason moves should not have taken place.
Speaker 3: You know the other thing too, just to be consistent,
Like we're trying to evaluate what a team's goals were
and how to you know one was that the right goal?
And two did they like act in a way that
furthered that goal? The King's goal last offseason was what
they thought they were going to improve. They thought they
were gonna be more dangerous as a playoff team. That's
why we need Derosen we need we need a mid
range scorer to offset our non spacing center and point
guard who can shoot once every three years. Like from
a process, it's just another way of saying DeRozan is
the absolute wrong guy for this team, and they specialize
in getting it.
Speaker 1: Does it feel do you think that we got a
case of group think? We saw so many people like
insisting it was fine that we should have harsh like
more harshly critiqued it in real time.
Speaker 3: I'll be honest, like I'm sensitive to believe it or not.
I try not to be overly critical of the Kings
because I know I have a reputation of just burying
them no matter what they do, and so I think
I was probably subject to that where I was like,
I don't like the DeRozan thing.
Speaker 2: I'll just it's it's the price is fine.
Speaker 3: And I think maybe I went the other way where
it's just like, yeah, like we kind of what you're saying,
Like I'm trying. I'm trying not to seem like I'm
biased against the Kings, and so like I'll err, i'll
be too charitable. Sometimes I think I don't know, maybe
maybe that doesn't come across, but I that's part of
my thought process.
Speaker 2: It shouldn't.
Speaker 1: But what would you have said about the price paid
for duro? Oh, look at that grant take the victory
lap you want to, Yeah, the only chat I'll put
up on screen? What would you have said about the
Demarge Rosen trade had you known dearon Fox was gonna
leave just that swap was in there, would you have like.
Speaker 3: Colossal mistake because you should reset, you should start over
if Fox is leaving it they should have traded some
bonus if they could have, Like, I like you, this
team is this is it's it's sorry, we haven't brought
this up yet. This is bulls West like this is
the same kind.
Speaker 1: Of thing almost literally, yeah, trade no, right there, that's
a problem.
Speaker 2: That's a problem.
Speaker 3: I think it's fine. Everything's fine. It's fine, meme, everything's fine.
Speaker 1: Do you have anything else? Are you ready to take
us out?
Speaker 2: We should under an hour and a half.
Speaker 3: Look, we could do another tight ninety on the Kings
if you want another.
Speaker 2: Just nice, stay on brand.
Speaker 3: Thanks everybody for listening, for watching. Let us know what
you thought, how much your opinions of the grades changed? Uh,
you know, leave us a comment comments on YouTube, you know, thanks,
thanks every Thanks Tom especially very active in the comments.
Speaker 2: As we're live recording.
Speaker 3: As always, rate review, subscribe, tell your friends, tell your enemies.
If you're not following us on socials, please do that.
Please subscribe on YouTube and especially like the videos there.
Speaker 2: Help the algorithm. Love us back, leave us some comments.
We'll talk to you about our grades.
Speaker 1: There.
Speaker 3: I think that's going to cover it. We'll be back
at some point with an interesting project. I'm not sure
when that's going to drop, but it involves Mount Rushmore.
This whole teas there, so we are going to be
releasing that then, am I surprising you a little bit?
Speaker 1: Who knows?
Speaker 2: Maybe we won't deliver.
Speaker 1: Thanks everybody shoting for me to comment about it now
if you watch it in the end, we're not going
to publish it unless someone mentioned.
Speaker 3: They want to see it about Gauntlet Throne, who listens
to the end of the night shouts Frank Nilo Kin.
Speaker 2: Apologies, Yared Allen