NBA 2019 Off-Season Thread

[savemedrzaius]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Kinda cruel that he basically dragged this on and left the Raps with no options free agency wise. They're definitely in that possibility of going from Champions to out of the playoff next year.


I would expect that all of the love for him will turn into anger at him by game 20 of next year if the Raps get off to a rough spot.


I doubt that he was ever seriously looking at resigning with the Raps.

He actually hurt the Lakers but the Rapsnwere already in the luxury if they signed him or not.

They were 17-5 without Leonard last year. They are most definitely still a playoff team without Leonard.

They go from a legit contender to a longshot darkhorse.

It sucks Leonard left but them the breaks.

This is still a good team.

[SportsJunky]

Chris Broussard was bang on!

[Imported_Aussie]

The Raptors may have been 17-5 without Leonard, but that was also when they had more depth: they have also lost Green, and most of these games were pre-Gasol trade.

They can bring O.G. in at the 3, but there is a serious hole at the 2. They need a 2 with size as well, especially since their bench guards in Van Vleet and Powell are small.

This all being said, it could be time to do a soft reset: lock in Siakam and O.G. then flip the expiring deals to shake up roster.

[devo22]

I'm really sorry for you Raps fans. I hoped he'd return to Toronto too (mainly because of the East/West balance and because I hate superteams), but hey, that trade for him was more than worth it and I think you'll be fine with guys like Siakam and Anunoby.

I'm just glad he didn't end up with the Lakers. A) I've always disliked them (I was a huge NBA fan in the early 00s and they dominated ... and they destroyed my hope of an Iverson championship) and B) I just hate those thunderbuddy superteams. Happy for the Clippers, it's about time they have some success and be the #1 in LA. I take Leonard/George over Lebron/AD in a heartbeat, especially defensively ... add Beverley and that's a nightmare for the oppositions offense. Then you got Williams, Harrell, Shamet, Zubac, Harkless ... that's a really solid group of role players. Losing Gilgeous-Alexander surely stings, but it's worth it. Clippers are going to do a lot of damage next season.

[Sainters7]

...I was actually mostly cool with it until the George news broke. Now it just seems like more super team crap. This league is kind of a joke in that regard.

[Senator Clay Davis]

I'll give more detailed thoughts in a bit, but I'm honestly just so relieved it's not the Lakers. I also don't think this ruins the league either, Clippers are the favorites sure, but the West is gonna be an absolute bloodbath next year. Clippers, Nuggets, Rockets, Lakers, Jazz, Blazers, and oh yeah those Warrior guys....wide open year.

[Cheese]

So much for my prognosticatications lol. Don't like the super teams, but I wish Kawhi well. He doesn't act like a snob. Anxious to hear more on this over the next week.

[devo22]

Raps could have had a superteam themselves it seems.

In a wild night of negotiations, Presti leveraged the Clippers and Raptors off each other, preying on the uncertainties of what the other might be willing to give OKC for the chance to secure Leonard and George -- and perhaps the inside track on a championship. Clippers leadership -- Ballmer, Frank and GM Michael Winger -- harbored fears that Presti was close to striking a deal with Toronto that would've delivered George to Leonard and the NBA champions, sources said.

Had Presti been able to strike a deal for George with the Raptors -- and Leonard was willing to stay -- George was believed to be willing to join the Raptors too, sources said. Presti pursued a package of Russell Westbrook with George to the Raptors -- with the NBA's Most Improved Player, forward Pascal Siakam as the centerpiece of a deal -- and Ujiri balked, league sources said.

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/...ove-clips-deal

[Senator Clay Davis]

Be curious what else what have been added to make the George trade happen. Probably OG and Van Vleet, but that is hefty. Clippers had picks which are far more valuable to the Thunder who are well, well over the luxury tax line.

[SuperMatt18]

I’m a huge Siakam fan...but if it was Siakam and picks and you knew you were getting George, Westbrook, and Leonard...you might have to do that.

It would probably made them favourites to repeat instantly.

But the price the clippers ended up paying for just George was ridiculous- no idea what George and Westbrook would have cost.

I’ll be intrigued to see if OKC and the Raptors pursue a Westbrook trade separately now though. Feel like Masai is going to want to make a splash after this.

[devo22]

well if it's George AND Westbrook, that's a ton of assets going the other way - both in terms of roster players and draft picks. There might have been little left beyond the big 3, plus it seems no one really likes to play with Westbrook anyway.

[Senator Clay Davis]

The Raps would have to gut the team to make the money work for George and Westbrook. Kawhi, Westbrook, George and Lowry alone would have them at $140 million+ for salaries next year. Plus there's that whole Westbrook isn't a great team player thing that would have ruined the Raps offense.

[Senator Clay Davis]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

I’ll be intrigued to see if OKC and the Raptors pursue a Westbrook trade separately now though. Feel like Masai is going to want to make a splash after this.

Nah, there's no need to do something so insanely idiotic as acquiring a negative asset with a terrible contract (besides he's so clearly going to end up on the Knicks who will do anything at this point). They made their play with Kawhi, it worked brilliantly short term, but with him gone you reset for 2020-2021. They have multiple guys on expiring deals this year they can move for more assets to reboot. The splash is finding a way to open up a couple max slots ASAP.

[Senator Clay Davis]

It also sounds like the Raps were never anything but the second choice to the Clippers.

The first sign that Kawhi Leonard has a whole lot more to say than anyone ever imagined came a few days before NBA free agency officially opened.

Kevin Durant was getting ready to commit to the Brooklyn Nets, along with his good friends Kyrie Irving and DeAndre Jordan. They'd all grown close in 2016 with the United States Olympic Team, and had talked often about playing with one another someday. All that remained was for free agency to officially open on the evening of June 30.

Then Durant got a call from Kawhi Leonard, asking if he'd consider teaming up with him and signing with the LA Clippers. They'd be a great complement to each other, Leonard told Durant. He'd always admired him, and had tremendous respect for him as a competitor.

Durant was flattered and more than a little stunned, according to sources close to the situation. He didn't know Leonard that well, so getting a recruiting call like that made a real impression.

And while Durant followed through on his plan to play with Irving and Jordan in Brooklyn a few days later, the seeds of Friday's blockbuster night -- which saw the Clippers secure a commitment from Leonard and trade for Oklahoma City forward Paul George -- had been sown.

Leonard's ambition in trying to recruit Durant to the Clippers suggested he was serious about joining LA in free agency. But it also suggested that they needed to get him another star.

After the Clippers met with Leonard for approximately three hours at head coach Doc Rivers' house in Malibu on Monday night, both sides went to work to make that happen. At the same time he was meeting with the Los Angeles Lakers and Toronto Raptors this week, Leonard was meeting, calling and texting with George, trying to convince him to find a way out of Oklahoma City.

Like Durant, George was flattered by Leonard's recruiting. The two had a fair amount in common. They'd grown up in the Los Angeles area at about the same time. George, 29, is from Palmdale, a dusty high desert town about an hour and a half north of L.A. Leonard, 28, is from Riverside, a sprawling Inland Empire town about an hour and a half east of L.A. Both had been lightly recruited out of high school, found their footing as players at mid-major colleges (George at Fresno State, Leonard at San Diego State) and then quietly entered the NBA as mid-first-round picks.

Still, Leonard's recruiting efforts caught George by surprise.

Said one source close to George, "For a quiet guy, he's a hell of a recruiter."

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/...eorge-away-okc

[The Big Chill]

Well that's disappointing. I got my hopes up even though I knew I shouldn't. I wonder if we'll see any of the expiring contracts moved out now.

[SuperMatt18]

I think Westbrook gets a bad rep even though he’s still great. Plus he only dominates the offence when he’s the only option - with Durant and George his attempts went way down.

Guy still was the 6th best player in the league based on Value over replacement player last year, and averaged 22/11/11.

4 years and $170M left on that contract isn’t great but if he’s being treated as a negative asset then I think that would be an okay move.

[bluejays]

99% of my sources say what?

I don't blame him at all for what he did. In hindsight when you heard the Clippers were thinking themselves as being out, it was a decoy they put out as they put that out to not give anything away and give the impression if it got out, that they were probably dealing to move on from not getting Kawhi - not making a deal to satisfy Kawhi's condition. I think from their standpoint, floating that out there was brilliant. As for the price they gave up for George, it was very large. If I'm OKC, I think they did amazing with that deal, though it works out for LAC as they get Kawhi. I actually really like this deal for what it does for the NBA. There's a legit LA rivalry, and the league legitimately as maybe 10 teams contending now, as opposed to say, 4 a year ago. With Danny Green, he's going to be #### on so hard by Lebron. He's not a big game player, and as much as I liked his attitude, good riddance. He's the last player I'd overpay for.

As for the Raptors, I think you maintain this team for a year going forward. They still have depth and lessons learned from this year and perhaps you sign a second rate player to replace Kawhi. Most of the team is off the books, so you build around Anunoby and Siakam. If at the deadline Masai doesn't see it happening, you deal any combination of the rest for good picks.

[Senator Clay Davis]

Russ's attempts didn't go way down, they rose the first year without KD when he won MVP. And yeah they declined with PG, but sadly his efficiency didn't improve much (and got worse from 3). Because so much of his game is based on his ability to blow by, his decline is going to be quick and steep because he's not a good shooter. The last two years of the deal you're paying him $90 million+. That could have been really ugly. Plus, Kawhi wanted to team up with PG, and PG apparently had grown tired of Russ. Not sure acquiring Russ would have helped keep Kawhi, but also don't think the Raps could acquire PG without taking on Russ's deal. It must have been a brutal night for Masai trying to make things work.

[Patek23]

So essentially my understanding is if the Clippers don’t pull this deal off then we would of had long term Kahwi is that right?



Edit- I mean the Clippers pulling off the trade for George

[Senator Clay Davis]

Yeah but the Clippers had the biggest pile of assets in the league to get the trade done. It was just a matter of how much could Presti get leveraging the Raps against the Clippers. I don't see a realistic scenario getting PG that didn't involve the Raps losing the rest of their team.