David Levine
Posts: 71285
Joined: 7/14/2007
From: Las Vegas
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Bill Jandro This is from 2017 regarding the Wolves lottery woes In the past 13 years combined, there has been a 14.28% chance of us never moving up, which means there was an 85.72% chance of us moving up at some point. In our franchise's existence, we have been to 21 lotteries in 27 years (wewlad). In those 21 lotteries, there was a 1.523% chance of us never moving up, and a 98.48% chance of moving up at some point. One would think we are overdue to move up big time one of these decades It would be nice, but its not needed. Teams in "woe is us" markets aren't at nearly the disadvantage that some people think they are. Denver just broke a 9 year streak of being out of the Playoffs by getting the #2 seed in the West. Their best player was a 2nd round pick. Hell, they have 3 2nd round picks in their starting line-up along with a #7 pick and a #19 pick. Milwaukee was the #1 seed in the East without having a single lottery pick they drafted in their starting line-up. Smart drafting, shrewd trades and bargain free agents made that team. Look at the turnaround by the Clippers. Yes, they're in LA (the red-headed step-child of LA), but that entire team was built on smart front office moves and not attracting big free agents. Here is a dirty little secret in the NBA. Attracting big-time free agents almost never leads to big-time winning. Smart drafting, good trades and finding hidden gems in free agency is how teams are built. You can't look at the Wolves history and project forward. For the first time ever, we have a smart guy at the top (Cassan) that Glen appears to trust enough to defer to. That's HUGE. On top of that, we hired the right-hand man of a Top 3 GM to run the team. He first two moves were to hire one of the most respected analytical minds in the entire NBA and one of the top international scouts. Towns is good enough that just 1 season ago, he was the runaway choice of NBA GMs as the "player they'd most like to build a franchise around". Did he suddenly get worse this year? Nope. He was actually even better - especially once Butler and then Thibs were gone. But no one is good enough to carry this roster (and all the disfunction and toxicity that Butler and Thibs brought) anywhere. Dude is a legit superstar. He's the best offensive big in the game, and he's shown flashes of being a solid defender. You don't throw that away and hope you can somehow find better. And you absolutely don't give an entire new front office (that inherited a shit show of a roster) one year to "prove it" before you dump your best player.
< Message edited by David Levine -- 6/4/2019 12:04:19 PM >
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