Since not all NBA news pertains to the playoffs, a separate offseason thread is in order. First up, as of early this morning, the Timberwolves are allegedly close to signing Ricky Rubio. The important stuff: I agree with that last part. Passing on Irving is obvious, but Williams as well, who is too similar to Michael Beasley to be worth Minnesota's while. A trade would definitely be a smart move. Which means it probably won't happen, since Kahn is allergic to smart decisions.
If I were them, I would trade Rubio and go with the Irving. What happens if the kids comes over here and sucks? It's happened before, you know. In other offseason news, Doc is coming back to the Celtics for 5 years. I know we'll have basically the same team, but something needs to be done about the J & S O'Neal experiment.
I think the Minnesota situation is easily one of the most intriguing this offseason. Despite looking like (relatively speaking here) shit during this past season, we've seen this kid's innate talent. Having a guy like Love being fed by Rubio would be a hell of a combination. A healthy Beasley in the mix would really make things interesting. The question is, what kind of trade do you go after? I agree that the acquisition of Rubio probably should rule out Irving (plus, I want his ass in Cleveland, goddammit). This draft basically blows at the SG position, which leaved Minny in a bit of a tricky gambling state. A small lineup of Rubio at the point, whoever at SG, Derrick Williams at SF, Beasley at PF and Love playing C would be fun as hell to watch, though not necessarily anything Rambis would actually put on the court.
Derrick Williams would be a bad pick for Minnesota, since he and Beasley are essentially the same player. A bit faster, but that might be it. Plus, I question Williams' ability to play the 3 at the NBA level. He's more of an undersized PF. Regarding a trade, the article said that Minnesota would prefer trading their pick for a veteran PG to mentor Rubio. I've seen Calderon's name thrown around a bit; that would make the most sense. The issue lies in where Minnesota ends up picking. If they don't get in the top 2, that'll really hurt their potential return.
Rubio is terrible. I don't understand why people think he's good. The kid will get laughed at in the NBA.
Excellent breakdown. Truly, my eyes are opened. FYI, we encourage thoughtful analysis around these parts. If you have an opinion, cool. But you'd better have something more substantial than, "this guys sucks lololol." If you think Rubio is terrible, that's fine; but elaborate on WHY you think he's terrible. Is it his court vision? His jump shot? Do you feel he's not athletic enough? What about his perimeter defense? Most people - particularly those who are far more knowledgeable than yourself - would be inclined to disagree with you about Rubio, so I'm intrigued about what, specifically, you feel will get him "laughed at." Keep in mind that the kid's still only 20. As well-versed as his game is, he's still younger than every player currently in the NBA, with the exception of three: Derrick Favors, Xavier Henry, and Avery Bradley.
I'm not real high on Rubio. I don't think he's quick enough to beat the top points in the NBA. I remember seeing clips of Steph Curry running circles around him, and Curry isn't crazy quick. Plus, a lot of those flashy passes he throws in Spain are going to turn into turnovers in the NBA where the holes close quicker.
To help atm1892 out, what makes me think he's less than a sure thing is this quote: Seriously, any all-star PG from the NBA would tear that fucking league up. 6 ppg, 3 rpg and 3 apg on 39% shooting? What would Chris Paul do in that league? Rondo? Derrick Rose? I just did a quick google search on Regal Barcelona and looked at his team, and he's not even the best player on there. Lots of box scores where he played 11-17 minutes, lots of 1-4 shooting and 6 point games. I know people are hyping him up, but I've also seen them hype up Darko Milicic, Harold Miner, Kwame Brown, etc, etc, etc. The list of people who were supposed to "come into the NBA and absolutely tear shit up" and end up being anywhere from awful to average is far larger than the list of guys who end up anywhere from good to great.
My bad, I should have elaborated but $100T2 summed it up pretty nicely. For someone who was a top 10 pick in the draft, you would expect them to put up some better numbers. Statistics aside, have you seen the kid play recently? I have, and I could not believe how slow and awkward he was on the court. There is no possible way he is athletic enough to be an effective player in the NBA. Not to mention, he's only listed at 6' 4'' and 180 lbs.
Larry Bird ring a bell? Steve Nash ain't the most athletic guy on the court, either. I think vision and skill set can make up for a lot of short comings, but from his stats, I say he would get his shit rocked in the NBA. Plus, he's gotta guard somebody. I can see a lot of "Another career game against Ricky Rubio!" headlines in his future. Bottom line, the NBA is the best players in the world. How does a guy who averages 6, 3, and 3 in the Spanish league come to the NBA and suddenly do better? It just doesn't make sense to me.
To be fair, this has been the case for most Euro-transplants. Even many of the successful ones. For example, Brandon Jennings threw up a whopping 5.5 ppg, 1.6 rpg, and 2.2 apg in Italy. 35% and 22% from 3. Yet the Bucks seem to be somewhat pleased with him. Pau Gasol was better, but not exactly dominant: 12.4 ppg, 5.8 rpg. Euro leagues are typically dominated by older players (often American) who are more developed, but with less in the way of raw talent. There have been other players who had good careers/stats abroad (Manu, Marc Gasol, Dirk), but my point is that lack of production abroad has traditionally not been a meaningful criteria.
I'm curious to see how Rubio handles the cultural change as well as the underlying logistics of the move (different laws, different norms, different area to navigate). He's going to be one of the youngest Euros to enter the league ever. Its asking a lot for a 20 year old kid to move his entire life to another country, and ask him to run your team. He might crack Darko style.
Woohoo!! My Cavs could very well be a good team again much sooner than originally thought. Picking this high twice could cut the rebuild down a year or two. This is a pretty weak draft after the first handful of picks. Thank god we have the 1st and 4th. Irving and Valanciunas. PG and a big man. Use the TPE and the two second rounders, one being as close to late first round as it gets to somehow end up with more picks next year or a decent veteran and use next years draft to fill out the team and they should be back on track. Hell, that 32nd pick could easily land a decent role player. With all the rookies developing together, it could be nice. Since it will be a couple years before the team will be good again, nobody needs to be a star right away. I personally like Valanciunas a little better than Kanter, although it's a toss up. I think Kanter will be gone anyways at #4. In one fell swoop, Cleveland could have their PG and Center locked down for the better part of the next decade. And spare the Cleveland jokes. It's technically the offseason, where all Cleveland fans get optimistic and hopeful. All this only a day after the Indians were on the good side of a sick blowout baseball win, being witness to the single worst pitching performance in the history of baseball. Just awesome.
I'll spare the Cleveland gushing for the most part. Lord knows I've been doing it over beers all night. Go Cavs. Enes Kanter, to me, seems like the kind of guy who could do some damage. Solid moves for a big, especially at his age. Decent size. High ceiling. I'd bet my middle nut that Cleveland goes with Irving. That leaves 2 teams with pretty damn solid PFs (Love and Milsap) drafting at 2 and 3. A guy like Kanter could conceivably slip through the cracks to the 4 pick if scouting reports have him there rather than at center (which they seem to so far, if I'm seeing things correctly?). I'm not sold on Devin Harris out in Salt Lake, and would love to see a guy like Kemba Walker or Brandon Knight go out there with the 3 pick. This draft being so Euro-big heavy worries me a bit, and probably speaks volumes about overall class quality. Any Utah fans out there hear buzzing out of the organization as to who they'd lean toward?
Apparently, David Kahn thinks that shenanigans were involved in the lottery. Someone should tell him it doesn't matter, since he probably would have traded the top pick for a bag of Oreos and a '70s porno magazine. I'm a little disappointed that the Cavs won the pick, not because of the fans (hey, good for you guys), but because of my complete disdain for that piece of shit who owns the team. He goes on a Charlie Sheen-esque rant back in July, and now we should feel sorry for him because of his son? Fuck him. I feel that was really low of him, parading his sick kid like that.
I don't have a problem with Gilbert and I've tried to look at it objectively. His letter pretty much summed up what everybody I know who's a Cav's fan was feeling. At the moment, it pretty much kept people off the ledge, although it was a pretty stupid letter to write. Problem was on both sides. Lebron didn't even have the courtesy to inform the team prior of his intentions. Even the top brass. That's pretty low. The team was built around him. He hamstrung the team by forcing them to make knee-jerk moves to keep him happy. He never recruited, which if he did, they wouldn't have had any of the problems. I also believe he tanked the Boston series knowing it would be harder to leave otherwise. This is all conjecture and nobody will know the truth. It's just what I feel. Lebron isn't necessarily a bad person, he just grew up with bad people chirping in his ears and never had anybody help him grow up enough not to make bad decisions like screwing a city on national television. It could have been handled better. Same thing on Gilbert's side. Stupid mistake, but it at least was a pretty sincere reaction to being shit on. As for him parading his son, maybe it was a little too much. It could also just be a father who loves his son, who has issues, and wants to do whatever to make him happy. His son seemed to have a great time. He's got problems and this probably made his day. Maybe the draft was rigged, who knows. Regardless, I'm pretty happy about the outcome. Somebody is going to get lucky every year, rigged or not. Maybe Kahn needs to come up with his own feel good story to get the ball to drop his way. Probably not as he's an idiot and a horrible GM. Regardless, don't accuse this stuff publicly. Also, there's a very good chance he loses his job over this. Publicly vilifying the NBA and therefore Stern isn't too smart. His move is actually much worse than what Lebron did and Gilbert's letter. He just publicly accused the NBA of fraud. Nobody wins with what he just did. Wow.
While I can sympathize with Cavs fans relating to the vitriol Gilbert put in his letter, he ought to know better, as the owner of a sports franchise, to behave in such a juvenile manner. As for the lottery, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he was just giving his son a great moment to remember. Even for a shithead like him, I don't really think he'd use his son's condition as a way to rig the draft. Because let's face it, there has always been something rotten in Denmark with regards to the NBA draft lottery. Why so secretive? Just show the fucking balls bounce on TV. I've always been skeptical of how that's run. But then again, I have complete disdain for that goofy fuckhead David Stern. I consider him to be more irresponsible as a commissioner than Bud Selig. Still, I don't think anyone will feel bad for David Kahn if he loses his job over this (which I'm inclined to agree with you on).
I love that the Cavs actually had better odds to get the first and third pick (~1.25%) or the first and second pick (~1.2%) than the first and fourth (~0.9%). So if they were really trying to fix it, they could have given the Cavs even better picks with more deniability. I doubt the lottery gets fixed, seeing how a team in the biggest media market got completely hosed last year. It just looks bad because the odds for the worst team getting the first pick are crazy low. If it was fixed, it probably would've had more to do with keeping Kahn from trying to put 5 point guards on the floor than anything else. Imagine if the Clippers would have kept that pick, though. They could have had a core of Blake Griffin, DeAndre Jordan, Eric Gordon, and Irving. Of course they would still find a way to lose.
Shaq is retiring. Yeah, he probably should have after Miami won the championship with him, but hey, he's one of those guys like Bird, Magic and Jordan you don't want to see leave. For those of you who weren't into basketball back when he was younger, or in case you forgot, this man was one of the baddest motherfuckers of all time.
Truly a great career that man had. God, how fun was it watching him go beast mode on, well, pretty much everyone? Shaq's highlight reels are just as fun to watch as MJ's, Iverson's, Magic's, and Bird's. He sounded very humble on his phone call with Michelle Bonner. Also, Dr. Shaquille O'Neal, PhD?? Holy shit. That was very surprising. Also, this: