Everything 2018 Off Season

[Joey]

Man, right when the ACC was starting to become part of the Toronto lexicon ... Scotiabank Arena? Doesn't that already exist in like 4 other cities? Lol

What the heck are we going to call it? "The Arena" I guess? Lol

[DogeLover1234]

Love that Masai is sticking with the 2 year window. Was expecting 4 years.. 2 years is pretty awesome. I suspect Masai really wants to blow this puppy up in 2 years and we're going to just roll out the same band with a few minor changes each year until then.

The thing is that if you decide to wait until your guys are free agents to decide if you like them, you don't get any value if you want to move on. A rebuild in two years looks a lot worse than one now tbh. Would much rather do a clippers rebuild, and get value for their guys while retaining long term cap space.

[thead]

Did we trade for a once in a generation all star yet? I've been too busy to check twitter

[planetmars]

it's a very different era.

anyways the Leafs lost two good offensive players who they couldn't play in the d-zone - JVR and Bozak. Tavares is a superstar centre who you can play in any zone and he'll be fine. More importantly, for the majority of the game we'll have one of Matthews, Tavares, and Kadri out there. Tavares himself will improve the defence as a result as we'd be replacing Bozak and JVR's minutes with his.

Cool.. thanks for the insights. So Tavares is more like a Kawhi, George, Butler.. than just a DeMar or Booker type player than.

[Demographic Shift]

We've officially got Scotiabank Arena now, so there's that. Could be worse, I guess.

Man, right when the ACC was starting to become part of the Toronto lexicon ... Scotiabank Arena? Doesn't that already exist in like 4 other cities? Lol

What the heck are we going to call it? "The Arena" I guess? Lol

From "The Hangar" to the "The Vault"...
or
Scotia Bank Arena.... 1/3 "A" and two thirds "BS"

[The Great One]

Man, right when the ACC was starting to become part of the Toronto lexicon ... Scotiabank Arena? Doesn't that already exist in like 4 other cities? Lol

What the heck are we going to call it? "The Arena" I guess? Lol

The King's Castle?

[Joey]

The King's Castle?

You're really embracing your inner-troll these days eh? Lol Just looking to get any sort of reaction from people? It's not a good look for you Rex.

[Demographic Shift]

Yep. Everything is going according to Hoyle on the Serengeti. The lions have feasted. Despite all the talk of wanting to play for a winner or wanting to go home, every tier 1 NBA free agent has grabbed every penny and stayed with their current team, except for DeAndre Jordan who left the Clippers for the exact same amount he could have got.

Still one lion left to eat, but Lebron Inc's calculation is quite different, because the global icon and his Klutch posse have much different revenue streams depending on where he goes, compared to the run of the mill superstar.

Who knows... Kawhi may still end up having his arm twisted to accept a quarter billion dollar supermax deal from the Spurs. Just follow the money.

Yeah Leonard in Los Angeles makes me smile a bit... Its not a stretch to say this guy has said 14 words all year on his situation and he is a fit in LA ? I guess he could endorse the Marcel Marceau film festival.. but short of that.... you have to have a personality a bit more vibrant than a bag of wet cement to flourish in that fish bowl. Hard to see him going there.

[planetmars]

The thing is that if you decide to wait until your guys are free agents to decide if you like them, you don't get any value if you want to move on. A rebuild in two years looks a lot worse than one now tbh. Would much rather do a clippers rebuild, and get value for their guys while retaining long term cap space.

I look at it slightly differently. Ideally the best situation would be to break the core early and get young prospects and picks now for them if a rebuild is in the cards. But I don't see teams willing to give those up for our guys.

Maybe I have some bias because I watch these guys all the time.. but our core have big flaws (JV is a plodding center, DeMar doesn't play defense and sucks in the playoffs, Lowry is getting old) and teams may be shy to give way their future for guys like that even if they can help in the short term.

At least that seems to be the way the NBA is going now. Superstars like Lebron, KD etc are diamonds. But draft picks are gold. And I think draft picks (especially lottery ones which have the most value of course) are more valuable than our all-stars/core are.

So in 2 years when all our big contracts are off the books I would suspect we go into a tank with really young players (like OG, Siakam, etc).. and use that cap space to absorb really crappy contracts (like the Noah's, Parsons, Deng's, and Mozgov's of the NBA) and get picks attached to them.

I honestly really think cap space is way more valuable than our core pieces are. I hope I'm wrong. This summer should determine some of that I think. If Masai has to hold on to his core for another year than there is a good chance nobody wants them.

[The Claw Reborn]

If Ujiri is staying put then he is betting on:

- what a head coach Nurse can do to not only continue his offensive prowess, make Derozan play defense, involve JV more and improve his players accuracy outside of 22 feet (more so than just leading the league in hail marys hoisted)

- bench mob additional year under their belts being together

- just like his coach, hoping that his main cog (Derozan) can play defense, shoot the three with much better accuracy and shows up in the playoffs after being on this league for 10 years

- relying on an aging Lowry and Ibaka that both are due to breakdown for a longer period of time

- Boston/ Philly and Cavs with Bron will all suffer a season ending injuries of one or more of their core (though Boston had two players down for a lengthy time but yet was close enough to beat the King)

Looking at it...its like you are watching an opposing poker player holding transparent pair of cards...you and everybody in the world knew the obvious hahahaha

Lets not fool ourselves... Just one of the things I mentioned failing then it would be another disaster of a season, so it has to be perfect yet we are expecting that they still would fall short.

[Demographic Shift]

If Ujiri is staying put then he is betting on:

- what a head coach Nurse can do to not only continue his offensive prowess, make Derozan play defense, involve JV more and improve his players accuracy outside of 22 feet (more so than just leading the league in hail marys hoisted)

- bench mob additional year under their belts being together

- just like his coach, hoping that his main cog (Derozan) can play defense, shoot the three with much better accuracy and shows up in the playoffs after being on this league for 10 years

- relying on an aging Lowry and Ibaka that both are due to breakdown for a longer period of time

- Boston/ Philly and Cavs with Bron will all suffer a season ending injuries of one or more of their core (though Boston had two players down for a lengthy time but yet was close enough to beat the King)

Looking at it...its like you are watching an opposing poker player holding transparent pair of cards...you and everybody in the world knew the obvious hahahaha

Lets not fool ourselves... Just one of the things I mentioned failing then it would be another disaster of a season, so it has to be perfect yet we are expecting that they still would fall short.

You remind me of the Monty Python sketch ... with the punch line that I'm not dead yet.
Still a fair bit of time to go before training camp and all the deck chairs are arranged.

[Demographic Shift]

Lakers are talking to Clint Capella..... the whiff of abject panic is in the air..... If there was ever a chance to move DD back home to LA and get a couple of young prospects for him... nows the chance....

[Mindlessness]

Cool.. thanks for the insights. So Tavares is more like a Kawhi, George, Butler.. than just a DeMar or Booker type player than.

I guess you could say that, yeah.

I don't know if positionally they really match up but Tavares is very much a strong two-way player.

[The Claw Reborn]

If Ujiri is staying put then he is betting on:

- what a head coach Nurse can do to not only continue his offensive prowess, make Derozan play defense, involve JV more and improve his players accuracy outside of 22 feet (more so than just leading the league in hail marys hoisted)

- bench mob additional year under their belts being together

- just like his coach, hoping that his main cog (Derozan) can play defense, shoot the three with much better accuracy and shows up in the playoffs after being on this league for 10 years

- relying on an aging Lowry and Ibaka that both are due to breakdown for a longer period of time

- Boston/ Philly and Cavs with Bron will all suffer a season ending injuries of one or more of their core (though Boston had two players down for a lengthy time but yet was close enough to beat the King)

Looking at it...its like you are watching an opposing poker player holding transparent pair of cards...you and everybody in the world knew the obvious hahahaha

Lets not fool ourselves... Just one of the things I mentioned failing then it would be another disaster of a season, so it has to be perfect yet we are expecting that they still would fall short.

You remind me of the Monty Python sketch ... with the punch line that I'm not dead yet.
Still a fair bit of time to go before training camp and all the deck chairs are arranged.

Good one, its my year brotha. Jurassic World lives on (posting while polishing this claws)

The claw with a boy scout cap on, I always come prepared.

[Barolt]

I'm somewhat convinced that if LeBron goes to Philly it's bad for the Raptors in the short term, but potentially very good for the long-term. Pushes the Lakers into desperation which could help facilitate a DeRozan trade.