NBA GDT | 18'-19 | I Love Mod Edits

[RandyMossIsBoss]

2 hours ago, showtime said:

I love Denver's announcers and their home court fans.  Great team to watch on league pass.

Interesting, they're pretty notorious for their unabashed homerism so every non-Nuggets fan tends to hate on them. When fans show up, Pepsi Center is electric and combined with that elevation definitely one of the toughest places to play.

 

[MookieMonstah]

3 hours ago, Mossburg said:

Hai bois

Does anyone play defense in 2018?

Yeah, can't look at points allowed. The pace to start this season has been unreal.

[seminoles1]

1 minute ago, MookieMonstah said:

Yeah, can't look at points allowed. The pace to start this season has been unreal.

This freedom of movement rule and the shot clock being reset to 14 instead of 24 is going to keep the pace incredibly high.

[CWood21]

9 hours ago, kyle21121 said:

Quit living in the past you sound like an entitled ***. 50+ wins each of the last 5 years, division titles, #1 seed and a Conference finals appearance for Toronto. Has L.A. done any of that recently? Garbo the biggest FA signing in franchise history? FOH but okay. I like the blind stat test with Ball and Kidd I did the same with Bargnani and Dirk after year one they were eerily similar as well. 

I'm not sure how that's relevant to the discussion.  Toronto has been more successful than the Lakers the last 5 years, nobody is taking it away from Toronto.  But 5 years doesn't change the opinion of a franchise.  And there's still the fact that Los Angeles is a more appealing destination than Toronto for most people.  I honestly don't know who the most successful FA signing in Toronto's history.  Garbajosa was one of the ones I remembered, but I don't think Toronto has been super-active in FA.

Of course a blind stat test isn't the end-all, be-all.  But the problem with Bargnani was the fact that he never developed after his rookie year.  Dirk came in his rookie year and averaged 15/6/2 per 36, but in his 4th year he averaged 22/9/2 per 36.  Bargnani averaged 16/6/1 per 36 as a rookie and 18/6/1 per 36 in his 4th year in the league.  He just never developed.  That's the same case with Lonzo.  He needs to continue to develop, but his numbers are very similar to Kidd.  But the point was that BayRaider was ready to write off Lonzo as a bust.  I guarantee he wouldn't have done the same thing with Kidd.

[CWood21]

9 hours ago, kyle21121 said:

Also if you say Boston is the one team who could challenge GS then say if Toronto beats them and makes the finals it’s because the conference is a joke that makes no sense. Toronto and Boston are both top 4 teams in the NBA. Whoever wins that series is deserving even if it is Boston that wins. GS still may be leaps and bounds better than anyone though.

Kawhi for Demar swaps instantly transforms this team with the best bench in the NBA and now the best player in the conference.

If things end up the same and  I’m wrong I’ll cross that bridge when it comes. I never fully believed in Demar but I had to try and believe in the team as a whole. Kawhi is night and day better. 

Boston can be beaten by Toronto, yet still be the better matchup against the Warriors.  Just being you win a H2H series doesn't necessarily mean that the better team won.  My argument was that Toronto and Boston are guaranteed the 2nd round of the East by virtue of how miserable the East is.  Outside of those 2, you have Philadelphia and to a lesser extent Milwaukee with Giannis.  In terms of tiers, it's Golden State (break) Houston/Boston (break) Toronto and most of the WC teams.  Toronto isn't in that same tier as Boston and Houston just yet.

I get the change from DeRozan to Kawhi goes, but that still doesn't change the fact that they're not a very complete team.  I'd easily take the Celtics starting 5 over Raptors and it isn't even close.  Quite frankly, the only player that would start on the Celtics from the Raptors is Kawhi.  Jonas V/Horford is probably close.  The bench doesn't make that up.  And being the best player in the conference isn't a huge accomplishment when the rest of the players are in the West.  In ESPN's top 20 player rankings, six of the top 20 players played in the East.  That's 70% of the top talent in the NBA are in the Western Conference.

I'm not saying Toronto isn't better.  But they're not better than Boston just yet.  And assuming Boston can stay healthy, I don't think it's likely.

[CWood21]

4 hours ago, champ11 said:

The Lakers have been failing upward for sure. They've made probably around 5 decisions that would cripple most franchises in the last 5 years. But obviously they are in LA and have an incredible history so they got LeBron. 

They compounded signing the best player in the league with bad veteran signings, which two games in already hilariously resulted in a fist fight. It's too good.

But the organization does deserve credit for drafting Kuzma and Hart, who both look like they will be nice players, and Luke Walton was a good hire. But yeah I mean I'm not sure their young core is even in the top 5 of the league, but I'd have to think about it. 

Failing upward?  They've really only made two real bad decisions in the last 5 years, if you don't include allowing Jim Buss to run the franchise into the ground.  The Timofey Mozgov and Luol Deng signings were inexcusable.  But since Magic has taken over, this franchise has done a complete 180 from where they were before.

Bad FA signings?  They signed a BUNCH of 1 year deals to maintain cap flexibility, so that's a bad signing?  You're telling me you'd be willing to forfeit flexibility next offseason instead of punting the rest of the cap space?  Players weren't really signing 1 year deals this last offseason.  The Lakers did exactly what they should have done.

I'd definitely argue the Lakers have a top 5 young core (and for the record, I'm talking about guys with no more than 5 years in the league).  I'd have Boston clearly ahead of them.  Phoenix and Philadelphia are probably ahead of them as well.  But they're in a similar tier as Denver IMO.

[RavensTillIDie]

Hindsight is certainly 20/20, but imagine what the 76ers would like now if they had the foresight to take Tatum over Fultz last year.

Simmons/McConnell
Redick/Shamet
Covington/Smith
Tatum/Chandler
Embiid/Muscala

I'm just saying it now, that team beats the Warriors.

[champ11]

5 minutes ago, CWood21 said:

Failing upward?  They've really only made two real bad decisions in the last 5 years, if you don't include allowing Jim Buss to run the franchise into the ground.  The Timofey Mozgov and Luol Deng signings were inexcusable.  But since Magic has taken over, this franchise has done a complete 180 from where they were before.

Bad FA signings?  They signed a BUNCH of 1 year deals to maintain cap flexibility, so that's a bad signing?  You're telling me you'd be willing to forfeit flexibility next offseason instead of punting the rest of the cap space?  Players weren't really signing 1 year deals this last offseason.  The Lakers did exactly what they should have done.

I'd definitely argue the Lakers have a top 5 young core (and for the record, I'm talking about guys with no more than 5 years in the league).  I'd have Boston clearly ahead of them.  Phoenix and Philadelphia are probably ahead of them as well.  But they're in a similar tier as Denver IMO.

Denver is easily ahead of them as a core. Denver has an All NBA caliber player already and probably a top ten player this season. It's not even a debate. Spare yourself. 

Their free agent signings were poor to terrible. I understand they were signing one year deals. There are plenty of players that they could have brought in on one year deals that would have been better signings than bringing in the meme team. They could have brought back Lopez over McGee. Seth Curry would have been a better signing than Lance. Tyreke Evans would have been a better signing than KCP. That's off the top of my head. I could hit google and really get cooking.

2 real bad decisions over the past five years? Didn't y'all have a worse record than the process era sixers over a 5 year span? Where to begin. This is also off the top of the head 

1. Kobe Bryant extension

2. Allowing the Kobe Bryant goodbye tour while trying to develop prospects

3. Employing the worst coach in the league in Byron Scott

4. Signing Nick Young to a real contract. 

5. Mozgov and Deng contracts - quite possibly some of the worst in the modern era

6. Dumping lottery picks for cap space - this may or may not work out, but the Lakers are about the only organization that could get away with pretty much dumping 2 of their 4 high lottery picks in a rebuild.

7. They've had 4 lottery picks and there are 0 franchise cornerstones out of those 4 as of now. Ingram and Ball could be really good, depends on how you see their ceiling. 2 guys are on different teams.

I know there have to be more than that based on the results, too, lmao. Pretty wild to think the Lakers, who haven't won more than 35 games since 12-13, have only made a couple errors in their rebuild 

[seminoles1]

Boston has to figure out how to balance out their offense. Otherwise I'm starting to get more bullish on the Raptors. 

Both teams need to consolidate their rotations. Boston might be able to squeeze out a protected 1st for Morris from a wing desperate team like New Orleans.

[J-ALL-DAY]

21 minutes ago, CWood21 said:

Boston can be beaten by Toronto, yet still be the better matchup against the Warriors.  Just being you win a H2H series doesn't necessarily mean that the better team won.  My argument was that Toronto and Boston are guaranteed the 2nd round of the East by virtue of how miserable the East is.  Outside of those 2, you have Philadelphia and to a lesser extent Milwaukee with Giannis.  In terms of tiers, it's Golden State (break) Houston/Boston (break) Toronto and most of the WC teams.  Toronto isn't in that same tier as Boston and Houston just yet.

I get the change from DeRozan to Kawhi goes, but that still doesn't change the fact that they're not a very complete team.  I'd easily take the Celtics starting 5 over Raptors and it isn't even close.  Quite frankly, the only player that would start on the Celtics from the Raptors is Kawhi.  Jonas V/Horford is probably close.  The bench doesn't make that up.  And being the best player in the conference isn't a huge accomplishment when the rest of the players are in the West.  In ESPN's top 20 player rankings, six of the top 20 players played in the East.  That's 70% of the top talent in the NBA are in the Western Conference.

I'm not saying Toronto isn't better.  But they're not better than Boston just yet.  And assuming Boston can stay healthy, I don't think it's likely.

Jonas/Horford absolutely isn't close, and it is a moot point since Jonas isn't starting anyways. 

Boston has more top talent, but it could be argued the Raptors talent mixes better. They have the better bench and while only one player from the Raptors may start on the Celtics, it doesn't mean their starters aren't close to the level of the Celtics starters.

Lowry/Green/Leonard/Siakam then whoever they start at C whether it be Ibaka or whoever it is pretty damn good. 

[champ11]

13 minutes ago, RavensTillIDie said:

Hindsight is certainly 20/20, but imagine what the 76ers would like now if they had the foresight to take Tatum over Fultz last year.

Simmons/McConnell
Redick/Shamet
Covington/Smith
Tatum/Chandler
Embiid/Muscala

I'm just saying it now, that team beats the Warriors.

Speaking of the Lakers - having Tatum on that team rn would be pretty great as well! 

But nah that team would not beat the Warriors IMO

[CWood21]

9 minutes ago, champ11 said:

Denver is easily ahead of them as a core. Denver has an All NBA caliber player already and probably a top ten player this season. It's not even a debate. Spare yourself.

Nikola Jokic isn't a top 10 player, sorry.  LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Steph Curry, James Harden, Giannis, Anthony Davis, Kawhi Leonard, Russell Westbrook, Damian Lillard, Kyrie Irving, and Joel Embiid are guys I'd easily take over him.  And there's probably a slew of guys in a similar tier as him.

11 minutes ago, champ11 said:

Their free agent signings were poor to terrible. I understand they were signing one year deals. There are plenty of players that they could have brought in on one year deals that would have been better signings than bringing in the meme team. They could have brought back Lopez over McGee. Seth Curry would have been a better signing than Lance. Tyreke Evans would have been a better signing than KCP. That's off the top of my head. I could hit google and really get cooking.

Because I really don't think you don't.  Players didn't really take 1 year deals.  The biggest names to sign 1 year deals this past offseason DeAndre Jordan, Trevor Ariza, Tyreke Evans, JJ Redick, KCP, and Rudy Gay.  None of those guys make the Lakers' roster any better than they currently are constructed.  When did this notion that Brook Lopez was any good?  He can shoot well for a big guy.  But aside from that, he's awful.  He doesn't rebound well and he offers virtually no rim protection.  I mean, at least McGee offers some level of rim protection and doesn't need touches to be effective.  Given what the Lakers want out of their C position, I'd rather have McGee for less.  Seth Curry is on his sixth team in six years, yet he's this outstanding signing?  I get not liking the Lance signing, but Seth Curry gets hyped because of his last name.  As for KCP/Tyreke, I kept hearing about how the Lakers don't have enough shooting yet you want to trade a career 35% shooter from beyond the arc for a career 32% shooter?  The Lakers don't need another guy who needs the ball in his hands to be effective.  Even if you believe Evans is better than KCP, it's a marginal upgrade at best.  Nothing that's going to change the Lakers.

18 minutes ago, champ11 said:

2 real bad decisions over the past five years? Didn't y'all have a worse record than the process era sixers over a 5 year span? Where to begin. This is also off the top of the head 

1. Kobe Bryant extension

2. Allowing the Kobe Bryant goodbye tour while trying to develop prospects

3. Employing the worst coach in the league in Byron Scott

4. Signing Nick Young to a real contract. 

5. Mozgov and Deng contracts - quite possibly some of the worst in the modern era

6. Dumping lottery picks for cap space - this may or may not work out, but the Lakers are about the only organization that could get away with pretty much dumping 2 of their 4 high lottery picks in a rebuild.

7. They've had 4 lottery picks and there are 0 franchise cornerstones out of those 4 as of now. Ingram and Ball could be really good, depends on how you see their ceiling. 2 guys are on different teams.

I know there have to be more than that based on the results, too, lmao. Pretty wild to think the Lakers, who haven't won more than 35 games since 12-13, have only made a couple errors in their rebuild 

Prior to last year, the Sixers won 75 games over the previous four seasons.  The Lakers won 91 games over that same period.  But let's also not look at the difference in which way each team was built.  The Sixers had less talent than an NBADL team had at one point.  Let that sink in.  They bottomed out and FOUR top 3 picks in four years, including back-to-back #1 overall picks.  Lakers had 3 top picks in four years, and none of them were #1 overall picks.

The Kobe extension kicked in before he tore his Achilles, and we all saw how that affected him.  And it's kinda hard to bench Kobe Bryant, even if he is struggling.  That's not going to end well.  Byron Scott was abysmal, but they tried to stay in the family and make the Lakers competitive.  Blew up in their faces, but not exactly a franchise crippling move.  I'm not really sure what you're getting at with Nick Young.  He signed a 4 years, $21M deal (MLE money) and was a semi-useful scorer off the bench.  Nothing special, but I'd hardly call it an egregious move but that might just be me.

As we've mentioned, a Ball/Russell backcourt wasn't going to work out.  You can say it might or may not have worked out, but it clearly has.  The Mozgov dumped cleared the max salary for LeBron James, so that's a HUGE win for the Lakers.  I'd even argue that you could make a very legitimate argument that Kyle Kuzma is more valuable than D'Angelo Russell all things considered.  So not only did they turn Russell into Kuzma, they also managed to create cap space from Mozgov's contract in order to sign LeBron.  How many people here are going to take D'Angelo Russell and Timofey Mozgov over LeBron James and Kyle Kuzma?  I didn't think so.  That's easily a win in itself.  And it doesn't help that D'Angelo Russell has plateaued as a high usage guard who doesn't shoot efficiently.

Brandon Ingram is entering his 3rd year in the league, and Lonzo Ball is entering his 2nd year.  Let's give them some time before we write them off.  Julius Randle was the 7th player picked in his draft.  IIRC, he was the last player left in his tier.  I'm not sure what your expectations are for the 7th overall pick, but if you're expecting a franchise player you're grossly overestimating the return on that pick.  He's still a solid starter if he can repeat what he did last year.  D'Angelo Russell in 2015 was the right pick at the time even if Kristaps Porzingis ended up being better.  It was a two-horse race between he and Jahlil Okafor, and Okafor is halfway out the league.

[CWood21]

30 minutes ago, J-ALL-DAY said:

Jonas/Horford absolutely isn't close, and it is a moot point since Jonas isn't starting anyways. 

Boston has more top talent, but it could be argued the Raptors talent mixes better. They have the better bench and while only one player from the Raptors may start on the Celtics, it doesn't mean their starters aren't close to the level of the Celtics starters.

Lowry/Green/Leonard/Siakam then whoever they start at C whether it be Ibaka or whoever it is pretty damn good. 

It still pales in comparison to Boston.  Kyrie > Lowry, Brown > Green, Leonard > Hayward, Tatum > Siakam and Horford =~= Serge.  Toronto's bench doesn't change that fact.

[J-ALL-DAY]

2 minutes ago, CWood21 said:

It still pales in comparison to Boston.  Kyrie > Lowry, Brown > Green, Leonard > Hayward, Tatum > Siakam and Horford =~= Serge.  Toronto's bench doesn't change that fact.

Again you are comparing them in a way that is good for fantasy basketball but not reality. Just because player X is better than player Y, it doesn't mean player Y isn't a better fit for his team or makes just as much, if not more impact. Raptors team just blends in very well. If the Celtics reach their potential and maximize their talent, than obviously they are likely to be the better team. But as we know, that isn't always the case. 

[CWood21]

Just now, J-ALL-DAY said:

Again you are comparing them in a way that is good for fantasy basketball but not reality. Just because player X is better than player Y, it doesn't mean player Y isn't a better fit for his team or makes just as much, if not more impact. Raptors team just blends in very well. If the Celtics reach their potential and maximize their talent, than obviously they are likely to be the better team. But as we know, that isn't always the case. 

And Boston's doesn't?  We saw Boston finish 4 games back of the Raptors last year with Gordon Hayward missing the entire year and Kyrie Irving down the stretch.  They're the better team.