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Berry Tramel of the Oklahoman reports that the Thunder made a last-ditch offer to Harden on Friday, proposing a four-year, $53MM extension. The team gave him a one-hour window to accept it, telling him that if he turned it down, he'd be traded to Houston. that seem ridiculous... only a 1 hour window when dealing with such a huge amount of money.
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On October 29 2012 17:53 TieN.nS) wrote:Show nested quote +On October 29 2012 08:43 Jerubaal wrote:On October 29 2012 08:18 wei2coolman wrote:On October 29 2012 07:09 Jerubaal wrote: The working class hero spiel was pretty predictable.
So I'm supposed to be smart and savvy and build a lean mean team, but once I get them I'm supposed to overpay to keep it together? Gimme a break. Gotta pay to win. There is abundant evidence to the contrary. Of the top 10 salaried teams this year I give 2 any chance to win the championship. That's cute. I think it's fair to say that you're talking about the Heat and the Lakers, who are the two odds-on favorites. Paying the luxury tax isn't working out for them? Sure, just being willing to spend money recklessly like the Knicks and Nets have isn't a recipe for success, but I'd certainly prefer an owner like that to a Robert Sarver or Donald Sterling. In the long term, based on how the lottery picks go and how Jeremy Lamb develops, this trade might wind up being good (and they got decent value regardless, considering they probably weren't going to be able to sign Harden). But the fact remains that the Thunder just broke up an NBA Finals team not because they weren't able to afford paying a player, but because they weren't willing to. And somehow you're defending this! l o l
The Heat aren't a normally constructed team; the players colluded to get there and took pay cuts, especially Lebron, to make the team feasible. It would have been stupid for the Heat to not have taken such a bargain, especially considering the monetary effect of Lebron's arrival. I heard all year how the Lakers were the odds on favorites for the West last year, so you'll forgive me for not taking them in the preseason. Even if they somehow magically manage to win the championship this year, they'll have paid, what, about 50% more than any other team to get it? The Top 10 stat is there to disprove what you so ardently believe- that paying equals winning. Several of those teams are unproven at best and most will be bad.
The existence of the Yankees does not disprove the effectiveness of the Oakland As or the Florida Marlins. If OKC wants to model themselves off of the As or the Spurs then you stick to your guns and not go all in for some temporary success. And I'm not 'defending' the decision, I'm defending the GM's making the decision. So why don't we stop talking like there's some sort of moral element in resigning basketball players.
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It's interesting reading Zach Lowe's take on the Harden trade.
He's alluding the the fact that OKC was willing to trade Harden to the Dubs for Klay Thompson + filler.
Did the Dubs fail in this regard if this is so? I guess three major considerations:
* Klay has a big upside at a lower price * Taking on Harden would really hurt GS's financial position with the new lux tax looming * No guarantee Harden would extend?
I'm guessing the Dubs passed due to a combination of the above, but a pretty big call not to do it (assuming it was on the table and the details of the filler in the trade).
If you were in charge of the Dubs would you have done a Harden for Klay Thompson + filler deal (edit: let's assume filler included future picks)?
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I don't know how I feel about the CBA, which is supposed to create more parity. It sort of does, but LA and NY still have an advantage while a team that drafted well like OKC faces stiffer penalties than before. Wish there was something in there saying that salaries of drafted and never traded players count as less that 1x as far as the cap calculation goes.
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On October 30 2012 10:56 RowdierBob wrote: If you were in charge of the Dubs would you have done a Harden for Klay Thompson + filler deal (edit: let's assume filler included future picks)?
the way i think about it is the value of klay, to me he is worth more than kmart and lamb, and subsequently the deal would have been more tilted to the OKC. i think i would have kept Klay, great young prospect for a lot cheaper, he'll average around 18/4/3 which isn't far off what harden would get you. dubs desperately needs a pg considering curry's ankles are about 60 years old.
you bring up a good point about extensions...wonder if rockets "knew" harden would extend if they got him...it's a massive risk. gws would definitely not trade if there was any chance harden wouldn't extend.
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United States22883 Posts
On October 30 2012 10:49 Jerubaal wrote:Show nested quote +On October 29 2012 17:53 TieN.nS) wrote:On October 29 2012 08:43 Jerubaal wrote:On October 29 2012 08:18 wei2coolman wrote:On October 29 2012 07:09 Jerubaal wrote: The working class hero spiel was pretty predictable.
So I'm supposed to be smart and savvy and build a lean mean team, but once I get them I'm supposed to overpay to keep it together? Gimme a break. Gotta pay to win. There is abundant evidence to the contrary. Of the top 10 salaried teams this year I give 2 any chance to win the championship. That's cute. I think it's fair to say that you're talking about the Heat and the Lakers, who are the two odds-on favorites. Paying the luxury tax isn't working out for them? Sure, just being willing to spend money recklessly like the Knicks and Nets have isn't a recipe for success, but I'd certainly prefer an owner like that to a Robert Sarver or Donald Sterling. In the long term, based on how the lottery picks go and how Jeremy Lamb develops, this trade might wind up being good (and they got decent value regardless, considering they probably weren't going to be able to sign Harden). But the fact remains that the Thunder just broke up an NBA Finals team not because they weren't able to afford paying a player, but because they weren't willing to. And somehow you're defending this! l o l The Heat aren't a normally constructed team; the players colluded to get there and took pay cuts, especially Lebron, to make the team feasible. It would have been stupid for the Heat to not have taken such a bargain, especially considering the monetary effect of Lebron's arrival. I heard all year how the Lakers were the odds on favorites for the West last year, so you'll forgive me for not taking them in the preseason. Even if they somehow magically manage to win the championship this year, they'll have paid, what, about 50% more than any other team to get it? The Top 10 stat is there to disprove what you so ardently believe- that paying equals winning. Several of those teams are unproven at best and most will be bad. The existence of the Yankees does not disprove the effectiveness of the Oakland As or the Florida Marlins. If OKC wants to model themselves off of the As or the Spurs then you stick to your guns and not go all in for some temporary success. And I'm not 'defending' the decision, I'm defending the GM's making the decision. So why don't we stop talking like there's some sort of moral element in resigning basketball players. Also, the Lakers aren't exactly operating under the new CBA yet. It was a short term move and one of the only ways they could acquire D12 but 2013/14 will kill them. I think once Kobe and Pau's contracts are up in 2014/15, the Lakers will come back to reality and you won't see them pull this again. Especially if they fail to win the West in any of those years. Plus the repeat offender tax kind of guarantees it. I don't care how big their fanbase is, the Lakers aren't stupid or popular enough to pay $4.25 on the dollar.
I mean, Miami's bottom line is a much better example for how you should try to win a championship but they got there with massive cooperation from their stars. The Lakers are not a model for anyone. The Heat are going to pay something like 15-18 million in taxes in 2013/14, whereas the Lakers might go all the way up to 60 million after giving Dwight a max deal.
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On October 30 2012 11:02 citi.zen wrote: I don't know how I feel about the CBA, which is supposed to create more parity. It sort of does, but LA and NY still have an advantage while a team that drafted well like OKC faces stiffer penalties than before. Wish there was something in there saying that salaries of drafted and never traded players count as less that 1x as far as the cap calculation goes.
That's because it won't create parity at all. It doesn't matter how many stupid rules they try to include to affect player salaries: Superstars win in this league. If 3 of them decide to team up for less than market value then market size means absolute shit. Miami is a mid sized market, OKC tanked for years, got good returns and massive profit off their draft picks and now wants to make Harden look like the villain.
I said it during the lockout and I'll say it again: If you can't afford to WIN when you have the shot then don't own an NBA team. Mark Cuban was right when he said some owners are about winning and some are about profit. You have 4 pre-prime stars (or 3 and a specialist) all of whom you drafted and had ages to reap money off their rookie deals. The "we're too small to pay" shit needs to stop.
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On October 31 2012 03:09 Ace wrote:Show nested quote +On October 30 2012 11:02 citi.zen wrote: I don't know how I feel about the CBA, which is supposed to create more parity. It sort of does, but LA and NY still have an advantage while a team that drafted well like OKC faces stiffer penalties than before. Wish there was something in there saying that salaries of drafted and never traded players count as less that 1x as far as the cap calculation goes. That's because it won't create parity at all. It doesn't matter how many stupid rules they try to include to affect player salaries: Superstars win in this league. If 3 of them decide to team up for less than market value then market size means absolute shit. Miami is a mid sized market, OKC tanked for years, got good returns and massive profit off their draft picks and now wants to make Harden look like the villain. I said it during the lockout and I'll say it again: If you can't afford to WIN when you have the shot then don't own an NBA team. Mark Cuban was right when he said some owners are about winning and some are about profit. You have 4 pre-prime stars (or 3 and a specialist) all of whom you drafted and had ages to reap money off their rookie deals. The "we're too small to pay" shit needs to stop.
Amen to that.
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Bill Simmons wrote a great piece about the Harden trade: http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/8573213/the-harden-disaster
On October 30 2012 10:49 Jerubaal wrote:Show nested quote +On October 29 2012 17:53 TieN.nS) wrote:On October 29 2012 08:43 Jerubaal wrote:On October 29 2012 08:18 wei2coolman wrote:On October 29 2012 07:09 Jerubaal wrote: The working class hero spiel was pretty predictable.
So I'm supposed to be smart and savvy and build a lean mean team, but once I get them I'm supposed to overpay to keep it together? Gimme a break. Gotta pay to win. There is abundant evidence to the contrary. Of the top 10 salaried teams this year I give 2 any chance to win the championship. That's cute. I think it's fair to say that you're talking about the Heat and the Lakers, who are the two odds-on favorites. Paying the luxury tax isn't working out for them? Sure, just being willing to spend money recklessly like the Knicks and Nets have isn't a recipe for success, but I'd certainly prefer an owner like that to a Robert Sarver or Donald Sterling. In the long term, based on how the lottery picks go and how Jeremy Lamb develops, this trade might wind up being good (and they got decent value regardless, considering they probably weren't going to be able to sign Harden). But the fact remains that the Thunder just broke up an NBA Finals team not because they weren't able to afford paying a player, but because they weren't willing to. And somehow you're defending this! l o l The Heat aren't a normally constructed team; the players colluded to get there and took pay cuts, especially Lebron, to make the team feasible. It would have been stupid for the Heat to not have taken such a bargain, especially considering the monetary effect of Lebron's arrival. I heard all year how the Lakers were the odds on favorites for the West last year, so you'll forgive me for not taking them in the preseason. Even if they somehow magically manage to win the championship this year, they'll have paid, what, about 50% more than any other team to get it? The Top 10 stat is there to disprove what you so ardently believe- that paying equals winning. Several of those teams are unproven at best and most will be bad. The existence of the Yankees does not disprove the effectiveness of the Oakland As or the Florida Marlins. If OKC wants to model themselves off of the As or the Spurs then you stick to your guns and not go all in for some temporary success. And I'm not 'defending' the decision, I'm defending the GM's making the decision. So why don't we stop talking like there's some sort of moral element in resigning basketball players.
OKC's plan worked out better than they ever could have hoped for. And then they traded Harden away while painting him as a money-grubber, giving him only one hour to decide whether or not to accept an offer far less than what he was guaranteed to get on the market. The Thunder could've given him up until the contract extension deadline or just let him become a restricted free agent while giving their championship aspirations with this core group another season. You are mistaken in thinking that signing Harden would be going all-in for temporary success -- having Durant, Westbrook, and Harden, all top-20 players, secured for the next half a decade seems as sure a plan for lasting success as you can get in pro sports. Throwing that away and hoping the ping pong balls bounce your way seems the gamble to me, but perhaps you're looking at it from the owner's perspective; after all, they're going to sell tickets regardless so why bother cutting into your bottom line? OKC's portrayal and handling of this situation have been disingenuous, and that's what I take issue with.
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lakers can pull whatever they want. they have a shitfuck tonne of money coming from time warner deal, in addition to their already loaded sources of revenue. the luxury tax will mean nothing to them, until maybe the 3rd year
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I find it funny the idiot sports writers saying Harden's offense is replaceable by Kevin Martin is actually being allowed to go to print. I swear not one of them has seen him play in the last 2 years.
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Same sports writers that keep ragging on Westbrook though and argue that Rondo's not an elite PG, probably *shrugs*
Re: parity, there won't ever be parity in the NBA because moreso than any other major league sport there's a tremendous disparity between the top 20-30 players and the other 300 or so players in the league. There just aren't enough players to go around.
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On October 31 2012 06:41 Southlight wrote: Same sports writers that keep ragging on Westbrook though and argue that Rondo's not an elite PG, probably *shrugs*
Re: parity, there won't ever be parity in the NBA because moreso than any other major league sport there's a tremendous disparity between the top 20-30 players and the other 300 or so players in the league. There just aren't enough players to go around.
The other way to look at it is that there are too many teams.
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On October 31 2012 06:41 Southlight wrote: Same sports writers that keep ragging on Westbrook though and argue that Rondo's not an elite PG, probably *shrugs*
Re: parity, there won't ever be parity in the NBA because moreso than any other major league sport there's a tremendous disparity between the top 20-30 players and the other 300 or so players in the league. There just aren't enough players to go around.
While individual players in basketball impact the game more than individuals in any other sports, and having LeBron James by himself is good enough for a 20-win improvement, I think the lack of parity is due more to the inherent allure of the big market teams. Players would rather live in those cities, all of the limelight and sponsorships come with playing in those markets, and kids grow up dreaming about playing for those teams. Even if there was a hard salary cap in place, the big markets would still have those natural advantages and not only secure the top-level talent, but also have the best chance of persuading stars to take less. Meanwhile, the small-market teams would still be stuck overpaying B-tier stars, unless they luck out and draft the homegrown prodigy or such. Not only is parity impossible, I'd argue that it'd be terrible as far as entertainment goes, from a big-picture point of view. If the Heat and Lakers meet up in the finals like everyone expect them to, the ratings and the level of play will both be ridiculous. Besides, the CBA was really just about the owners wanting a larger slice of the pie; as this offseason has proven, there's no way to protect dumb front offices from themselves.
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Unfortunately there has never, ever, ever been a period in NBA history where a ton of big name Free Agents moved to big markets. It's a rare event and there is no evidence of it happening.
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Aye, otherwise the Knicks would have won at least once in the last 40 or so years, you'd think.
The problem is that 1 player makes you a legit contender, 2 makes you almost a lock to contend, and 3 generally wins it. But if you were to say there are maybe 20 players at any time that can be considered a team-carrying superstar, then assuming one team has two, you're still looking at literally half the league not having a single one. Then you get to today's state where teams generally need 3 (although in all honesty prior stud teams tended to also have 3, people just undervalued the third until they left/retired/etc.) and assuming there are two teams with three (usually the case) then you're looking at even less of a shot for the majority of teams, because now you need at least two, not just one. It's a simple numbers game. Historically though the number has not even been at 20 - really you're looking at anywhere between 2-5 transcendent superstars and about 10-15 star sidekicks, and then a bunch of random mob all-stars that have fatal flaws. The tragedy is that a lot of dumb teams think these mob all-stars are actually superstars when they're not even an ideal #2 on a championship team.
And if you think only the big-name cities have had these large clusters, you're wrong - if anything, city/teams became relatively larger markets because they managed to snag 3-4 such stud players in a row, which allows for the creation of a market. The only true exception would really be the Spurs over the past decade or so, but despite national outcries of them being a small-market team, I don't think they've ever actually had financial issues and such, so it's actually hard to categorize them as a "small-market team." They just have low national exposure... and a lot of it has to do with what I perceive to be an organizational decision to be that way (because if they actually tried they probably would easily get national exposure. I mean come on, it's not like Texas is a barren sports state or something).
For reference sake, transcendent superstars I consider something like Lebron, Dwight, Nash (a couple years ago anyways), and maybe Chris Paul/Derrick Rose. These are the guys that can take over a game and it almost seems to not matter who the rest of their team is. Sidekick superstars are players like Wade (never really had much success on his own IMO) and dare I say Kobe (though he may have been transcendent-level some years back) - players who are clearly good but tend to "need help" because they're not actually the one-man beasts they're hyped up to be. Then you get mob all-stars like Joe Johnson.
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On October 31 2012 06:27 a176 wrote: lakers can pull whatever they want. they have a shitfuck tonne of money coming from time warner deal, in addition to their already loaded sources of revenue. the luxury tax will mean nothing to them, until maybe the 3rd year
$250M from TV revenue alone lol, sell out premium ticket prices + merchandising means they'll just spend whatever they want to. insanely rich franchise...
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On October 31 2012 07:09 Ace wrote: Unfortunately there has never, ever, ever been a period in NBA history where a ton of big name Free Agents moved to big markets. It's a rare event and there is no evidence of it happening.
On October 31 2012 07:33 Southlight wrote: Aye, otherwise the Knicks would have won at least once in the last 40 or so years, you'd think.
The problem is that 1 player makes you a legit contender, 2 makes you almost a lock to contend, and 3 generally wins it. But if you were to say there are maybe 20 players at any time that can be considered a team-carrying superstar, then assuming one team has two, you're still looking at literally half the league not having a single one. Then you get to today's state where teams generally need 3 (although in all honesty prior stud teams tended to also have 3, people just undervalued the third until they left/retired/etc.) and assuming there are two teams with three (usually the case) then you're looking at even less of a shot for the majority of teams, because now you need at least two, not just one. It's a simple numbers game. Historically though the number has not even been at 20 - really you're looking at anywhere between 2-5 transcendent superstars and about 10-15 star sidekicks, and then a bunch of random mob all-stars that have fatal flaws. The tragedy is that a lot of dumb teams think these mob all-stars are actually superstars when they're not even an ideal #2 on a championship team.
And if you think only the big-name cities have had these large clusters, you're wrong - if anything, city/teams became relatively larger markets because they managed to snag 3-4 such stud players in a row, which allows for the creation of a market. The only true exception would really be the Spurs over the past decade or so, but despite national outcries of them being a small-market team, I don't think they've ever actually had financial issues and such, so it's actually hard to categorize them as a "small-market team." They just have low national exposure... and a lot of it has to do with what I perceive to be an organizational decision to be that way (because if they actually tried they probably would easily get national exposure. I mean come on, it's not like Texas is a barren sports state or something).
For reference sake, transcendent superstars I consider something like Lebron, Dwight, Nash (a couple years ago anyways), and maybe Chris Paul/Derrick Rose. These are the guys that can take over a game and it almost seems to not matter who the rest of their team is. Sidekick superstars are players like Wade (never really had much success on his own IMO) and dare I say Kobe (though he may have been transcendent-level some years back) - players who are clearly good but tend to "need help" because they're not actually the one-man beasts they're hyped up to be. Then you get mob all-stars like Joe Johnson.
You know what? You guys are probably right about that. But I'd contend that that's because roster spots are limited (and, while the support of big-market fans requires big names on the marquee, NBA CHAMPION Eddy Curry and CBA CHAMPION Stephon Marbury probably aren't a recipe for success) and players in past eras didn't really realize their own worth/earning potential the way players nowadays do.
Obviously I agree with you on Joe Johnson but you're crazy for putting the sidekick label on Wade. Post-06, he's been injured/on some really awful teams. Sure, LeBron probably would have turned them into 60-win teams anyway, but that's LeBron.
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That's why I place him on a separate "tier" so to speak. There are only a handful of true one-man players, but they do exist. They're the players that regardless of the talent around them seem to always make it to the playoffs. TMac of old used to be like that. It's the sidekick players and the all-star players that get overvalued because people like hyping them as tragic transcendent players and such, but they're just not at that extra level. The "problem" for league parity is that these "sidekick" type star players seem to always find a way to land on a team with the transcendent player (Pippen and MJ, Admiral and Duncan, etc. etc.), and I think what people fear is that if a "big" market team manages to land a transcendent player, they'll have free dibs on sidekick/allstar players to come. But my contention is that it's actually the transcendent players that create the market - that's why the Spurs have actually had their pick of free agents and such for quite a while (dating back to the reign of the Admiral), and so on. Thing is, as Ace said, there just aren't examples of transcendent players favoring a major market, particularly when they're actually still transcendent (we're not counting their decline years). In fact, that's the reason why Lebron leaving was such a shocker, right, transcendent players don't change teams. But even then, he didn't actually go to a large market. Miami's become "big" now but really until Wade/Shaq they were considered a pretty shitty market. That championship and the Wade Hype Machine grew their market, and now with the Lebron trio they're kicking into major market status.
Sorry, aren't many. Because Shaq obviously did. But the point is that the mere movement of the player is a shocker, and I don't think there's a pattern of them preferring the perceived major markets.
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