Huge Dumars Post

[lospistones]

Here are some great moves he's made:
a) signing Tracy McGrady to the vet's min. This guy has been versatile enough to start for/backup three backcourt positions, and thus is playing off the versatility and masking weaknesses of other players. He's not leading us to the promised land, but what an effing steal. He helped resurrect a career.
b) drafting Greg Monroe. Thank God he didn't take Ed Davis or Cole Aldrich, like a lot of rumors had it. It appears we may have our own Al Horford, a 20/10 guy. He got the best rookie big in the draft.
c) getting Ben to return, another starter on a low-level contract. He righted a wrong on this one.
d) drafted Jonas Jerebko, an All-Rookie 2nd Teamer and versatile frontcourt player. We'd be much better with this kid, the second best athlete in his draft class, on the active roster.
e) drafted Austin Daye. Besides Lawson and Holiday, and perhaps Collison, nobody drafted immediately after him is worth a damn. Besides, with Stuckey/Gordon/Bynum we were all PG'ed out, anyway.
f) signed Chris Wilcox. The guy's an expiring contract now, but 3million is great value for a guy that's shown he can be a 13/7 player. PER36 he's putting up 16/10 for us right now.
g) Firing Michael Curry after 1 season.
h) Getting Ben Gordon, the best player in the 09FA class.

Moves that are not inexplicable, but still not the greatest:
a) Getting Ben Gordon when we had just extended Rip, without a trade partner in line for Rip. This could be mitigated if Rip is moved for an expiring.
b) Head coach John Kuester. I understand that he wanted a cheap coach after having to pay both Carlisle and Brown after the fact.
c) Head coach Michael Curry. """
d) Signing Maxiell when he wasn't guaranteed to be a consistent 6th-8th man. 5 million a year is not bad for a rotation player.
e) Trading away Chauncey Billups for Allen Iverson, when not utilizing Allen Iverson correctly. Two years prior AI was the second-best 2-guard in the league. We tried to make him a backup PG. Otherwise, a shakeup needed to be make. To this day, the 2004 save for Ben Wallace needs to be entirely out the door.

There are few moves I have no explanation for:
a) Trading away Afflalo for cash and a pick :-( The guy's a very solid player, Raja Bell-esque.
b) If he doesn't fire John Kuester after this season.
c) Trading away Chase Budinger. The kid would be great depth right now at the swing positions.
d) Trading away Amir Johnson. He's a foul machine, but trading him for cap space kills me. PER36 he's a 13/9/1/s/1.6b kinda guy. I don't know who to compare that to, but it's valuable.

We COULD have been:
Stuckey/McGrady
Afflalo/Gordon
Prince/Daye/Budinger
Villanueva/Johnson/Jerebko
Wallace/Monroe

We're not far from it, though. Even with our wonky lineups.
McGrady/Gordon
Stuckey/Hamilton
Prince/Daye
Monroe/Villanueva
Wallace/Wilcox

Don't comment yet. Work in progress post.

[lospistones]

Well, whatever.

The point is, a lot of his work can be summarized by the Rip Hamilton extension/Ben Gordon signing, which we know. Once he clears that up, even if it's just for an expiring, the roster is much more balanced.
Assuming the more traditional lineup we've shown:
Stuckey/Bynum
Gordon/McGrady
Prince/Daye
Villanueva/Wilcox or Maxiell or Jerebko
Wallace/Monroe

Then, we should probably move Prince, who has repeatedly undermined the coach to the media (unacceptable, even if a monkey is coaching). I believe that Joe is show-casing Wilcox right now so as to paint him as more than just an expiring. We then have Prince/McGrady/Wilcox to move. We trade them to a contender trying to leapfrog the pack.

At this point, we should get back a few young prospects, or a young but overpaid stud. Let's assume he's a C or PG. Then we wind up with:
Stuckey (more than worth his draft spot, still a good trading chip)/PG or Bynum
Gordon (top FA in 2009, alongside a good theoretical complement)/Stuckey (gets to be a combo guard, hooray)
Daye (more than worth his draft spot, a project that's progressing nicely)/Jerebko (2009 All-Rookie)
Villanueva (bargain contractually if a starter, alongside a good complement)/Maxiell (worth his contract if a rotation player)
Monroe (All-Rookie, arguably best C from draft)/C or Wallace

After that, we're a lotto pick and/or MLE exception away from a solid, young, 9-10 man rotation with good trading chips all around (except for Gordon depending on the new CBA).
Honestly, I believe that Joe's hands were very much tied by having a cheap luxury-tax fearing owner, and then that owner's wife who wanted to sell the team and invariably froze everything. I think he had a vision and that his latest success (the draft) could pan out along with his 2k9 signings.

[Pharaoh]

Just one point: Afflalo was traded for nothing so we could give Chris Wilcox his contract - despite the fact we actually had $18 million worth of cap space to start the off-season and the only big under contract was Maxiell.

So, we traded a young prospect for nothing to sign a scrub big man when we actually should have used our $18 million worth of cap space to sign quality bigs!

This way you avoid having both Rip and Gordon locked in.

This way you don't have an unbalanced roster.

What many want to see now is Joe trade Rip for an expiring so that we can once again have millions in cap space! And then we hope to sign a quality big man...

WTF? LMFAO!

IF this happens it means Joe wasted 2 fucking years, man!

[lospistones]

I don't care about having the cap space. I would rather be over the cap and use the MLE at this point.
I really cannot comprehend why Joe traded away Affalo, a playoff team starter, for a big man that rode the pine. I don't. In that case, force the coach to use Wilcox as the fourth big. Lord knows he's capable of producing statistically.
But the pieces are there to be a competitive, young, balanced team after a singular move (or the domino effect that would result from that move).

Honestly, though. Look at two trades that are often bandied about:
Prince/Maxiell for Kaman/Foye
Hamilton/Summers for Murphy/Petro.

Stuckey/Bynum/White*
Gordon/Foye
Daye/McGrady/Jerebko
Villanueva/Murphy/Wilcox
Monroe/Wallace/Kaman*/Petro

So much better, and we arguably take a hit in talent!
We even have a glut in the frontcourt rather than the backcourt, and that's a better problem to have IMO (Joe has gone on the record and stated such in the past, too). At that point, we can see what Wilcox/Bynum/McGrady would fetch us from a contending team.

[lospistones]

BAM. To Portland:http://games.espn.go.com/nba/tradeMa...radeId=4wx7hkg
We ask them to cut White, plz. We are:
Stuckey/Andre Miller/White
Gordon/Foye
Daye/Jerebko/Morrison
Villanueva/Murphy/Wallace
Monroe/Kaman/Petro
We pick up Adam Morrison!

and that's a rebuild in one season, three plausible trades. All the bad energy is gone, the rotation is balanced, and players get to be where they deserve.

[Hermy]

and you win 30 games.

[lospistones]

Nowhere in there did I trade away the lotto pick.

[lospistones]

and I disagree about winning 30 games the year after.

[Glenn]

30 might actually be a significant improvement after this year.

[lospistones]

We're on pace to win 26.