Post by aar on Aug 1, 2012 15:03:59 GMT -5
1) Many GMs have complained about lopsided trades. Which do you think was actually the most lopsided?
I think that gms overreact a lot without really understanding the trade. Gms that know the players best, for better or worse, are the ones that have them and if they are willing to trade them there is probably a reason but we will get into that in the next question. That said there are some bad trades which are done bc a team takes into account what it wants to do instead of trying to maximize value. A good example is the NOH-MEm trade. Mem made out like bandits but NOH wanted to tank so the dumped Denton and Willoughby for its pick. The worst trade imo was
Bucks Trade:
Kermit Washington
Andrew Toney
Blazers trade:
Tree Rollins
Tom McMillen
Vet FA
Tree is a top center, maybe the best in the league. Tom is a solid scorer and rotation player. Kermit is a decent starter and I really don't like toney. Can't shoot threes, low rebounds, tos are nothing special. The stat defense is great and if he had low tos and didn't shoot that alone could make him a starter on the right team. He has only had 2 tcs and can still get better but tree is a superstar and is worth much more than Kermit and Toney. Add that to Tom and this is a lousy trade.
2) You caught flack for dealing Michael Cooper. What was your rationale behind the deal?
Shocking, another Greeme trade bashed. Of course my trades have been bashed for the past 6 years and I have one my division every year so yah. Rationale is pretty simple. Cooper is at the top of his value now.
Players are like stocks; you try to trade them when they have maximum value. He is coming off a great tc but my best guess is that his ratings are at the low part of those letter ratings. He is good-very good at a bunch of things but not elite. If his ratings take a tc hit next year he could be untradeable. I made out very well imo. Dunn is a great player on the right team. He can score 20 as a non option on nice %$s, rebound well for a sg, good defender with steals and he almost never turns the ball over. Valuewise he isn't close to Coop but as far as contribution to a team he is a lot closer than people think. I love EJ. He is currently backing up my 1 and 3.
He can score as a rookie 25-27 as a top option on sick %s. Even though he is playing half his time as backup pg his tos are only 0.2 per 13 minutes. His big negative is his defense. His steals are ok so his per d is probably pretty bad. I can live with that given all of his pluses. And he is still a rookie!! The big wildcard in this trade is Theus.
He can be a top option scorer in the future. I don't really have time for him in my dc and he seems to get most of his minutes at pg which is killing his tos. If he resigns cheap that ill make this trade even better for me but even if he doesn't I have no regrets about this trade at all. My team has been playing better since the trade and as they say the proof is in the pudding.
3) Broph is gone and Play hasn't won a championship in awhile. Who do you think are the top-3 GMs right now?
Obviously J has to be there. Drafting MJ first was a masterstroke. Never would have thought it. Didn't think that Broph was top 3, I actually thought he was overrated. I still think that Play is top 3 although he has done a bad job lately.
Repole has been dominant lately. Did a good job flipping Bingo for assets and developing those assets. I think he made a major mistake in talking too much and saying that gms "had" to trade for their picks back. I think that caused the gms try to prove him wrong even though the logical thing was to trade for their picks. I still have Play at 2. He is still paying the price for the hc penalty. The penalty would have caused half the gms here to be cyd. I don't really like his current team. Marques shouldn't have been maxed. Don't like most of his young guys. Still think that he can consolidate some talent and put a contender on the floor within a year or 2.
I have aar and DBW in a tie for third. I really don't like how aar runs his teams – championship or bust – but there is no arguing that aar is a top gm and put together championship quality teams. DBW has done a great job lucking into magic Johnson and putting players around him. Always seems on the verge of hc problems. It would be hilarious – to me not to DBW – if he couldn't resign Magic bc of hc problems. He will probably move Rudy for expiring before the deadline to avoid hc problems.
4) Recently, a thread was started urging a restart. Are you for or against it?
I hate restarts. There is an influx of activity and then it drops off. Some guys start tanking right away and there is very little middle; either total tanks or guys trying to win. One thing I would like to see in a restart is some kind of auction instead of a draft. Or maybe try a new sim program. If it is done at least there should be something different.
5) The West is hotly contested. Who do you think finishes with the best record?
It isn't that it is hotly contested, it is that none of the teams is really elite. You could make the argument that the 8th seed is more talented than the first seed. I think that the Lakers have the best starting 5 but their depth sucks. I think that the Clippers will end up on top. They have a very solid frontcourt with Neal and Lucas. 2 big time snipers in Vinnie and Bristow. Solid team defense all around. If they could get more of their shots to Vinnie and Bristow they could be a contender to take it all.
6) Which team without Jordan, Bird or Magic is best setup for the future?
The Grizz. They have 2 superstars in Isiah and Mchale. They have an allstar in Buck. Willoughby and King are two more solid young players. They should just get better and better for the next few years as the players develop. If Willoughby can improve his rebounding enough to play pf then Isiah/DT/McHale/Willoughby/Buck could be a top team for years to come.
7) The Bucks team has been trading like crazy as always. Have they become a contender or are they looking like a treadmill team?
I think that the trade for Tree pushed them over the top. They have an impressive array of talent. I don't think that the pieces fit together very well but the sheer amount of talent makes them a force to be reckoned with. Take English for example. His talent is scoring and he has led the league in scoring the past 2 years. There is so much talent surrounding him that he only scores 25 a game. A waste of his main talent. If they seriously want to win they should flip Blackman for a big. Landsberger could be a solid third big and Mahorn a 4th.
8) The Mavs and Hornets are now both tanking due to retaining their picks. Will it be too little too late in terms of either being in position to land a top-3 pick?
Mavs won't be able to tank if they don't move Drew. They have to tank seriously bc they have a ton of ground to make up. The Hornets are in full tank mode and will end up bottom 5 easily. The fact that Spencer is tanking leads me to believe that the draft will be very good. We will see soon.
9) Many GMs are unhappy that Spencer is taking over teams and making then competitive again. Do you agree with it?
Gms always complain. There is nothing wrong with it. It makes sense to make the team decent especially since the teams are pickless. It is unfair to expect a new gm to deal with it and it makes more sense than making up new rules for each gm – this one gets 2 freebie years, this one gets 3 etc. Maybe if gms know that Spencer will take over teams that will devalue future picks and less teams will trade for them. I think that the trading of futures has gotten somewhat out of control. Everybody makes their own decision how many is too many and there should be a clear rule what is allowed so we can all play by the same rule. Otherwise somebody in their cy will decide to trade their next 20 picks.
10) Finally, give me your Finals prediction for this year.
Celtics – Nuggets. Celtics are still better than the Magic and the Bucks imo. Not only are they the three best teams in the East but they are the three best teams in the league. I think that MJ is one more year away unless J pulls off a trade for another piece. Repole can pull off a trade for Bingo or Elvin Hayes and make himself the favorite but it would cause him future cap trouble so I don't think that he will do it.
The Nuggets aren't the best team in the west but they are very flexible and can throw a lot of different lineups at you which is very helpful in the playoffs. And their gm is a nice guy. Really it wouldn't be a shock if any of the teams in the top 8 gets out of the West. The teams are really that close.
I think that gms overreact a lot without really understanding the trade. Gms that know the players best, for better or worse, are the ones that have them and if they are willing to trade them there is probably a reason but we will get into that in the next question. That said there are some bad trades which are done bc a team takes into account what it wants to do instead of trying to maximize value. A good example is the NOH-MEm trade. Mem made out like bandits but NOH wanted to tank so the dumped Denton and Willoughby for its pick. The worst trade imo was
Bucks Trade:
Kermit Washington
Andrew Toney
Blazers trade:
Tree Rollins
Tom McMillen
Vet FA
Tree is a top center, maybe the best in the league. Tom is a solid scorer and rotation player. Kermit is a decent starter and I really don't like toney. Can't shoot threes, low rebounds, tos are nothing special. The stat defense is great and if he had low tos and didn't shoot that alone could make him a starter on the right team. He has only had 2 tcs and can still get better but tree is a superstar and is worth much more than Kermit and Toney. Add that to Tom and this is a lousy trade.
2) You caught flack for dealing Michael Cooper. What was your rationale behind the deal?
Shocking, another Greeme trade bashed. Of course my trades have been bashed for the past 6 years and I have one my division every year so yah. Rationale is pretty simple. Cooper is at the top of his value now.
Players are like stocks; you try to trade them when they have maximum value. He is coming off a great tc but my best guess is that his ratings are at the low part of those letter ratings. He is good-very good at a bunch of things but not elite. If his ratings take a tc hit next year he could be untradeable. I made out very well imo. Dunn is a great player on the right team. He can score 20 as a non option on nice %$s, rebound well for a sg, good defender with steals and he almost never turns the ball over. Valuewise he isn't close to Coop but as far as contribution to a team he is a lot closer than people think. I love EJ. He is currently backing up my 1 and 3.
He can score as a rookie 25-27 as a top option on sick %s. Even though he is playing half his time as backup pg his tos are only 0.2 per 13 minutes. His big negative is his defense. His steals are ok so his per d is probably pretty bad. I can live with that given all of his pluses. And he is still a rookie!! The big wildcard in this trade is Theus.
He can be a top option scorer in the future. I don't really have time for him in my dc and he seems to get most of his minutes at pg which is killing his tos. If he resigns cheap that ill make this trade even better for me but even if he doesn't I have no regrets about this trade at all. My team has been playing better since the trade and as they say the proof is in the pudding.
3) Broph is gone and Play hasn't won a championship in awhile. Who do you think are the top-3 GMs right now?
Obviously J has to be there. Drafting MJ first was a masterstroke. Never would have thought it. Didn't think that Broph was top 3, I actually thought he was overrated. I still think that Play is top 3 although he has done a bad job lately.
Repole has been dominant lately. Did a good job flipping Bingo for assets and developing those assets. I think he made a major mistake in talking too much and saying that gms "had" to trade for their picks back. I think that caused the gms try to prove him wrong even though the logical thing was to trade for their picks. I still have Play at 2. He is still paying the price for the hc penalty. The penalty would have caused half the gms here to be cyd. I don't really like his current team. Marques shouldn't have been maxed. Don't like most of his young guys. Still think that he can consolidate some talent and put a contender on the floor within a year or 2.
I have aar and DBW in a tie for third. I really don't like how aar runs his teams – championship or bust – but there is no arguing that aar is a top gm and put together championship quality teams. DBW has done a great job lucking into magic Johnson and putting players around him. Always seems on the verge of hc problems. It would be hilarious – to me not to DBW – if he couldn't resign Magic bc of hc problems. He will probably move Rudy for expiring before the deadline to avoid hc problems.
4) Recently, a thread was started urging a restart. Are you for or against it?
I hate restarts. There is an influx of activity and then it drops off. Some guys start tanking right away and there is very little middle; either total tanks or guys trying to win. One thing I would like to see in a restart is some kind of auction instead of a draft. Or maybe try a new sim program. If it is done at least there should be something different.
5) The West is hotly contested. Who do you think finishes with the best record?
It isn't that it is hotly contested, it is that none of the teams is really elite. You could make the argument that the 8th seed is more talented than the first seed. I think that the Lakers have the best starting 5 but their depth sucks. I think that the Clippers will end up on top. They have a very solid frontcourt with Neal and Lucas. 2 big time snipers in Vinnie and Bristow. Solid team defense all around. If they could get more of their shots to Vinnie and Bristow they could be a contender to take it all.
6) Which team without Jordan, Bird or Magic is best setup for the future?
The Grizz. They have 2 superstars in Isiah and Mchale. They have an allstar in Buck. Willoughby and King are two more solid young players. They should just get better and better for the next few years as the players develop. If Willoughby can improve his rebounding enough to play pf then Isiah/DT/McHale/Willoughby/Buck could be a top team for years to come.
7) The Bucks team has been trading like crazy as always. Have they become a contender or are they looking like a treadmill team?
I think that the trade for Tree pushed them over the top. They have an impressive array of talent. I don't think that the pieces fit together very well but the sheer amount of talent makes them a force to be reckoned with. Take English for example. His talent is scoring and he has led the league in scoring the past 2 years. There is so much talent surrounding him that he only scores 25 a game. A waste of his main talent. If they seriously want to win they should flip Blackman for a big. Landsberger could be a solid third big and Mahorn a 4th.
8) The Mavs and Hornets are now both tanking due to retaining their picks. Will it be too little too late in terms of either being in position to land a top-3 pick?
Mavs won't be able to tank if they don't move Drew. They have to tank seriously bc they have a ton of ground to make up. The Hornets are in full tank mode and will end up bottom 5 easily. The fact that Spencer is tanking leads me to believe that the draft will be very good. We will see soon.
9) Many GMs are unhappy that Spencer is taking over teams and making then competitive again. Do you agree with it?
Gms always complain. There is nothing wrong with it. It makes sense to make the team decent especially since the teams are pickless. It is unfair to expect a new gm to deal with it and it makes more sense than making up new rules for each gm – this one gets 2 freebie years, this one gets 3 etc. Maybe if gms know that Spencer will take over teams that will devalue future picks and less teams will trade for them. I think that the trading of futures has gotten somewhat out of control. Everybody makes their own decision how many is too many and there should be a clear rule what is allowed so we can all play by the same rule. Otherwise somebody in their cy will decide to trade their next 20 picks.
10) Finally, give me your Finals prediction for this year.
Celtics – Nuggets. Celtics are still better than the Magic and the Bucks imo. Not only are they the three best teams in the East but they are the three best teams in the league. I think that MJ is one more year away unless J pulls off a trade for another piece. Repole can pull off a trade for Bingo or Elvin Hayes and make himself the favorite but it would cause him future cap trouble so I don't think that he will do it.
The Nuggets aren't the best team in the west but they are very flexible and can throw a lot of different lineups at you which is very helpful in the playoffs. And their gm is a nice guy. Really it wouldn't be a shock if any of the teams in the top 8 gets out of the West. The teams are really that close.
