re: Pelicans with plenty of love in Simmons' worst contracts piece

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Even with the flaws, this is a funky, uptempo, small ball, interchangeable roster. However one feels about Williams, none of those words describe his philosophy.

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Sounds like a George Karl roster to me.

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After basketball reasons, you get Howard and Harden.

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FIFY

David Stern saved Morey from himself.

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but how do we get better right now?

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Get healthy. This team was never meant to contend this year. I can't believe how many pelicants are in this thread when if this team were 100% healthy and in 6-8th place most of you would be saying we're a James Posey away from contending.

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what is the plan?

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Keep Gordon healthy so he either opts out or you can trade him next deadline. Follow the money, Tyreke always meant Gordon was not in the future plans. And honestly Tyreke may not be in the future plans. I think Demps was collecting assets hoping that he'd have an appealing package for the next James Harden/Dwight Howard, which now appears to be Kevin Love. Do you think Minnesota wants to rebuild completely, or turn Kevin Love into Kevin Love lite (Ryno) and Tyreke? 2 B to B+ players certainly seems like a better package than a B+ and 2 Cs that you'd have with Vasquez and Lopez. People keep asking where is the big move, you have to wait for the big moves to happen, they aren't always available.

That's the plan. You have to wait. There is no fixing now. The problem with now is health and Eric Gordon. You have to trade Eric Gordon by next(2015) draft (or have him opt out) so you can use his salary space before AD gets his extension. You have to wait for opportunity to trade any of our 3 B players besides AD for a 2nd A player.

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how do we acquire assets and improve the product?

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In the next 2 years we will hopefully turn Gordon's cap space into a B player and add 1 - 2 C+/B- players via the MLE.

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That's the plan. You have to wait

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Fine

We're going to waste a lot of prime AD years sitting around. If current NBA trends hold true, we might not have him all that long. I think the FO needs to understand this.

And if it's all about patience and two or three years down the road, then what the hell was Demps thinking with all of the short-sighted win now moves (Jrue trade, Reek). Was that all about Benson and making the franchise good NOW? or is Demps just kind of wheeling and dealing and signing people without a long-term plan?

Like someone said earlier, we now have 3 7 footers that do the same thing, and about 5 guards that do the same thing. And a SF that can't score. What exactly is the blueprint here? Holiday, AD, and Anderson make sense. No one else really does. What recipe is Demps following? Some of this stuff just doesn't make any sense.

And now it's just be patient as we start all over again? Well shite, what were we doing the past 3 years post-CP3 then? The only good long-term move that happened that whole time was AD, and he just fell into our lap.

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We're going to waste a lot of prime AD years sitting around

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A player's prime is from 25-30 years old. AD is 20.

We need to be a playoff team next year. A 2nd round contender the year after that. And a legit Conference Finals contender in 3-5 years.

So freaking relax man.

Not 100% on the specifics but Houston could've made an offer than Memphis was unwilling to match.

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We're going to waste a lot of prime AD years sitting around.

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So the alternative of drafting youngsters would move things along faster?

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If current NBA trends hold true, we might not have him all that long.

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You need to be steadily moving in a clearly contending direction by year 7 AD, that is the current NBA trend. We certainly don't want to screw around, but the team isn't on the clock until 5 years from now.

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I think the FO needs to understand this.

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So by not drafting rookies and trading 2 C players for a B player you think the FO is screwing around with Davis?

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And if it's all about patience and two or three years down the road, then what the hell was Demps thinking with all of the short-sighted win now moves (Jrue trade, Reek).

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Those weren't win now moves, they were about maximizing cap space and trading uncertainty for certainty. Holiday is a B player. Demps has proven he can get C players fairly easily and cheaply, so the only way for the 2 picks to work out better than trading for Holiday would be for them to both become B players. The odds of 2 6-10 picks both being B players is about 10%, and there's also the possibility that neither become a B player. So there's a 10% chance you're worse off trading for Holiday and a 90% you're the same or better. Not win now, uncertainty for certainty.

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What exactly is the blueprint here? Holiday, AD, and Anderson make sense. No one else really does. What recipe is Demps following? Some of this stuff just doesn't make any sense.

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#HireKarl Why did Demps want the Lakers deal more than the Clippers deal? Because he's a Moneyball GM and in pure NBA2k points, the Lakers deal was better. I think Demps is trying to maximize the talent he has and figure out the rest later. Gordon obviously was a big mistake, and I'm not trying to give Demps a pass on that, but the fact that he didn't even entertain trade calls makes me wonder how much resigning Gordon was "encouraged" by Boss Stern.

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And now it's just be patient as we start all over again?

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How did you take anything I said as wait 3 years and start over again? If Demps fails that certainly may happen, but the plan is probably a lot closer to

Dump Gordon sign Deng
Trade Ryno and Reke for Kevin Love
Use the MLE on a SG

Holiday
MLE
Deng
Love
Davis

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You'd rather we go with AD+One knee noel+a bunch of ragtags and suck for another 2 years and bank on that panning out down the road?

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It's better than tying up all your cap space, trading away your first round pick and still missing the playoffs.

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Why would Memphis have shipped Marc to Houston? He was a RA and Houston had no more ammo after getting Pau.

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It was Nene we would have gotten. Marc Gasol did sign an offer sheet with Houston after the basketball reasons happened. Memphis obviously matched. The popular opinion was that Nene was going to sign with Houston if we landed Pau. Would have been an interesting team. Lowry, Lee, Parsons, Pau and Nene.

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Dump Gordon sign Deng
Trade Ryno and Reke for Kevin Love
Use the MLE on a SG

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For the record I take satisfaction in playing some devil's advocate on here. I'm not really THAT fricking miserable about this team.

But I will say if we do anything even CLOSE to this with Demps at the helm, I will seriously never post a single negative word on this board ever again. Ever.

But I don't see that whole scenario happening, or anything anything close to it happening. At the best we would get a pissed off Love in a trade that would Eric Gordon (yea that's right, a verb) us into signing a max deal contract on a disgruntled player that doesn't try on the court.

The rest of your post was predictably top notch and I have no rebuttal

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It's better than tying up all your cap space, trading away your first round pick and still missing the playoffs.

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Thing is:

That precious first round pick will be no better than 12th(a rotation player or a euro)

If we weren't decimated with injuries we'd have a fairly solid shot at the 7-8th seed(when the the big 5 played together they had some astronomical OFF rating)

Hell we'll probably still win 38-42 games even with all the injuries(we'd have to go 17-13 or so to hit 40 wins,very attainable with our schedule.)

That's what we predicted before the year