re: Team age/Roster construction

quote:

---

Evans, Asik, and Holiday all posted career high PERs last seasons So Id say yeah, the could have a better season than they already had considering they just did that a year ago (when they were young! amirite!).

---

So, you would say that last season was Holiday's greatest season he has ever played? Not his all-star season where he averaged 17/8/4 and only missed 4 games. But you think the season he averaged 14/6/3 and missed half the season was his best year? Do I need to do this with Asik and Evans too? I'm sure you will throw out Evans historic rookie season where he went 20/5/5 to say last year was his best. PER is hardly the greatest measure of a player. That's sad you went there..

quote:

---

Davis has gotten better every season, and he's the only one that this team needs to keep improving.

---

He is the only one that can at this point and that isn't going too well right now.

So are you saying that the guys are young? Still growing and improving? Is the 29 year old Asik still a young pup? I'm still trying to get over you saying that he had his best year last year. All the Houston fans are going to be pissed. They all still love him for that one magical season he had with them..

And, other than Davis, Pels players listed in that article are flatlining or going down per that model.

Again, the point isn't that they are "old" and cannot get better. Rather, guys in the league for 4 or 5 years usually are who they are. They can get better, but it's more around the margins than the gains you see less experienced players make. For Demps, that was an acceptable risk given what he realized he had in Davis and the fact that these guys were locked in for 3/4 years. But many Pels fans figured out early on that Holiday and Evans were never going to be the 2nd guy on a title contender.

A couple of questions I think about with these guys is this: how much is it they are getting better v getting to play with a force like Davis? Conversely, how much have they helped Davis v playing with lotto picks with uncertain futures?

I think there is a happy median, where you build through the draft and make smart personnel decisions. Instead of trying to copy the Thunder, we could have used an approach like Chicago. A slow methodical rebuild. Draft a superstar like Rose. Find nice gems like Noah, Gibson, Snell, McDermott, Butler and on and on. Then pepper in savy vet pick-ups like Gasol, Dunleavy, Brooks and a long list of pgs. That team always has a plan and nobody has had worse injury luck. But they keep on churning out victories. Thats how i hoped we would build..

Philly is the worst build/rebuild I've ever seen and nobody has ever done anything like that. They are flipping a 1/3 of the roster each season and haven't really developed a player in 3 years. So that is an extreme example.

But a team should be bringing in 2-3 young players a year and you need 1 or 2 to stick. I think its just necessary to keep injecting new blood and enthusiasm. Plus they are more desperate and push the other players. I'd love to have some young swingmen to push Gordon and Evans. Cunningham and Poindexter did that great. But they are limited and not too cheap. Plus they are what they are.

It would just give me more hope and its fun watching young players get better..