Which casino in Oklahoma will allow 18 year old to gamble

I had started writing a post about what the next steps for the franchise could entail when I realized that a huge amount of it revolves around one guy... the player return we got from the Harden trade who happens to be entering Unrestricted Free Agency in a few months.
When the news came through that we had traded LeVert for Oladipo, many assumed that it was just a move to reduce salary by Tilman, but I reject that as overly pessimistic. Oladipo in his prime (which was not long ago at all) was a 2-time All Star and one of the premier defensive shooting guards in the league. His horrific injury has taken a bit of time to come back from, and worried Indiana enough to scare them off from wanting to deal with re-signing him to the max contract he will be requesting in Free Agency next summer. They saw so much value in having LeVert locked up on a cheaper deal for extra years that they were willing to take him on with his cancer concerns instead of dealing with a potential max deal for Vic. I don't see this as a salary move from Tilman so much as I see it as a gamble on a player returning from injury by Stone. Between taking chances on Wall, Boogie, and Nwaba, hoping players can come back from bad injuries is a common thread in his gambles and seems to be his "M.O.", so I'm thinking he honestly hopes Victor can come back to a significant percentage of his peak level.
Trading Harden for a younger All-Star SG +8 FRP assets is a massive coup of a deal... if Oladipo is capable of playing close to the level he was at before his injury.
Unfortunately, Victor hasn't gotten back to that level yet... But he isn't that far away, either. He has flashed his potential several times, but has had an equal number of horrific shooting nights. This lack of consistency is problematic, but if he could stabilize around the level of his better performances (which he is obviously capable of), there isn't really a question that he would be worth a near-max deal if not a full max.
Obviously, getting that consistency back is his primary goal and there is no reason to believe that it isn't our hope for him as well. If he does, then we can feel safe signing him to a long-term deal or, if he returns to form quickly enough, we can flip him for more assets.
The first option there is relatively straight forward. Re-signing him if he is close to his old production levels is a no-brainer. You've seen the reports that neither side are giving committed answers one way or the other at this point, which is sensible in terms of leverage in negotiations. Both sides know that he has more to prove and if he doesn't prove it, there isn't a good reason to offer him a max deal next summer. Some team will likely do it anyway, and there is even a chance that it may be us; but saying we are looking to do it before seeing that proof of play is a bad move (especially with no guarantee that another team will do it). It would be a mistake to offer him $34M/yr with 8% increases if he doesn't show serious progression from his current level of play. The question is... at what point does it no longer become a mistake?
Here is a list of available UFAs next summer (from Hoops Rumors):

2021 Unrestricted Free Agents

Point Guards

Shooting Guards

Small Forwards

Power Forwards

Centers

Although there are some interesting names on the list, unless Schroeder ends up with a FMVP or Jrue Holiday or Kawhi Leonard decide to leave their teams, Victor Oladipo is probably going to be the most sought-after Free Agent next summer. A fair number of teams have max space, so it is likely that he will get his max deal from somewhere. Oladipo has expressed interest in Miami, but they aren't likely to have a max slot available after signing Bam to his extension. A number of other teams do have plenty of space available, though, including the Knicks, Bulls, and Spurs.
If you can't see where I'm going with this, the question is... should we also consider being a team that offers him a max contract? Obviously we don't want to get caught up in a bad contract that prevents us from missing out on other Free Agents! Well, who else on that list strikes you as someone we should spend money on? There are some interesting names. Harry Giles... Otto Porter... Hey, maybe we could get Kelly Oubre!
But anyone we would want will also be wanted by another team, and there will be a bidding war that also makes that guy overpaid. In short, I'm suggesting that year 1 of an Oladipo max would not be a problem even if it were an overpay.
Well what about year 2? Here is a list of available FAs the following summer:

Unrestricted Free Agents

Point Guards

Shooting Guards

Small Forwards

Power Forwards

Centers

Zach LaVine is obviously the highlight here. Aaron Gordon and Terry Rozier are some other interesting names (and it's worth pointing out that Brooklyn's Big 3 could opt-out and enter FA). Is the hope of convincing Zach LaVine to sign here worth leaving open space for? Maybe you think so, but I'd suggest it's not.
Because here's the thing...
We can trade Oladipo.
Obviously we can trade him in the next 7 weeks, but we can trade him after re-signing him, too. In fact, as long as he doesn't get re-injured or regress horribly (the latter being something we can probably determine this year if you aren't already convinced), it won't be so hard to move his contract. A 30% max contract is not the problem that a 35% supermax represents. Any of the big name Free Agents could be sign and traded by their teams in return for Oladipo. If his contract has turned negative, we may need to include a pick or two... but we have a lot of those! And using them to move a bad contract as a way to sign a top-tier FA really isn't a waste of picks. It's essentially the same thing as using picks to trade for a superstar (WHICH WE CAN ALSO DO! more on that in a minute). Using Oladipo as salary filler in future trades is a good reason on its own to keep him around. There is a chance the deal will look like an overpay, but unless he has a horrific injury or falls off a cliff (which doesn't seem likely, imo), it isn't going to be that negative.
Victor will make over $10M/yr less than Harden is scheduled to make next year. Add that to an increased salary cap, and we can probably re-sign him to a max, re-sign Nwaba with Early Bird Rights, and along with Wall, Gordon, Wood, House, Tate, KJ, Ma$e and KPJ, have room to use the MLE and still fill out a roster while remaining under the tax.
It's basically this year's roster minus PJ, Ben, and Brown, but with an MLE signing to help out. Is that a Championship roster? No. It is competitive and has significant upside if the youth improve and the vets recover further from injury, but Wall and Oladipo are not the top-tier superstar needed to win a title.
But either one of them could easily be the 3rd best guy on a Championship team (with the other being sent away as salary match if/when such a deal arises) and resigning Vic - even to a max contract, if necessary - allows us time to find a trade for a superstar (or sign one in Free Agency by trading one of our guards).
I hear you calling me crazy for suggesting it. But what are the alternatives? Let's game plan them out, too. The popular idea is trading Vic before the deadline for more assets. This is not a bad idea... in fact, it may even be a better plan than re-signing him... but only if he can bring back a good deal.
What does a good trade for Oladipo look like? Well, in his prime he was a decidedly better player than Jrue Holliday, who just got traded for a decent player in Eric Bledsoe as well as 3 FRPs. It's unlikely that Oladipo will return to that form in the next 7 weeks (although not impossible, especially with the extra opportunity that Wood's injury affords him), but if he continues to flash that level of potential, we would be getting robbed to let go of him for anything less than 2 very lightly protected FRPs.
If that's the price for someone to trade for him, do you see it happening? I really don't. Maybe we get lucky and Miami gets desperate. Maybe another contender with assets to spare (there aren't so many left) decides to throw down an offer with hopes of a promise that he will re-sign (likely a max contract) with them. Again, I don't see this as likely. It would be great if it happens, though!
No, it is unlikely we can trade Oladipo for more than a FRP and some expiring filler. Now you may think that sounds like a good deal, but is it? Certainly it isn't good compared to what New Orleans got for Jrue, and while Oladipo doesn't look as good as Holiday right now, he undeniably has the potential to look that good. So the question is, do we certainly lose value on him by trading him on the cheap, or do we take a risk of losing value if he can't regain max-contract form. The former is obviously safer, the latter could obviously blow up if he has a career-ending injury (but it could also pay off with significantly higher rewards than a FRP).
So unless we get a lucky deal, it comes down to what our appetite for risk is. I'd say roll the dice on Vic. He's only 28, so age is not really a factor on his next contract. It's completely a question of how close to his old self he can return to. We've seen some promising signs in the short season so far, and will now get a month of real opportunity to gather information on him.
And here's the biggest problem with trading him for bad value... if we trade him for a pick without getting a very solid player in return, our roster will absolutely get worse. It drops us from our current status of 'bottom bracket playoff team' to 'No-Mans land'... being in the 9-12 range.
That's a horrible spot to land. If we are there, it makes more sense to tank, leading us into the last section of this essay on guarding our assets...
DON'T TANK
It's 2 AM here and I've been writing for too long, so I'm gonna make this short and sweet.
Tanking sucks. Losing sucks. We don't want to be losers if we can be semi-competitive. Showing a commitment to winning attracts Free Agents, keeps Wood happy, and allows us to maintain a franchise that is literally one piece away from being right back as a contender.
We are not Oklahoma City. Free Agents want to play in Houston. Maybe its not LA, NY, or Miami, but there aren't many other cities above us on the list of destinations. If we trade for a guy, he's liable to stay. We don't need to rely on high draft picks to get talent.
(side note: tanking is not even a reliable way of getting talent! Between reduced lottery odds and the uncertainty of high picks panning out, it's a bad way to depend on getting a superstar. Philly and OKC are the closest examples of it 'working out' and those were under the old lottery odds... now it would be significantly harder. Additionally, remaining competitive keeps our Brooklyn pick swaps in play as being assets. If we sell all assets and aim for the bottom, then it will be a long climb out in which at least 2 and quite possibly 3 of our swaps are basically completely surrendered, whereas keeping competitive can allow those swaps to become quite valuable even if the Nets don't bottom out as badly as they did for Boston. Not to mention the increased danger of giving much better picks to OKC)
Signing or trading for stars are MUCH more reliable methods... and we now have the picks to trade with. So that should be our preferred path to contention. Wait for the next top-tier superstar to become unhappy and fire away to get him. Only OKC and NO can compete with our picks package (and we can offer a decent player in return as an additional bonus!)
So when that next disgruntled star shakes free (which has happened more and more frequently), we stand poised to strike stronger than any team in the league.
A new era of contenders is on the horizon. The Lakers, Clippers, Warriors, and Nets are aging out. The Nuggets and Celtics are the types of teams we look to be competing against in a few years. Those are the superstars we need to be worrying about for now... not the old guard, but the young ones. Tanking next year puts us way behind in a rebuild that is only one move away. So get those thoughts out of your heads. We can compete with those teams with Wood, another star, and Oladipo or Wall along with all our promising young talent.
We will be back sooner than anyone expects. And as surprising as it sounds, the first step may well be signing Oladipo to a max contract next summer.

guilt, anger, empathy

I'm so fucking mixed up right now. My dad is so deeply invested in Trump and QAnon that he has completely fucked everything his father worked for til the day he died. Forced his mother, my complete saint of a grandmother, to sell their house and income property in one of the most desirable cities to live in and move out to BFE Oklahoma. She and my Uncle, his brother, both have heart conditions and now 0 infrastructure to manage them. My germaphobe Uncle is being forced to attend medical visits where he is regularly in contact with unmasked people. They feel unsafe and disconnected where they live, though they love the new house itself. I got the you-told-us-so call a few days ago, and I feel more upset than before. I managed to get my grandmother to stop actively propagating Q material on facebook, and my impression is that she just doesn't know what to believe at this point and is trying to avoid politics. I can understand that, at least. She is an extremely kind woman who was taken in on the child-trafficking claims and nothing else, it wasn't too hard to talk to her.
My dad is so fucking sick now. He's in recovery and has now taken up gambling for fun, and has been going to the casinos and coming home (endangering the remainder of the at-risk household) since they reopened. He openly brags about being at bars, smoking and singing maskless. He voted for Trump in 2016 because he hated Hillary and the libertarian candidate wasn't going to win (or so he told me). Now he's so far gone he can do nothing but post on Twitter about HCQ and how he refuses to bend to "covid fascist edicts" and won't allow himself to be "reprogrammed" by the government. He railroaded my whole family into tearing up their roots and starting anew in a brand new place and now he isn't even unpacking because he plans to move to Texas with his girlfriend. My Uncle gave up the business he built for over a decade, and the relationship he'd been in for nearly as long. All of my grandma's comfort and independence have been stripped away. I kept begging them not to do it, I kept telling them it wasn't safe, but they were constantly being manipulated with my dad in the house and everyone screaming about the stupid governor trying to destroy everyone's livelihoods with shutdowns. So many people are dead, and all he could be assed to think about was his own freedom. I begged and begged, but my grandma just won't think of herself or her wellbeing. They used her for her money so that they could afford to move, and they are already priced out of the market they just left. My childhood home, lemon trees, rose vines, ugly old tile and all is being rented out to randoms now. The thought of picking up and moving again sounds horrific but less horrific than the consequences of staying where they are and in a home with him.
I found out the day after the Capitol riot that he had traveled all the way to DC to take part when a friend I had at my last job sent me a news article with his extremely unique name in it. There he was, in front of God and everybody, disgracing the family name and making us look like a bunch of hateful lunatics. I wonder if I'll ever be able to get a job again. I was planning on changing my name when I get married, I might have to do it sooner. That day I discovered the extent of his issues (3200 tweets in 3 months) and how awful the things he was saying had become. When I found out he was one of the people joining 'militias" to "keep the peace" during the George Floyd protests, I knew he was gone. I didn't understand how deeply he had bitten into the conspiracies until now. Being someone who has frequented 4chan from much too young an age, it was so hard to fucking explain to these people that the things they were sharing (literal photos of computer screens showing 4chan posts!!! I'm not even making this shit up) came from a place with complete anonymity and less vetting for posts than any of their social media platforms, let alone wikipedia. An actual forum full of gore, porn, and memes. I could not get through to them, but now even my Uncle who voted for Trump thinks he has gone too far.
This week has been a fucking mess for me. This is the man I used to call my hero. He used to be an avid musician, a gentle hand on my shoulder when I was wound up and tense, a patriot in the military who served and strove to better himself. There were several times in my life when it was us, and just us. I have been neglected or abused by most of my family, including him. My conflicted feelings go back further than when he started to openly oppose women's rights, back before QAnon even existed. But he is a different person now. He is not the man who spent all the cash in his wallet to win me the biggest dog at the booth in the fair, nor the man who brought me a copy of our favorite book when I was hospitalized for making an attempt on my life, nor the man who took me to see snow, stars, and the countryside in thousand-mile-trips cross country. He's gone. I am crying here with the letter he slipped me when I was in the mental hospital with instructions to read it when I was hurting. Here it is, the final sentence, a quote older than both of us.
"You have been, and always shall be, my best friend."
I reported him to the FBI the day before the inauguration. You won't see me on the news being called a hero, I am here in my home unable to sleep or eat, existing in obscurity. I have no parents anymore, though my chosen family is wiser than me to say I never really did. When I found out he had not returned home after the riot, and had a weapon with him, the choice was made for me. None of the adults in my family have the strength to even stand up to him, they certainly aren't going to grow up now.
I don't know where he is, or what's going to happen. I don't think he can go back to being that person, he is as invested in avoiding admitting he is wrong as he is in getting his way. His actions are those of a bitter man who feels wronged by the world and is trying to extract what he can for himself from society. It saddens me to say that I am not his only child, which makes that outlook even more disturbing. I started treatment for PTSD a couple months ago, and I am barely functioning. Today, I had to email my landlord and go to the post office. I have already broken down three times, and drank until I could pass out for a few hours this afternoon. The nightmares are intense. The shaking is intense. I keep remembering things he did and said, good and bad. I wish I knew how to get through to him. He calls me a fucking libtard. The last safe space I had is gone because of him. He just doesn't care, about his kids, his mother, nothing. My grandfather is rotting in a grave miles from the product of his life's achievements, and the family is slowly going broke now. I stopped thinking of him as family years ago, but going through this with his mother is really difficult.
I am sorry for being all over the place. I feel like I'm barely surviving right now, for a combination of reasons that reach far beyond my parents.

[TheAthletic] How Christian Wood went from 15th man with Pistons to a face of the Rockets by Edwards III & Iko

In what now feels like a lifetime ago, there was a stretch of weeks in the not-so-distant past when Christian Wood was duking it out with 17-year veteran Joe Johnson for an NBA paycheck. Yes, that Christian Wood, the man who in a year went from a basketball couch surfer to one of the most intriguing and efficient big men in the NBA.
This offseason, months after becoming a recognizable name with the Pistons, Wood signed a three-year, $41 million contract with the Rockets. It’s a significant upgrade from being picked up off waivers by Detroit a year prior. For most of last season, there was a belief that when Wood officially became one of free agency’s marquee names that he’d re-sign with the Pistons, the franchise that provided him his first real opportunity and was pivoting toward a rebuild. Per sources, there was interest on both sides for most of the offseason.
In the NBA, though, things change quickly.
The decision to part ways has worked out so far for all parties involved. The Pistons instead used their cap space to gamble on Jerami Grant, a career side-kick forward who, with the role as top option in Detroit, has emerged as one of the league’s breakout candidates. And Wood has taken his success story from the Motor City and continued to add pages in Houston.
“It’s a journey,” Wood said during his introductory press conference as a member of the Rockets. “I wouldn’t put it on anybody. It’s a journey that I’ve learned a lot from to get to where I am now. And I wouldn’t ask for any other way, because I know it made me who I am now. It made me have this chip on my shoulder. It made me have this determination to try and be better than everybody I played against on the court.”
In July 2019, Wood signed a non-guaranteed contract with Detroit. After a short but productive stint with the New Orleans Pelicans, the Pistons’ decision-makers identified the then-24-year-old as someone who was worth taking a closer look at. After all, his abilities as a basketball player were always met with high regard. It was his immaturity and lack of professionalism upon entering the league that caused him to play in six NBA cities and China in less than five years.
Wood wasn’t always on time to practice. He didn’t always pay attention to detail. Professionalism, or lack-thereof, was going to be the reason the on-court production might not see the light of day.
“For me, I thought at a young age that my talent was going to take over,” Wood told The Athletic last season. “I thought I was more talented than everybody. It wasn’t that. I had to get the work aspect down. It wasn’t just about talent all of the time.”
After decisively beating out Johnson for the final 15-man roster spot, Wood started the season coming off the bench for Detroit but was one of the more efficient scorers in the league. His offensive rating of 110.9 was tied for second best on the roster, and his true shooting percentage of 66.2 was 13th in the NBA (min. 18 minutes per game and at least 20 games played) from the start of the regular season to the trade deadline.
At the Feb. 7 trade deadline, the Pistons, who had their playoff aspirations crushed by injuries to Blake Griffin and Luke Kennard, signaled for the first time that they were going to rebuild. The franchise traded cornerstone big man Andre Drummond to the Cavaliers for cap filler. This opened the door for Wood to take on a starting role to finish the season. Teams called Detroit about Wood at the deadline, per sources. His efficient scoring in a limited role intrigued other teams like it did the Pistons. The Celtics and Rockets were two of the teams that were in hot pursuit of Wood, per sources. Detroit, though, wanted to see if the big man could handle more responsibility before having to invest in the coming offseason.
Once Wood became a full-time starter, he took off. Now with a larger role, Wood continued to prove that he was one of the most diverse frontcourt talents in the NBA. From the day after the trade deadline to the moment the NBA was shut down in mid-March due to COVID-19, Wood averaged 22.8 points and 9.9 rebounds while shooting 40 percent from 3 and holding a true-shooting percentage of 65.3.
For a month and some change, Wood was the best player on an NBA team. And while Detroit was destined for a top-10 pick in the lottery, Wood showed that he could be the new franchise cornerstone as it moved in a different direction.
However, as the months passed and the league decided to restart in the Orlando bubble without the Pistons and seven other teams, Detroit made some organizational changes. In June, the Pistons hired Troy Weaver as its new general manager. Weaver spent the last decade as Sam Presti’s right-hand man in Oklahoma City. His vision for the early days of the rebuild was to create a defensive-minded roster equipped with length and versatility. During his early press conferences, Weaver told reporters that Wood was someone of interest for the organization. Detroit had roughly $30 million in cap space to use.
When free agency opened in late November, the Pistons shocked the basketball world by committing $60 million over three years to Grant. Detroit eventually executed a sign-and-trade with the Nuggets — Grant’s previous employer — to make the deal happen. Grant and Weaver have a relationship that goes back to Grant’s high school days in Maryland. Weaver believed that the 26-year-old was the ideal player for the type of roster that he wanted to construct. Additionally, Weaver thought Grant had the potential to be more than just a role player. In hindsight, Weaver’s evaluation and thought process has proved to be more than correct.
During this process, the Pistons also offered Wood a contract, per sources. Detroit wanted him to be part of this retooling, as well. However, there was a specific price in mind. Detroit had Wood’s “Early Bird” rights, which meant that if it were able to sign him to a deal that paid, roughly, $10 million annually, Wood’s salary would only count as $1.7 million against their cap. Anything more would count toward the cap in full. Per sources, Detroit didn’t offer more than the annual amount that it would take for the smallest cap hit. The priority for the Pistons under Weaver was to acquire Grant, who, especially defensively, fits more of the mold of what the revamped front office was looking for.
Wood and his reps then turned their attention elsewhere. The Rockets, who were now under new leadership but still interested in landing Wood’s services, stepped up to the plate. Houston and Detroit worked out a sign-and-trade that was highlighted by Wood going to the Rockets and the Pistons receiving the No. 16 pick in the 2020 NBA Draft.
Last season, as much as Houston emphasized the need to go small for spacing and Russell Westbrook-related reasons, the internal plan was never to be exclusive. There was still a desire to add a skillful big man to the roster. The biggest benefit of small ball is the ability to play five out offensively and while that view has never departed, the Rockets believed that you didn’t need to be small to play that style — granted you have the personnel to do so.
After trading Clint Capela to Atlanta for Robert Covington before the trade deadline, Houston aggressively pursued expanding the deal to add another center in the league-allotted window, sources say. Wood was among the options the Rockets pursued, with the team offering Isaiah Hartenstein and two second-round picks to Detroit, sources say — which Detroit turned down.
When free agency rolled back around, Houston was determined to get the big man they had been keeping tabs on for five years. The coronavirus pandemic has changed a lot of in-person interactions — an underrated aspect of free agency — but that never deterred the Rockets from getting their message across. Internally, Houston saw Wood as the best offensive big man available during the offseason in part due to his versatility as a roller and floor spacer. With the direction the franchise was heading in — at least offensively — being able to do multiple things on the floor was seen as the best way to pressure opposing defenses. His potential and his successful stint post-trade deadline only increased his profile from a Rockets aggression standpoint.
At the beginning of free agency, Houston reached out to Wood and his representation and told him that getting a deal done was a priority. The majority of interactions took place via Zoom, phone calls and even FaceTime.
For Wood, the most important thing for him was talking to Rockets head coach Stephen Silas himself. The two had a relationship that dated back to their time together in Charlotte five years ago, but Wood was much more raw and younger then. Their early conversations centered on Wood’s development. Now, with both of their careers having seen tangible growth, it was a timeline come full circle.
“The old days were more about building habits and what it takes to be a consistent NBA player,” Silas said. “Less about the game and playing, more about the maturity it takes to be an NBA player. Now it’s more about the responsibility of being a starting center, a go-to guy, the anchor of our defense, and all of those things. It’s definitely shifted in a big way. It’s a credit to him because he’s grown in so many different ways to become the player that he is today, but also the professional that he is.”
Wood wanted to hear what Silas thought about the potential fit and what his offense would look like. Coming off the historic year Silas had as a member of the Dallas Mavericks’ staff during the 2019-20 season, Wood was intrigued with the thought of reuniting with Silas.
In those conversations, Silas detailed a plan for Wood in a role similar to Kristaps Porzingis’ in Dallas. There was enough of a sample for Silas to see that Wood could do similar things offensively to Porzingis. Like his Mavericks counterpart, Wood can play the power forward or center position, although he has played the latter for the bulk of his time in Houston this season. Both players are blessed with a unique blend of height, length, and on-court savvy. Porzingis is obviously the more polished and experienced player, but Wood has the capability of reaching that level.
Looking at their per-36 stats from the 2019-20 season, they were nearly identical to one another in most of the categories.

Player	Season	Points	Rebounds	Blocks	3P%	2PA
Christian Wood	2019-20	22	10.6	1.5	38.6	10
Kristaps Porzingis	2019-20	23.1	10.7	2.3	35.2	10.5

It’s still early in the year, but it’s been a successful start for Wood’s Rockets tenure, one that is more impressive given the wild and crazy start the team has had in 2020-21. He’s averaging All-Star numbers — 23.5 points, 10.8 rebounds, and 1.8 blocks per game, shooting 36.2 percent from 3 on 4.8 attempts per. Wood is second in roll possession per game and leads all players in points, according to tracking data from NBA.com.
At the beginning of the season, Silas acknowledged that Wood’s defense would be a process. There were some early moments when Wood failed to assert himself in the middle of the floor and his teammates discussed the importance of him becoming a more vocal leader and an enforcer in the paint.
Since the James Harden trade, Wood’s usage has increased to 28.8, and his defensive rating has improved to a stingy 100.3. As Silas has diversified his schemes, Wood has been able to adjust accordingly. The most important part of his defense has been how he performs in Houston’s drop coverage, a tactic that has its benefits but is risky against elite shooters. Wood has to pick his battles, when to show and when to hang back. Where he has excelled as of late is using his length to contest and block shots.
Privately, Wood feels decent about his season so far but he knows there is still room for improvement. He’d like to get more consistent with his outside shooting, although it’s back up to around league average now, as well as get to the free-throw line.
One notable area of growth for Wood has been his confidence. It’s no surprise to see him make a defensive stop on one end, bring the ball down the floor in the same sequence and score.
“I learn every game,” Wood says. “I feel like I’m getting better every game, especially defensively. Coach has that trust in me to bring the ball up the floor and make plays for others and I trust him too. It’s mutual.”
Life for Wood is a bit different now having started the season with Harden and now playing with a Victor Oladipo-John Wall backcourt. But Wood’s determination and optimism has never waned, only increased. Against the Suns on Wednesday night, Wood sustained a right ankle injury and looked questionable to return for the second half. The team medics advised against Wood playing but he couldn’t leave his teammates on the floor so he returned, pain and all.
“I was hurting the whole second half,” Wood said after the game. “They told me actually not to go in and play but I felt like my team needed me. My team needed to win this game. So, I have to sacrifice for my team. Whether it’s my body or shots or points or anything like that, I feel like my team needs me on the floor. That’s one of the reasons I came back out for the second half.”
Wood is part of a team’s future. He’s one of the guys. Much of Houston’s success in the coming years will depend on his development and sustained play as a rising star in the NBA.
It’s a far cry from where Wood was just even a summer ago.

[OC] The Overly-Long and Probably-Wrong list of the Top Draft Prospects

As a basketball fan, it's always fun to speculate on the NBA Draft prospects. That said, I'd stress the speculate part of that statement. As an outsider with no real access to these players, it's hard to be arrogant and steadfast in our opinions. We're working with about 10% as much information as actual NBA teams. If you feel confident in your analysis based on some highlight tapes of James Wiseman dunking on South Carolina State or LaMelo Ball jacking up shots in the Australian League, god bless you. And if you want to read my amateur analysis, god bless you too. But before you do, remember to check your sodium levels and take these picks with a grain of salt.

BEST PROSPECTS in the 2019-20 NBA DRAFT

(1) SG Anthony Edwards, Georgia
Based on pure stats, Anthony Edwards would be one of the least impressive # 1 picks of all time. We're talking about a player who just averaged 19-5-3 on bad shooting splits (40-29-77) on a bad Georgia team. In fact, the Bulldogs didn't even crack .500 (finishing 16-16). All things considered, this isn't the resume of a top overall pick. It's like a kid with a 2.9 GPA applying to Harvard Law.
Still, the "eye test" helps Edwards' case in the same way it helped proud Harvard alum Elle Woods. Edwards has a powerful frame (strong and long with a 6'9" wingspan) and a scorer's mentality. He's going to be a handful for NBA wings to contend with, especially when he's going downhill. And while he hasn't shown to be a knockdown shooter, his form looks better than the results suggest. I'd project that he can become an average (35-36%) three-point shooter in time.
It may be unfair to label Edwards with the "best case scenario" comparison -- Dwyane Wade, for example -- but it may be just as unfair to liken him to "worst case scenario" comps like Dion Waiters as well. One of the reasons that Waiters is such an inefficient scorer in the NBA is that he's allergic to the free-throw line; he averages 3.1 FTA per 36 minutes. Edwards didn't live at the FT line, but he did get there 5.3 times per game. With more encouragement from an analytical front office or coaching staff, Edwards has the potential to get to the line 7-8 times a game and raise his ceiling in terms of efficiency.
The key for Edwards' career is going to be his work ethic and basketball character. As a prospect, he reminds me of Donovan Mitchell; in fact, he's ahead of where Mitchell was at the same age. That said, Mitchell is a natural leader who made a concerted effort to improve his body and his overall game. If Edwards can do the same, he has true All-Star potential. If he walks into the building thinking he's already a superstar, then he may never become one.
best fits
Anthony Edwards has some bust potential, but he also has true star potential. Given that, it'd be great to see him go to a team that's willing to feature him. Chances are he won't last this long, but he'd be a great fit for Charlotte (#3). The Hornets desperately need a signature star, and Edwards has the chance to be a 20 PPG scorer within a year or two.
worst fits
If Edwards falls in the draft, he may end up clashing with the talent on the teams in the 4-5 range. Chicago (#4) already has a scoring guard in Zach LaVine. Meanwhile, Cleveland (#5) has already doubled up on scoring guards with Collin Sexton and Darius Garland. Adding a third would be a potential headache, both offensively and defensively.
(2) C James Wiseman, Memphis
A true center? Gross! What is this, 1970?
Traditional big men tend to get treated that way these days. In some ways, they've become the "running backs" of the NBA. They once ruled the draft, but now they have to scrape and claw to climb into the top 5.
Still, let's no go overboard here. Even if centers aren't as valuable as they used to be, there's still some value here. Some of the best centers in the game (Nikola Jokic, Rudy Gobert, Joel Embiid, etc) have helped make their teams staples in the playoffs. Wiseman can potentially impact a team in the same way, especially on the defensive end. He can get beat on switches now and then, but he's about as agile as you can expect out of a kid who's 7'1" with a 7'6" wingspan. Offensively, he has an improving face-up game in addition to being a devastating lob threat.
Another reason that I'm comfortable with Wiseman in the top 3 is because he appears to be a smart kid with the will to improve his game. He intends to keep stretching out his range towards three point territory. Even if he can be a passable three-point shooter (in the 33% range), that should help make him a consistent 18-12 player and a fringe All-Star. And if not, then he'll still be a viable starting center.
best fits
We mentioned Charlotte (#3) as a great fit for Anthony Edwards, and I'd say the same for Wiseman here. His game complements the more dynamic P.J. Washington well; between the two of them, they'd have the 4-5 spot locked up for years. While Wiseman's best chance to be a star may come in Charlotte, we don't know if he truly has that type of aggressive upside. The more likely scenario is him being a pretty good starting center with an emphasis on defense. In that case, he makes some sense in Golden State (#2) and Atlanta (#6).
worst fits
Apparently James Wiseman doesn't want to go to Minnesota (#1), which makes sense given the presence of Karl-Anthony Towns. If he slips, Chicago (#4) may also be an odd fit. Wiseman is a better prospect than Wendell Carter Jr., but they're not terribly dissimilar. The new Bulls administration didn't select Carter, but it still feels too early to give up on a recent # 7 pick.
(3) PF/C Onyeka Okongwu, USC (HIGHER than most expert rankings)
Another big man? I may be showing my age here.
Still, I'm going to stick to my guns and suggest Onyeka Okongwu is a top 3 prospect in the class for some of the same reasons we ranked James Wiseman so highly. In fact, Okongwu is arguably an even better defensive prospect than Wiseman. While he doesn't have the same size (6'9" with a 7'1" wingspan), he's more switchable. He projects as a prowling, shot-blocking panther, not dissimilar to Bam Adebayo on Miami. Offensively, he flashes some solid skill here and there, although it's unlikely he'd get to Adebayo's level as a playmaker.
Another aspect that should help Okongwu is his selflessness. In high school, he played for Chino Hills alongside stars Lonzo and LaMelo Ball. While there, he blended in and did the dirty work for the LaVar Traveling Circus. It's likely that Okongwu will play a similar role in the NBA, complementing a star perimeter player.
While Okongwu may not have All-Star upside, I don't see much downside here. I'd be surprised if he's not a long-time starter at the center position (with the potential to play some PF if his shooting range improves.)
best fits
The most natural fits for Onyeka Okongwu mirror the best fits for James Wiseman. There’s a chance he may slip further than Wiseman too. Washington (#9) should be salivating if that’s the case.
worst fits
As a low-usage player, there aren't a lot of terrible fits for Okongwu on the board. However, Detroit (#7) already has Blake Griffin on a long-term deal and may re-sign Christian Wood as well. Given that, there wouldn't be much room for Okongwu barring a Griffin trade.
(4) PG LaMelo Ball, U.S./Australia. (LOWER than most expect rankings)
Every draft pick is an inherent gamble, but there's a difference between gambling in blackjack and gambling in Roulette. To me, LaMelo Ball is more of the latter.
No doubt, there's a chance that you may get lucky and "win big" with LaMelo Ball. He has great height for the position at 6'6"/6'7", and he makes some exceptional passes that illustrate a rare court vision. ESPN's Draft Express team ranks him as the # 1 prospect overall, and I take that seriously. Those guys were way ahead of the curve on calling Luka Doncic a transcendent talent at a time when most others were still skeptical.
At the same time, I'd say there is a sizable downside here as well. In fact, I'd estimate that there's a greater than 50/50 chance that Ball is a "bust" based on his current draft status.
LaMelo Ball put up good raw numbers this past season in the NBL -- 17.0 points, 7.6 rebounds, 6.8 assists -- but he was in a situation specifically designed for him to put up good numbers. The efficiency tells a different story, as his shooting splits (38-25-72) look worrisome. Yes, height helps on defense, but it doesn't matter much if you're not locked in on that end. And yes, highlight-reel passes and super-deep threes are fun to watch, but they're not a path to consistency on offense. As Ball makes the jump to the NBA, he may smack hard into a wall and crash into the water like was on Wipeout. There's a chance he'll be among the worst players (from an advanced stats perspective) as a rookie.
So what? We expect most rookies to struggle, right? That's true, but I'd be nervous about how LaMelo Ball and his camp would respond to those initial struggles. Again, I've never met the kid and have no real basis for this, but media interviews make him seem a little immature. That's totally understandable for a 19 year old, but it's not ideal for a 19 year old who's about to get handed the keys to an NBA franchise. If he struggles out of the gates, will he start to lose confidence? Will LaVar Ball start to make waves? Will the media gleefully tear him to shreds? No clue. And if I'm picking in the top 3, I'd prefer to have more confidence than question marks.
best fits
If we treat LaMelo Ball as a developmental project, then I'd prefer he land with a team like Chicago (#4). New coach Billy Donovan is a former PG himself, and spent decades working with young kids at the college level. If they slow play Ball's development, we may see the best of him down the road. Detroit (#7) also makes sense. Coach Dwane Casey has a pretty good reputation in player development himself, and he has a solid bridge PG in Derrick Rose to help buy Ball some time.
worst fits
Cleveland (#5) is an obviously wonky fit based on the current roster. I'd also assert that Charlotte (#3) is a poor fit as well. While the team desperately needs a signature star, they don't have the type of supporting cast that would be conducive to him right now. And if he struggles as a rookie, then coach James Borrego and the whole front office may be cleaned out. If that happens, a new administration would be inheriting a franchise player that they didn't pick in the first place.
(5) SF/PF Deni Avdija, Israel
The NBA tends to be reactionary when it comes to the draft, which can be particularly impactful for international prospects. Their stock tends to swing up and down more violently than a ride at Action Park. There was a ton of skepticism about Euros when Dirk Nowitzki came along. When he hit, the NBA got so excited they drafted Darko Milicic at # 2. Eventually that excitement wore off as the busts started to pile up again. But when Latvian Kristaps Porzingis looked like the real deal, it helped reverse that narrative and helped Dragan Bender go # 4 the following year.
In terms of that up-and-down timing, Deni Avdija stands to benefit. He's coming into the NBA on the heels of an incredible sophomore campaign from Luka Doncic. No one thinks that Avdija can be a superstar like Doncic, but teams aren't as wary of international wings (specifically white wings) these days. Avdija should go somewhere in the top 10 if not the top 5.
In my mind, that's justified. He's 6'9", which should allow him to play either the SF or PF positions. He hasn't shown to be an excellent shooter yet, but he should eventually be solid there. He's better suited as a playmaker and passer, and he can also use his size and skill to convert on slashes around the rim. I've seen some comparisons to Lamar Odom before, although that may be optimistic. More likely, he'll be a 4th or 5th starter. His experience as a pro should help toward that end, as he's used to working hard and fitting in on a team of vets.
best fits
If you project Deni Avdija to just "fit in" and be a solid starter, then he'd make sense on a team like Golden State (#2). He could effectively play the role of Harrison Barnes or old Andre Iguodala for them. If the intention is to make him more of a featured player, then the Knicks (#8) would be interesting. In that market, he has real star potential.
worst fits
I don't love the fit for Avdija in Charlotte (#3), where he may duplicate some of P.J. Washington's talents. Atlanta (#6) and Phoenix (#10) have also invested in young SF-PFs recently, so Avdija may find himself scraping for time there.
(6) SG/SF Devin Vassell, Florida State (HIGHER than most expert rankings)
Every single NBA team needs 3+D wings. They thirst for them like a dying man in the desert. And then, when a legitimate 3+D wing comes along, they often ignore them in favor of splashier players at other positions.
Part of the issue is that low-usage 3+D wings aren't going to put up monster stats. That's certainly true of Devin Vassell, who averaged a modest 12.7 points this past year. Still, you have to go deeper than the pure numbers alone and consider the context. Florida State had a stacked and balanced team. In fact, Vassell's 12.7 PPG was the highest on the roster (and came in only 28.8 minutes.) There's more in the tank here than we've seen so far. He can hit the three (42% and 42% from deep in his two years), and he shows a good feel for the game (2:1 assist/turnover ratio.)
Vassell shows even more potential on the defensive end. He's currently listed at 6'7" with a 6'10" wingspan, but he looks even longer than that to my eye. He's tenacious and disruptive (1.4 steals, 1.0 blocks) without being out of control. Presumably, he should be a good defender at either the SG or SF spot.
In a sense, Vassell's the prototype for a 3+D wing. To be fair, I don't anticipate him being a great shooter at the next level. His FT% was iffy, and he's apparently been tweaking his shot during the draft process. Still, if he can be a viable shooting threat in the way that Josh Richardson is (an inconsistent shooter who averages around 36%), then he should be a solid starter for an NBA team. That may not sound like something worthy of a top 5 pick, but the high "floor" helps him in this case. He also appears to have a strong character and work ethic, making him feel like an even safer bet.
best fits
Devin Vassell's skill set would fit on virtually any NBA roster -- but his perceived lack of upside may keep him from going as high as my personal ranking. If he does, then Cleveland (#5) would be a nice fit given their lack of big wings and their lack of defense. Defensive-challenged Washington (#9) would also make sense; Vassell tends to be listed as a SG but he should have enough size to play the SF for them.
worst fits
You can never have too many 3+D wings, but it may be a duplication to put Devin Vassell on the same team with Mikal Bridges in Phoenix (#10).
(7) PG Tyrese Haliburton, Iowa State
One of the reasons I'd have to be specific about a fit with a player like LaMelo Ball is that he needs the ball in his hands to maximize his potential. That's true for most lead guards.
Given that, it's a nice change of pace to see a prospect like Tyrese Haliburton come along. He's listed as a PG and he can perform those duties. This past season, he averaged 15.2 points and 6.5 assists per game. But he ALSO can operate as an off-the-ball player. As a freshman, he did exactly that, effectively working as a wing player and a glue guy on offense. His three-point shot looks wonky, but he converted 43% as a freshman and 42% as a sophomore. If that translates, he can be an effective spacer as well.
Haliburton's versatility also extends to the defensive end. He's 6'5" with an incredible 7'0" wingspan, allowing him to guard either PG or SGs. Like Devin Vassell, he also puts those tools to good use. Either one is an incredible athlete, but they're disruptive and locked in on that end. I'd expect Haliburton to be one of the better guard defenders in the NBA.
All in all, you may ask: why isn't this guy ranked HIGHER? The skill set would justify that. At the end of the day I don't see elite upside here (maybe George Hill?) because he may have some trouble getting his shot off in a halfcourt offense. Still, he's one of the safer prospects overall and a kid that you'd feel good betting on.
best fits
The New York Knicks (#8) may bring in a big-name guard like Chris Paul and Russell Westbrook, but if they stick with the rebuild then Tyrese Haliburton makes loads of sense. He can share playmaking duties with R.J. Barrett, and he can help Tom Thibodeau establish a defensive culture. He'd also make sense for Detroit (#7) and even Atlanta (#6). While the Hawks have Trae Young locked in at PG, Haliburton can play enough SG to justify 30+ overall minutes.
worst fits
Obviously any team that doesn't have room for a PG OR SG would be a problem here. Cleveland (#5) and Washington (#9) are the clearest examples of that. While Haliburton could theoretically guard some SFs, it's not the best use of his talent.
(8) PG Killian Hayes, France
If NBA centers are like NFL running backs, then point guards / lead playmakers may be like quarterbacks. There's positive and negatives to that comparison. Obviously, a good lead guard can immediately boost your team. At the same time, you don't really need more than one. And if you're not "the guy," then your impact is going to be limited.
Given that, there's a high bar to being a starting PG in the NBA. You have to be really, really friggin' good. According to many experts, Killian Hayes is exactly that. Physically he's what you want in the position, with a 6'5" frame. He averaged 16.8 points and 7.8 assists per 36 playing in Germany this year for a team that had a few former pros like Zoran Dragic. The Ringer has him # 1 overall.
Personally, I haven't completely bought into that hype yet. I can't claim to have season tickets to Ratiopharm Ulm, but when I watch highlights I don't really see ELITE traits here. He's not incredibly explosive, he's not a great shooter, he's over-reliant on his left hand. I have no doubt that he has the upside to be a good starter, but I don't think we've seen enough (or at least, I haven't) to make me confident in that projection.
best fits
Chicago (#4) and Detroit (#7) appear to be the most obvious fits for a potential star guard like Killian Hayes. And while the Knicks may have been underwhelmed by a French PG before, he would make sense for them at #8 as well.
worst fits
Teams with lead guards locked in -- Golden State (#2), Cleveland (#5), for example -- would be obviously problematic fits for Hayes. While he has the size to play some shooting guard defensively, he has a ways to go before he's a sharpshooting spacer.
(9) SG/SF Aaron Nesmith, Vanderbilt (HIGHER than most expert rankings)
Back when I was single, I dated a girl who presumably viewed me as a "developmental prospect." She'd always tell me how cool I'd look if I got some new jeans. How hot I'd be if I lost some weight. After a while, reality set in. It ain't happening, honey. What you see is what you get. The whole transformation idea may have worked with Chris Pratt, but it's not going to work with schlubby ol' Zandrick Ellison.
Sometimes it feels like NBA teams view prospects in the same delusional way. Josh Jackson can be a superstar -- if he develops his shot! Isaac Okoro can be a great pick -- if he becomes a great shooter! IF IF IF. We tend to forget that it's not that easy for a leopard to change his spots or for a player to suddenly develop a shooting stroke. It may have worked with Kawhi Leonard, but it's not working with most players.
Given that, we should value players who already have developed that skill. Aaron Nesmith is one of the best shooters in the draft -- right here, right now. He shot 52% from three and 83% from the line this past season. There's a sample size issue there (he only played 14 games prior to injury), but his shooting form looks fluid and suggests that he should be a legitimate 38-40% shooter from deep. While Nesmith isn't a great athlete or defender, his 7'0" wingspan should help him hang at either the SG or SF spots. All in all, we're talking about a player who should be a starter, or at the very least a high-level rotational player.
best fits
Aaron Nesmith isn't going to put a team on his back, but he can help carry the load offensively given his shooting ability. That should make him a good fit for a team like New Orleans (#13) as they look to replace J.J. Redick down the road. He'd also be an excellent fit with Orlando (#16) as they eye more shooters/scorers.
worst fits
It's hard to find a bad fit for a good shooting wing, but there are a few teams that may not have starting positions available. Phoenix (#10) already has Devin Booker and a few solid young SFs. Sacramento (#12) already has Buddy Hield and Bogdan Bogdanovic (presuming they retain them.)
(10) PG/SG R.J. Hampton, U.S/N.Z. (HIGHER than most expert rankings)
After that rant about delusions of grandeur with development prospects, let me try and talk you into a raw developmental prospect.
Like LaMelo Ball, R.J. Hampton went to play in the NBL during his gap year after high school. They were both top 10 prospects going in, but their stocks diverged from there. LaMelo Ball put up big numbers and locked himself into top 3 status. Hampton didn't showcase much (8.8 points per game on 41-30-68 shooting splits) and may drop out of the lottery altogether. But again, I'd caution us to consider context here. LaMelo Ball went to a bad team where he could jack up shots. Hampton played on a contending team that didn't spoon-feed him minutes.
Given that limited sample, I'm falling back on the "eye test" here. No doubt, Hampton's shot is a problem. He's a poor shooter now, and it may be 2-3 years before he straightens it out. At the same time, his size and explosion jumps out at you, particularly when he's attacking the basket. He also appears to be a mature and charismatic young man. That combo -- physical talent + basketball character -- tends to be a winning formula. There's some chance Hampton turns out to be a genuine star as a scoring lead guard. There's also a sizable chance he busts. Still, it's the type of gamble that teams in the late lottery should be considering.
best fits
In a PG-rich class, it'd be bold for Detroit (#8) to reach on R.J. Hampton. Still, he would fit there, as the team could groom him behind Derrick Rose for another year or two until he's ready to take over for major minutes. Any team that can afford him the luxury of patience would be a nice landing spot, even if it means going later in the draft to places like Boston (#14, #26) or Utah (#23.)
worst fits
I'd be less bullish on R.J. Hampton in situations where he may have to play early and take his lumps. The N.Y. Knicks (#8) have struggled to develop point guards Frank Ntilkina and Dennis Smith already, and a new coaching staff doesn't make those concerns go away. Hampton would also have lower upside on teams that already have scoring guards locked in, like Sacramento (#12) or Portland (#16).
(11) PF Obi Toppin, Dayton (LOWER than most expert rankings)
When Obi Toppin sees the list of names ahead of him, he should be stewing with rage. He's arguably the most productive player on the entire board. This past season at Dayton, he averaged 20.0 points on 63% shooting from the field. He's a good athlete and dunker, and he even hit 39% of his threes. At 6'9", he's a natural PF but he could theoretically play some SF or C too if need be. What else does a guy need to do to go in the top 5??
But while Toppin checks all the boxes on paper, I'm a little more skeptical. In fact, he reminds me a lot of Arizona PF Derrick Williams, who went # 2 in the 2011 draft. Many pundits thought Williams was the best player in the class, fresh on the heels of an awesome sophomore season that saw him average 19.5 points per game on 60% shooting and 57% (!) from three. The trouble is: Williams benefited from a small sample size from 3 that year (74 total). And while he was athletic in the dunking sense, he didn't have the hip movement to guard 3s or 4s effectively.
We see some of the same traits play out here with Toppin. He dominated this past season as a (22 year old) sophomore. Still, I'm doubtful that his three-point shooting is as good as the numbers suggest. I'm doubtful that his run-and-dunk athleticism translates to the defensive end, where he often looks stiff when changing direction. I can see a scenario where Toppin is a scoring big in the mold of a John Collins, but it's more likely to me that he'll be a scorer off the bench instead.
best fits
While I'm cool on Obi Toppin myself, I fully admit that I could be wrong and he may just end up being Rookie of the Year. That may happen if he plays on a team like Washington (#9) where his guards will be able to take a lot of pressure off and give him good opportunities to score. Cleveland (#5) would also make some sense if they trade Kevin Love.
worst fits
If Toppin's defense is going to be bad, then he'd be a poor fit with Atlanta (#6). I also don't see much of a fit with Sacramento (#12) given the presence of Marvin Bagley III. In the long run, both may end up being smallball 5s.
(12) SF Isaac Okoro, Auburn (LOWER than most expert rankings)
We've all had this experience before. You'll go see a movie that you hear everyone rave about and you come away... underwhelmed. It's fine. It's OK. But you just don't get all the fuss about it.
Right out of that Silver Linings Playbook comes Isaac Okoro. His stats don't jump off the page: 12.9 points, 4.4 rebounds, 0.9 steals, 0.9 blocks. He's allegedly a great defensive player, but his dimensions (6'6" with a 6'8" wingspan) don't suggest "stopper." Worse yet, he's a poor shooter from distance (29% from three, 67% from the line.) The last time I got this sense of "meh-ness" was Jarrett Culver last year. I didn't understand how he went in the top 5, and I'm not going to understand how Okoro goes in the top 10 this year.
To be clear, I don't think Okoro (or Culver) is a BAD prospect, just that they're both overrated by the community. Okoro is definitely a strong kid who is active around the rim. He's a live body. He could theoretically improve his shooting and become a starter. Still, "potential starter" is not something that I want in a top 10 pick.
best fits
While I don't love Isaac Okoro myself, I can see some good fits on the board. Washington (#9) could use some thicker wings who can play solid defense. Portland (#16) is incredibly desperate for capable wings themselves.
worst fits
With Okoro, I don't necessarily think the worst fits are a matter of skill set as much as expectation. If he goes as high as Chicago (#4) or Cleveland (#5), I suspect he'll disappoint in terms of the returns and garner some resentment from the fan base.
(13) SG/SF Josh Green, Arizona
As oddly overrated as Isaac Okoro is (in my mind), Josh Green is oddly underrated. Okoro tends to go about 10 spots higher in mock drafts, but they seem nearly identical in terms of a head-to-head comparison. In fact, I had to go back and forth about which I'd rank higher. They're both good athletes for their position and should be backend starters at the next level. Okoro is thicker and better around the rim, while Green is further along as a shooter. Overall I leaned to Okoro because he had the size to match up with bigger SFs and has a little more of a bullying scorer gene in him, but it was a close race.
In fact, you can argue that Josh Green's selflessness will actually benefit him in the NBA. He's a "team guy," with an underrated passing ability and basketball IQ. The stats don't jump off the pages in that regard (2.6 assists, 1.6 turnovers), but he was also playing with a good college PG in Nico Mannion. As he moves to the NBA, he's unlikely to have the ball much either, but he projects to be an all-around glue guy who can help on both ends.
best fits
As with Isaac Okoro, Portland (#16) could be a nice landing spot for a solid wing player. And while New Orleans (#13) has a lot of athleticism already, it never hurts to have another viable wing. They tended to play small at the SG-SF spot, which hurt their defense overall. Playing Green could help them when they slide Brandon Ingram over to the 4 and Zion Williamson at the 5.
worst fits
I don't see many "bad" fits for Josh Green on the board, but you'd prefer that he went to a team that intended to make him a part of the future. Minnesota (#17) may not be able to do that if they already have Jarrett Culver and Josh Okogie. Brooklyn (#19) may not be looking for long-term projects since they're in a "win now" mode.
(14) PG Tyrell Terry, Stanford
Tyrell Terry is rocketing up draft boards on account of his stellar shooting ability (41% from 3, 89% from the line) and his better-than-expected measurement of 6'3". It's only natural that pundits would start comparing him to stud shooters like Steph Curry.
That said, not every stud shooter is Steph Curry. Some are Seth Curry. Some are Quinn Cook. There's a slight chance Terry breaks out as a good starter, but there's a better than average chance he peaks as a rotational player instead. Still, he should be an asset to a team as a spacer, particularly if they run their offense through a playmaking forward (like a LeBron James).
And in case you're wondering, no he is NOT related to Jason Terry, although some of their skill sets do overlap as scoring guards with deep range.
best fits
If we presume that Tyrell Terry can be a Seth (not Steph) type player, then adding him to Dallas (#18) makes sense. He can develop behind Seth for a year or two as he gains weight, and then help complement Luka Doncic as a spacer after that. Similarly, he makes sense for Philadelphia (#21) as well. We'd still lock Ben Simmons into the starting PG role, but Terry could play alongside him in lineups or be used as a sparkplug off the bench.
worst fits
Teams that may be eyeing Tyrell Terry as a surefire starter will have to be careful. For example, Phoenix (#10) needs an heir apparent for Ricky Rubio, but a Terry + Devin Booker combo may be problematic on the defensive end. Some other teams -- Brooklyn (#19) and Denver (#22) -- already have sharpshooter guards, so they don't have as strong of a need for this type of player.
(15) PF Aleksej Pokusevski, Serbia
We mentioned that LaMelo Ball may be the biggest boom/bust prospect in the class, likening him to gambling on Roulette. Enter Aleksej Pokusevski. "Gambling" may not even be doing it justice. This is like risking your family fortune on a bag of magic beans.
But hey, that worked for Jack, and it could work for an NBA team as well. I have a friend who works in coaching who raved about Pokusevski and considers him a top 10 prospect overall. After all, this is a legit 7'0" player with true perimeter skills. Playing for Olympiacos' development team, he averaged 16.7 points, 12.2 rebounds, 4.8 assists, 2.0 steals, and 2.8 blocks per 36 minutes. He hasn't even turned 19 years old yet, giving him an enormous amount of upside.
Still, he scares the hell out of me. He's listed at 7'0" and 200 pounds, with narrow shoulders that make you doubt how much weight he'll be able to carry in the long term. His body type doesn't remind you of any current NBA forwards; it reminds you of two kids wearing a trenchcoat.
All in all, Pokusevski seems like a great prospect to invest in, presuming you don't have to withdraw from the bank until 2023 or 2024. To that end, teams should only consider them if they feel confident in their long-term job security.
best fits
If the goal is to send Aleksej Pokusevski to a good, stable organization, then you can't do much better than San Antonio (#11). Even if Gregg Popovich retires from coaching, R.C. Buford should be around to help the next coach (Becky Hammon? Will Hardy? R.C.'s son Chase?). And if the goal is to find a good stable GM, Sam Presti and Oklahoma City (#25) would be a great home as they prepare for a long-term rebuild.
worst fits
Orlando (#15) always values length, but they have limited space left in the frontcourt and limited leg room left on that poor charter plane.
I wasn't kidding when I said this post was "overly" long. The rest of the top 20 got cut off because of a length limit. I'll try to include them in the comment section.

Offseason Blueprint: The Detroit Pistons are an NBA basketball team. Hopefully, they can remind fans of that in the next few years.

The playoffs continue to rage on, but there are 26 teams sitting at home with nothing to do but twiddle their thumbs, watch the Conference Finals, and wait for next season to start.
For their sake, we wanted to look ahead with the next edition of the OFFSEASON BLUEPRINT series. In each, we'll preview some big decisions and make some recommendations for plans of attack along the way. Today, we're looking at the Detroit Pistons.
step one: weave a new narrative
Some teams are good, some teams are bad -- but almost all of them have a general direction. Are you a young team on the rise? Or a veteran team trying to squeeze out as many wins as possible?
Right now, the Detroit Pistons are in a wonky grey area. They're missing an identity. When they tried to make the playoffs, they were fairly mediocre (records of 37-45, 39-43, 41-41). When injuries hit this past season, they plummeted down to 20-46. While that generally suggests a young and rebuilding team, the roster doesn't reflect that yet. Their marquee players are Blake Griffin (age 31) and Derrick Rose (age 31.) They also have a veteran coach in Dwane Casey who's more accustomed to competing than rebuilding. All in all, they feel like a confused, forgotten franchise.
Fortunately, there's a new sheriff in town. The team hired a new GM in Troy Weaver, who had been Sam Presti's right-hand man in Oklahoma City. Weaver's been on the verge of a GM job for several years now, and his hire represents something of a coup for this embattled organization.
Going forward, the franchise needs to hold the keys over to Weaver and allow him free reign to do whatever he wants. Back in OKC, he had experience with a variety of makeups: with a rebuilding team, with a contending team, with a rebuilding-wait-whoops-we're-accidentally-pretty-darn-good team. It's up to him to look at this roster and this payroll and determine the best path forward from here.
step two: hold a garage sale for your old homeowner's property
Presumably, Troy Weaver will treat this project as more of a teardown than a remodel. Mainstay center Andre Drummond is already out of the door, and the other veterans may join him on the bus out of Detroit.
Unfortunately, that may be easier said than done. It makes a lot of sense to trade star PF Blake Griffin to a veteran team, but his injuries and his contract ($37M + $39M player option) would make that difficult from a logistical perspective.
There's a chance that a desperate team may be willing to roll the dice on Griffin. Throughout his career, he's been one of the more misunderstood players in the league. People want to treat him as an athlete-dunker only, but he's actually a skilled ballhandler and passer. In his last healthy season in 2018-19, he averaged 24.5 points, 7.5 rebounds, and 5.4 assists, and even showcased an improved three-point shot (36.2% on 7.0 attempts per game.) If healthy, he'd be a major difference maker to a team like Portland.
Still, teams aren't going to give up major assets for Blake Griffin until he proves that he is healthy. From Detroit's perspective, it makes more sense to wait to trade him. They need him to come back, put up some good stats, and then float him in offers. Right now, you'd be trading Griffin for 20 cents on the dollar.
In contrast, Derrick Rose's stock may be at a high. He put up good raw numbers this year (18.1 points, 5.6 assists), and he's on a reasonable $7.5M expiring contract. He'd be a positive addition to a playoff team, best served as a Sixth Man scorer. The Pistons and their fans like Rose (and he likes playing here), but it'd be irresponsible for them to not consider trade options. If they get any decent offers, they have to pull the trigger. If the offers are weak -- R2 picks or so -- then the team can keep him around as a veteran leader and placeholder starter.
step three: don't let your breakout break out
As bad as the Pistons were, they had a few bright spots. Derrick Rose played better than expected. Luke Kennard looks on track to be a rising starter. And, most surprising of all, rando Christian Wood broke out as a legitimate NBA player. As a starter, Wood averaged 21.9 points and 9.4 rebounds per game. Wood is a springy, energetic player who also has an improving range (40% from three as a starter.)
You can read a longer deep dive about Christian Wood here, but to sum it up. A) His production looks legitimate, as he's been putting up numbers in virtually every stop as a pro. But B) His breakout may be poorly timed for the Pistons, because he's slated for free agency and about to get more expensive. He's a 24 year old whose best days should be ahead of him.
Based purely on his stats and scouting profile, you could talk yourself into a contract closing in on $15M a year for Wood. However, players with his "pedigree" (undrafted, limited sample size) rarely get that type of contract right away. To me, paying him somewhere in the range of 3 years, $36M would be a fair deal on both sides. There's too much uncertainty to justify much more of a commitment.
Of course, the Pistons should know better than any of us whether to trust Wood. Prior to this year, he had a mixed reputation in terms of his basketball IQ and work habits. If Coach Casey can sign off on Wood's character, then the team can feel more comfortable with him as a building block. If there are still red flags, perhaps it's better not to get too attached. The Pistons have more cap room than most teams this offseason, so the money shouldn't be a major deterrent to this decision. It should be entirely about Wood as a person and a player. If you believe that he's the real deal, then you keep him around.
step four: find your next field general
Christian Wood is a solid young player -- Luke Kennard is a solid young player -- but these aren't franchise players. They're secondary scorers and members of a supporting cast. To truly advance to the promised land, the Detroit Pistons are going to need to find transcendent talent, somehow and some way.
Unfortunately, the NBA Draft Lottery didn't help. The Pistons slipped down from the # 5 slot to the # 7 pick, making it unlikely that they'll land a future star.
On the bright side, the "supply and demand" may be on their side. This draft class happens to be heavy with point guards. There's LaMelo Ball (the # 1 prospect on ESPN), Killian Hayes (the # 1 prospect on The Ringer), and Tyrese Haliburton (one of the safer picks in the class.) If any of them slip down to # 7, the Pistons should strongly consider them. It usually takes a point guard a year or two to find their footing, but they can sit behind Derrick Rose for a year and then get unleashed in 2021. From a personality standpoint, Rose isn't going to mentor and educate like Aristotle, but he's capable of soaking up 25 minutes and allowing the next PG some time to develop.
If those top guards are not available (and they are unlikely to be), the Pistons may have to take some chances. One name I'm intrigued by is R.J. Hampton.
On face value, that'd be a "reach." Like LaMelo Ball, Hampton was a top high school prospect who went off to play in the Australian league. Unlike Ball, his NBA stock suffered as a result. While Ball put up numbers (17-8-7), Hampton put up weak stats -- 8.8 points, 2.4 assists on 41-30-68 shooting splits. As a result, Ball is now locked into top 3 pick status, and Hampton is seeing his name ranked around the 10-20 range in mock drafts.
However, I'd defend Hampton to some degree. We have to consider the context here. LaMelo Ball joined a struggling team called Illawarra. With Ball, the team went 3-9 (and finished 5-23.) When you're playing on a bad team like that, you can be the "star" and jack up as many shots as you want. In contrast, Hampton joined the New Zealand Breakers, a better team that relegated him to 20.6 minutes a night and a more limited role. His raw stats may not do him justice.
No doubt, Hampton has a long way to go, especially as a shooter. At the same time, he's a big lead guard (6'4" with a 6'7" wingspan) who flashes a lot of explosive scoring ability when he's getting downhill to the hoop. He's also a smart kid and allegedly a good worker. There's some legitimate "star" potential here, even if it's a narrow bull's eye. Hampton doesn't have the same athleticism as Russell Westbrook (hardly anyone does) but maybe there's a parallel here. After all, Weaver and OKC selected Westbrook after he'd been a little under the radar after playing off the ball at UCLA.
To be clear, I'm not urging Detroit to take R.J. Hampton at # 7. I'm not endorsing him as a future star like Westbrook. I don't know enough to do that; I don't sit around and splice up tape of New Zealand basketball. Still, the point is, the Pistons should be looking at upside players in that vein, knowing that they're going to need to hit a home run in the future.
step five: keep one hand on the detonator
The Detroit Pistons only have $68M committed on the books for next season, which means they could be players in free agency even if they re-sign Christian Wood.
If the team decided to go "all in" in a desperate attempt to compete, then you could maybe talk yourself into retaining Blake Griffin, handing out a big contract for Fred VanVleet, and shooting for the playoffs. That may work. But to what end...? The 7th seed? The 8th seed? Is that the end goal here?
More realistically, the team should (as discussed) try to get Blake Griffin back and fully healthy in order to showcase him for a trade. After that, they'd then dive into a full rebuild.
Presuming that's going to be the ultimate destination, then the Pistons may as well get a jump on that with free agency. With their remaining cap space, they can take on a toxic asset that comes attached with future picks, or take some fliers on young and promising players. Among my favorite gamblers of this offseason may include PG Kris Dunn (CHI), SG Denzel Valentine (CHI), SF Josh Jackson (MEM), and C Harry Giles (SAC.) None of them should draw huge money offers, making them reasonable purchases and lottery tickets.
If the Pistons end up blowing it up, then they should play their younger players over the course of the season. That should mean a lot of Sekou Doumbouya (entering Year 2) and even some Thon Maker (entering Year 42). If that means you only win 25-30 games, that's all right. It'll only help your odds for next year's lottery.
I've mentioned this before with some potential tankers (CLE, CHA, etc), but next year's draft could be quite strong. The group is headlined by point forward Cade Cunningham (heading to Oklahoma State) and scoring swingman Jalen Green (heading to the G-League), but there are about 4-5 other players who have the potential to join the # 1 pick conversation in time. The Detroit Pistons aren't likely to be bad enough to get a top 3 pick on their own, but the flattened lottery odds make it possible for the 7th or 8th worst team to leapfrog into that territory.
Of course, before Weaver and the Pistons officially press the detonator and go into full-blown rebuild/tank mode, they need to have a heart to heart with Coach Casey. He's 63 years old already, and entering the third year of a five-year deal. Is he going to embrace the rebuild? Is he going to be the scapegoat if they rack up losses? They need to get on the same page, out of fairness to Casey and out of fairness to this franchise. A reasonable solution would be to promise Casey that, if he does tank like a good soldier, he'll still be retained for next season. Rome wasn't built in a day, and neither will chrome.
previous offseason blueprints
ATL, CHA, CHI, CLE, DAL, IND, GS, LAC, MIL, MIN, NYK, POR, SA, SAC, UTA

Offseason Blueprint: the Los Angeles Lakers may win the title tonight, but their ambition won't end there

The NBA season is nearly over: be it 1, 2, or 3 more games left. With the offseason looming around the corner, we've been looking ahead with our OFFSEASON BLUEPRINT series. In each entry, we preview some big decisions and make some recommendations for plans of attack along the way.
Like the NBA, we've officially come to the end of the road and to our final team, the Los Angeles Lakers.
step one: know it will never be All Quiet on the Western Front
The Los Angeles Lakers have plenty of fans, but also plenty of people who enjoy watching them struggle (some even run their own sports websites.) It feels like they've been a punching bag for almost a decade now. Even when the team landed a coup and signed LeBron James, there were plenty of skeptics and haters picking at the roster and fanning the flames of front office tension. Even when the team followed that up with a trade for Anthony Davis, there were STILL doubters and haters camped at the gates.
At the end of the day, LeBron James and company only had one way to shut them up: win.
Now, no one can criticize them anymore. Whatever they did to get here -- it worked. LeBron James deserves a huge amount of credit for this presumptive title (no offense, Miami) but there's plenty to go around. Anthony Davis reminded the world that he's a friggin' beast. Frank Vogel did a great job getting the defense to play on a string, especially on the perimeter. The maligned bench with Rajon Rondo, Markieff Morris, and Kyle Kuzma even stepped up in a major way on the road to the Finals.
While the team may be drenched with champagne by the time you read this, they still won't be satisfied. LeBron James went back to Cleveland to win a title. He didn't go to L.A. and recruit Anthony Davis to win a title. He wants to win multiple titles. He may get his 4th ring after this year, which means he'll only be 2 away from catching Michael Jordan. If he can do that, then there won't be any doubt about his GOAT status. And honestly, it's possible. James still looks like a top 5 player (if not 1 overall), and Anthony Davis is in the heart of his prime. With a decent supporting cast around them, they're going to be in title contention for the next two or three years.
However, the Lakers can't get complacent. They deserved this title, but they didn't exactly beat Murderers' Row to get here. In fact, their playoff opponents had the weakest seed value and weakest W-L percentage of any title team since 2000. Next season may be tougher sledding. The L.A. Clippers could be a real threat with better coaching and better rotations. The Milwaukee Bucks could be a real threat with better health. Health permitting, the Brooklyn Nets have the star power and the depth to be a force themselves. It's going to be a dogfight next season. The Lakers still may be the top dogs in that fight, but they're going to have to scrape and claw to get that bone again.
step two: convince your free agents that It's a Wonderful Life
LeBron James is a champion for player empowerment, but that concept is going to put his L.A. Lakers in a precarious position this offseason. Some decisions with be out of their hands. The team has an inordinate amount of player options for next season, with 5 separate players having the right to opt "in" or "out" of their contracts. Let's take a look at each of those one individually.
The most important, of course, will be Anthony Davis. He has the choice whether to opt in to his $28.7M salary. It's weird to say, but $28.7M is a bargain. Davis is a 27-year-old superstar. He deserves the new max and then some. From the Lakers' perspective, the only question will be timing the extension in the best interest of Davis and the team as a whole. If they wait until next offseason to give him a full max, they may have some more wiggle room in salary to bring in extra free agents (in Offseason 2021, not Offseason 2020.) Perhaps they can convince AD to wait until then to accrue more years. At the same time, uncertainty isn't their friend. If the Lakers disappoint next season and LeBron James hits a wall (unlikely, but theoretically possible) then perhaps Davis doesn't want to stay tethered to this older roster for the long haul. Perhaps his relationship with James -- great now -- bleeds into resentment over time. Who the heck knows. Superstar pairings don't always end with "happily ever after." Even that remote concern would make me push for a max extension for AD ASAP.
The second most important player option will be Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. When the Lakers first signed them, it raised some eyebrows and potential tampering conspiracy theories. These days, his $8.5M player option looks like a good value. KCP shot well this year and played hard on defense. Effectively, he looked like the player that Danny Green was supposed to be. Your hope here is that the Lakers have built enough goodwill with KCP and his representatives to make this a friendly negotiation. Whether that means he opts in, or whether that means he signs a long-term deal, it's a relationship that needs to continue.
step three: but convince others to ride off like Shane
Conversely, there are a few player options that the team may try to talk players out of taking. Avery Bradley missed the bubble for personal reasons, but the Lakers' backcourt did just fine without him. At this stage in their careers, Alex Caruso is probably better at the 3+D guard role. Still, it's going to be up to Bradley whether to return or not. He can opt in to his $5.0M player option. The value is OK in the broadest sense, but perhaps the Lakers are rooting for him to test the market elsewhere. The Lakers should take a hard line here and not offer him extra years; if Bradley leaves to chase a long-term deal, so be it. If he opts in, he may be used as a potential trade chip.
Meanwhile, JaVale McGee has a $4.2M player option himself. McGee started 68/68 games in the regular season, but he didn't always look like their best option in the playoffs. As he ages (now 32), he'll continue to struggle with certain matchups. I don't think McGee can match that $4M anywhere else, so trying to convince him to opt out may be a losing proposition. Again, if McGee opts in, then the Lakers need to consider utilizing his salary as a potential trade piece.
Some of those decisions -- whether they want to keep Avery Bradley and JaVale McGee -- may hinge on some other free agents on the team. Backup PG Rajon Rondo has his own player option of $2.7M. All season long, I'd been talking about Rondo as a potential liability for the team. Instead, he justified some of that "Playoff Rondo" talk. Between Rondo and Caruso, you'd prefer Caruso getting extended minutes. Between Rondo and Bradley, it's more of a debate. Rondo deserves more than $2.7M, so I expect him to opt out. Presumably, he appreciates the role and limelight here in L.A. and wouldn't play hardball. If he's amenable to a short-term, reasonable deal, then you'd want to keep him in house. If his playoff hype spirals into outsized offers (anything over $6M or so) then you should thank him for his service and wish him well.
The Lakers should treat backup C Dwight Howard (an unrestricted free agent) in a similar way. Now 34, he's become a role player. Moreover, his role -- as the more traditional center -- is no longer a valuable one either. Still, he's pretty good at that role -- arguably better than JaVale McGee. The team shouldn't over-invest in this one-two punch though. If Howard wants to re-sign for a bargain basement deal, great. If he expects a mid-sized contract or an extra year, then he may be on the move again. For both Rondo and Howard, I'd stand firm on 1 year deals. However, the team can potentially add in "team option" years on top of that. The purpose would be less to entice them into staying and more to make them potential trade chips (in terms of salary matching) later on down the road.
The Lakers will have more free agents to discuss. Markieff Morris is an interesting one; he looked like a shell of himself after some injuries, but he showed signs of life in the postseason. If that's legit, then he could potentially be a good rotational player for the team (when they go "small" with AD at the 5.) The verdict from team doctors will be crucial to determining his value. Alternatively, vets like J.R. Smith and Dion Waiters don't appear to have any value at all. Fortunately, they don't have player options either.
step four: solve the mystery of The Third Man
All season long, we heard that the Lakers would need a third star to emerge if they were going to win the title. Kyle Kuzma never got there, but it didn't matter. Perhaps we've just defaulted into a more familiar era of the NBA. Shaq and Kobe won without another "star." Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen won without another "star" (Dennis Rodman was more of an ultra role player.) With Kevin Durant removed from Golden State, perhaps the bar has been lowered back to reasonable heights for NBA title teams.
Still, the Lakers need to figure out who Kyle Kuzma is, and what his role should be. He averaged 16-6 as a rookie, but showed some signs of a "good stats / bad team" kind of player. That fear hasn't gone away. Since then, Kuzma's shot 30% and 32% from three over the following two years, and played poor defense overall. ESPN real plus/minus metric graded him as a -0.4 and -0.7 defensive impact, while box plus/minus had him at -1.2 and -1.0. That same BPM metric graded him below replacement level overall (-0.2 VORP).
Kuzma has played OK in these playoffs, but he hasn't had a major role. In fact, his minutes per game is down to 23.2 in the postseason so far, with 0 starts drawn. It's clear that Frank Vogel and the team don't believe he's the 3rd best player on the team. He may not even be the 4th or 5th best player.
You may ask: who cares? Kuzma isn't a world beater, but the Lakers beat the world anyway. Still, it's an important question hanging over their heads. Kuzma is under contract for one more year, and then will enter restricted free agency (at a time when they will be a lot of cap space out there.) Based on name value, he's going to get a decent contract.
If the Lakers don't believe he's worth decent money, it may be time to trade him now. (Realistically, the time to trade him was last offseason, but what can ya do.) Kuzma's $3.5M salary is easy to move, and the team can attach other contracts like McGee, Bradley, and Quinn Cook ($3M) to match a deal anywhere from the $3M-$15M range if need be.
What can the Lakers get for Kuzma on the open market? It's hard to tell. He's a polarizing name, so it may depend on whether their trade partner reads reddit or not. I'd call up Detroit and ask about Luke Kennard. If Houston's blowing it up, I'd ask about Robert Covington. If Minnesota's locked into Anthony Edwards at # 1, maybe they'd be open to trading Malik Beasley in a sign and trade. If you want to play dirty, you can tell Portland that Gary Trent Jr. (newest client of Klutch) is going to sign with the Lakers next season no matter what, so they may as well recoup something for him now. Fair? Ethical? Ehh. But hey, it's proven to be effective before.
step five: encourage others to hunt for the Treasure of the Sierra Madre
The Lakers don't have much cap space this offseason, but that's not a major problem. They're not going to have to list job openings on monster.com -- available players are going to flock to them. The most obvious reason to join the Lakers would be to chase rings. However, it goes deeper than that. There's not a lot of teams with cap space this offseason, but there are plenty with space next season.
If you're a free agent who's not getting a lot of attention, there's one great way to get attention: play with LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers. You can inflate your stock for next offseason, when hopefully you cash in.
If I ran the Lakers, my first call would be to a veteran like Darren Collison. Collison took the season off to pursue his faith, but reportedly he may return next year. If so, he'd be a dream fit for this Lakers' rotation. Collison can run the point when LeBron James rests, but he can also serve as a complementary spacer. The former UCLA standout has become a very reliable shooter -- hitting over 40% from deep in his last four seasons. He's undersized and sometimes outmatched on D, but the team has Alex Caruso ready to match up with bigger guards. Collison's skill set would merit $10+ million in a good market, but perhaps NBA teams are going to want to see him "prove it" after his extended absence. If that's the case, the Lakers can thank their lucky stars and Jehovah for delivering him into their laps.
Other veterans who may be drawn to the Lakers like a moth to the flame would include: the underrated E'Twaun Moore (NO) and likable vet Courtney Lee (DAL). Moe Harkless (NYK) could probably get more elsewhere, but he may decide to bet on himself and inflate his price for next season.
Since Anthony Davis still prefers playing PF, depth at center will be more important for the Lakers than other teams. As mentioned, JaVale McGee will probably be back (barring a trade) and Dwight Howard may be as well. If not, the team could try to recruit a player who wants to boost their stock. Nerlens Noel (OKC) could benefit from the spotlight like that; better yet, his agent happens to be some dude named Rich Paul.
Overall, the Lakers need to keep pushing and trying to improve, be it through free agency, through trades, or through the draft (where they have the # 28 pick.) This team may have been good enough to win the title, but as mentioned, one title isn't going to satisfy this star, this team, and this fan base. Hollywood's all about excess, and the goal will be to overindulge over the next few years.
other offseason blueprints
ATL, BKN, BOS, CHA, CHI, CLE, DAL, DEN, DET, HOU, IND, GS, LAC, MEM, MIA, MIL, MIN, NO, NYK, OKC, ORL, PHI, PHX, POR, SA, SAC, TOR, UTA, WAS

Offseason Blueprint: if the Boston Celtics turn their Big Hero 6 into the Magnificent Seven, they may be in the Finals themselves next year

The NBA Finals are underway, but there are now 28 teams sitting at home with nothing to do but twiddle their thumbs, watch LeBron, and wait for next season to start.
For their sake, we wanted to look ahead with the next edition of the OFFSEASON BLUEPRINT series. In each, we'll preview some big decisions and make some recommendations for plans of attack along the way. Today, we're looking at the Boston Celtics.
step one: don't flush money down the toilet
This is a difficult entry to write, because the Boston Celtics are a good team without any major problems hanging over their head. They were top 5 in W-L record, top 5 in point differential. They finished 4th in offense, 4th in defense. They advanced to the Conference Finals, knocking off a tough Toronto team along the way. If they rolled it back next season, they should be considered a top 5 team once again.
If you can nitpick, you can find reasons to quibble with some of their big splash free agency signings. Gordon Hayward got a huge contract and didn't sustain his All-Star level (for reasons out of his control.) Last offseason, the team gave out another huge contract to Kemba Walker ($32M + $34M + $36M + $38M player option), and they may be regretting that now. Walker never looked at 100% health and he got picked on some defensively in the playoffs. The idea of paying him that kind of money for three more seasons may be a little scary.
Of course, there's no use crying over spilled milk. Gordon Hayward will likely "opt in" to his $34M player option. Is that an overpay? Sure. Still, Hayward is still a solid starter with a balanced skill set. With another year removed from that injury, he may take another step up.
As for Walker, the hope is that he'll do the same with an offseason to recover and another year in the system. It can't be easy to go from the star of a franchise to the 2nd or 3rd option. In fact, most of Walker's offensive decline can be chalked up to a reduced role. His PPG dropped from 25.6 to 20.4, but that comes after his minutes dropped by 3.8 and his field goal attempts dropped by 4.4 per game. In terms of his efficiency, there wasn't a big difference. He actually scored a higher true shooting percentage (up from 56% to 58%). His offensive box plus/minus stayed near the same at + 4.9, which ranked as the highest on Boston's team.
Walker didn't look great in the bubble, but I'm going to chalk that up to some lingering injuries. He's still only 30 years old, so he hasn't gotten materially worse in a year. Will he get much worse by age 32? At 33? That's possible. But again, the Celtics have already committed to that. They can try to float trade packages for Walker to get off that contract, but I don't see teams beating down their door for it. If a team like the Knicks wants Walker, they may not offer anything back in return (aside from their willingness to take the contract.) Given Boston's situation as a team on the verge of the Finals, it doesn't make a lot of sense to take a step back like that just for cap relief.
step two: promote a temp to a full time desk
The Boston Celtics have a very strong "top six." You have the two rising stars in Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown. You have the two veterans in Kemba Walker and Gordon Hayward. You have the super role players in Marcus Smart and Daniel Theis. After that, it's more of a grab bag. No other player on the team averaged more than 20 minutes a night in the regular season, and no other player averaged more than 18 minutes a night in the postseason.
A team can make a deep run in the playoffs by going six strong, but it makes the margin of error narrower. When one of those players gets hurt -- like Gordon Hayward did this postseason -- it strains your depth. Beyond that, having an extra member of the full-time cast allows your players to take nights off and manage their minutes in anticipation of that deep playoff run. Hayward and Walker are both 30 now, so it's going to be important to keep them fresh.
Effectively, we want to take this "top six" and make it a "top seven." (Hence the post title.)
The top candidate for a promotion would be rookie PF Grant Williams. To me, Williams has more offensive potential than fellow forward Semi Ojeleye. After three good years at Tennessee, Williams dropped to # 22 in the draft based on the perception that he was more of a "college player" who couldn't keep up with NBA athletes. That didn't look to be the case so far for Williams (or for Cam Johnson in Phoenix, by the by.) Williams is a high-IQ player who can potentially play several different positions. He needs to keep increasing his range (25% from three), but he's been working toward that over his career. If he can take a leap next year, that'd be a major boon for the Celtics.
Fellow rookies Romeo Langford and Carsen Edwards may be slightly behind on the development curve, but it'd be great if they could get on the track toward the rotation eventually. Langford projects as a quality scorer who could potentially replace Gordon Hayward in the lineup in 1-2 years. Meanwhile, Edwards was a major shot maker in college who still has a lot of work to do. It may be too optimistic to think he could be a starter one day, but perhaps he could take the reserve role from Brad Wanamaker (a free agent.) If not, Tremont Waters (another rookie) may try to vie for that spot himself. It's not exactly Game of Thrones, but it's Game of Bench Seats. If nothing are ready for 15 or so minutes, then the team may need to re-sign Wanamaker or another filler vet.
In an ideal world, the Celtics would have faith that Robert Williams would be ready for an elevated role himself. They may lean more toward smallball bigs, but it's nice to have the option of a more traditional big at center as well. Enes Kanter has a player option for $5M that he may take -- he may not. He may try to finagle a longer-term deal somewhere. But if the team trusts the Time Lord, they can negotiate from a position of strength on that front.
No matter what happens, the Celtics will likely need their "7th man" to come from within. They have $120M committed on the cap for next season, so they're going to need to rely on internal improvements.
step three: bundle like the Big Short
If you thought the Boston Celtics had a lot of prospects in their "farm system" already, just wait. In this upcoming draft, they'll have pick # 14. And pick # 26. And pick # 30. And pick # 47.
Danny Ainge has always valued the draft and having a lot of picks, but we don't need this many. After all, we're trying to win the NBA title, not the G-League title.
The most obvious tactic would be bundling up these assets and trying to upgrade somehow. Like in The Big Short, perhaps a bunch of low-end assets can equal something of value. Still, the Celtics and their fans need to be reasonable here. They've tried bundling up lower draft picks in order to move for a while now, and always seem surprised when teams reject it (thinking of the potential Justise Winslow trade-up, primarily.) The truth is, these mid-to-late R1 picks aren't as valuable as many people seem to think. If the team packages all four of those picks together (14, 26, 30, 47) in order to move up, they may only land around pick # 9 or so. This isn't the NFL; NBA teams tend to value quality over quantity in the draft.
For a team that's already pretty strong and balanced, there may be a tendency to keep all their picks and just swing for a home run or two. The trouble is: there's only so much room on the roster. Consolidating (or pushing some of those picks back to future drafts) may be necessary.
If the Celtics can't move up and stay at # 14, they should have the option of getting another solid prospect. Some that may be intriguing to me personally would be Arizona SG/SF Josh Green ("Green"? karmic!), Villanova SF Saddiq Bey, or Maryland PF Jalen Smith. All three are quality prospects that project as rotational players in a year or two. A bigger home run swing may be Aleksej Pokusevski, the skilled 7'0" stretch big from Serbia. Pokusevski's narrow frame would make me nervous to bet on him if I was a GM on the ropes who needed to hit on my pick, but the Celtics have more freedom than that. They can take some chances if they want. Other upside plays would include PG/SG R.J. Hampton (U.S./New Zealand) and SF Jaden McDaniels (Washington).
With the # 26 pick, the Celtics could also get a decent prospect as well. You can never go wrong with a traditional 3+D prospect like SF Robert Woodard (Mississippi State). I also wouldn't rule out taking a traditional big like Vernon Carey (Duke). No one wants traditional scoring bigs anymore, but that's the reason that a player like that (who averaged 18-9 as a freshman) would slip down to # 24. In another era, the kid may be a top 10 pick. At the very least, he could replace the Enes Kanter role as a scoring sub.
step four: keep on truckin'
Hmm. Usually these offseason blueprints have 4 or 5 steps, but I'm running out of ideas here. As mentioned, things are running pretty smoothly for this franchise. I don't think Danny Ainge needs much help from reddit right now.
Still, I'll throw in some minor little notes that don't even merit a full section.
WHAT CAN BROWN DO FOR YOU? The Celtics have a lot of shot makers, but sometimes their offense can stall and fall into iso or hero ball. They need to keep pushing forward with ball movement and set plays if need be. One stat I noticed: Jaylen Brown is an exceptional shooter from the corner. He's at 43% from his career, and that swelled to 48% this season. Running action to get him more of those shots would be helpful.
REUNITE GERMANY. The team has a $5M option on center Daniel Theis that they'll definitely pick up. After that, Theis will be an unrestricted free agent. If I ran the team, I'd start talking to Theis about an extension. There may be a perception that the team can play any smallball center and save some money at the position, but I'd disagree. Theis is an underrated player that fits the modern NBA well. There may be a matchup here and there where he struggles, but overall he's a good starter and may need to be paid like one. He's still a little "under the radar," so perhaps they can get a team-friendly deal if they extend him now.
KEEP YOUR COACHING DEPTH STRONG. Celtics assistant coach Jay Larranaga is one of the better lieutenants in the game. He had been floated for some head coaching jobs in the past, but seems to have been lost in the shadows with all the major movement on the sidelines this year. Hopefully, for Boston's sake, Larranaga doesn't feel discouraged by that and doesn't start looking for head coaching opportunities elsewhere. His father is a good college coach, and he may decide to go that NCAA route eventually himself. The team should keep him well compensated so he doesn't feel the need to do that.
Overall, we're talking minor tweaks for this next season. The Celtics' chances of winning a title will hinge on how much they can improve -- both from their young stars and from their young bench.
other offseason blueprints
ATL, BKN, CHA, CHI, CLE, DAL, DEN, DET, HOU, IND, GS, LAC, LAL, MEM, MIA, MIL, MIN, NO, NYK, OKC, ORL, PHI, PHX, POR, SA, SAC, TOR, UTA, WAS

Part 1: article from TrueHoop re Morey

Hit piece on Darryl. Other GMs are altruistic, for the game and the players, would never trade a player to get ahead /s
Part 1: Daryl Morey, Rafael Stone, and the exploding Rockets “The single raindrop never feels responsible for the flood.” Dec 29
Below is the first half of a story just published to TrueHoop subscribers. To read the whole thing:
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By HENRY ABBOTT and YARON WEITZMAN
SportsCenter @SportsCenter James Harden was asked if he feels better about his situation with the Rockets now than he did before he arrived at camp.
"Next question." December 21st 2020
Daryl Morey changed NBA basketball by replacing fragile human assessments with something more calculated. He measured everything and ultimately valued different players, coaches, and styles of play—leading to many unusual bets. For the most part, time has proven him to be brilliant: His Rockets won more than 60 percent of their games and routinely made it deep into the playoffs.
If there has been a knock against Morey, it’s that he’s lucid on creating angles and closing deals, but a little blind on things like human feelings and building trust. It has long been discussed as a “lack of chemistry,” but to many who have lived it, the shortcoming feels more profound. “Daryl Morey” says one NBA source who has known him for more than a decade, “ruins lives.”
If there’s a “Game of Thrones” harshness to Morey’s Rockets tenure, it is coming full circle now on a team struggling to care enough about each other to function. Billionaire Tilman Fertitta has become the butt of jokes, and one person close to the team says he suspects they are on a path to become the worst team in the NBA. One of the team’s two best players from last season—Russell Westbrook—has already gotten himself traded. The other, James Harden, is making news almost daily for tearing at the fabric of the team by requesting a trade, breaking COVID rules, and reportedly throwing a ball at a young teammate. The team’s struggle with COVID protocols meant they are the only NBA team to date that couldn’t field sufficient players for a game—their season opener had to be postponed.
But there’s a deeper story of the Rockets’ infusion of callousness.
Daryl Morey moved to Houston in 2006, as the Rockets’ assistant GM. Like many well-to-do Houstonians, Daryl and Ellen Morey purchased a large house—theirs was near Buffalo Bayou, a drainage artery that runs away from reservoirs west of downtown. Then it started pouring. Eight to ten inches of rain flooded more than 3,000 homes in 2006. Hurricane Ike battered nearby Galveston and parts of Houston a couple of years later. In April 2009, several thousand more houses flooded, especially along Buffalo Bayou.
A house in a flood zone wants constant care and attention. Before the rain there is the upgrading and maintaining of pumps, valves, and drainage. The storms bring bouts of stress: sandbags, generators, power outages, and mucky cleanup. A few years in, the Moreys—hardly sentimental people—divorced houses altogether. They would face rain storms from a high rise in the Memorial City neighborhood. Once ubers became ubiquitous and readily available, Morey essentially quit cars, too—telling the Wall Street Journal driving was a poor use of his time. (Years later on the Rich Eisen show he explained, “I’m on my phone too much, it’s just too dangerous. For the sake of humanity.”)
And besides, many days Morey didn’t need a car at all. Another employee, general counsel Rafael Stone, lived nearby and was happy to drive Morey to work.
Morey and Stone got along fine. One Rockets employee at the time remembers them as “best friends.” In a recent Zoom press conference, Stone made a passing comment about Morey damaging his dash board with a foot on a morning commute. “Daryl and I are extremely different people,” Stone added. “We worked well together and became friends because we’re from very different perspectives but oftentimes ended up at the exact same point.”
One of Stone’s best friends, Andre Burrell, remembers Stone saying that “Daryl was really cool to him and took him under his wing, that he was getting all sorts of insights.”
Both were hired by then-team president George Postolos to bring a certain business acumen to a franchise that had long been defined by the well-liked but hardly cutting-edge Carroll Dawson.
A year into Morey’s time in Houston, Dawson was shuffled into a consultant role to make room for Morey to become general manager. It was an agreement Morey secured from then-team governor Leslie Alexander. The Rockets moved on from Dawson as easily as Morey moved on from houses and cars. That was another part of what fused Stone and Morey—an appreciation for the cold transactional nature of things. Many dream of running an NBA team. It’s a little cutthroat, at times.
Some college freshmen arrive at school unsure of what they want from their lives. Rafael Stone was not one of those kids.
Chris Jones first met Stone back in the fall of 1990. They were freshmen basketball players for Williams College, a Division III liberal arts school in leafy Williamstown, Mass. Even then, Jones—who would go on to live with Stone for three years—could tell that Stone was different. “Raf had his life planned out,” he says. “He was going to play basketball, then go to law school, then he hoped to one day be involved with an NBA team.”
Stone grew up in Seattle. His father was a corporate lawyer who had starred at point guard for the University of Washington. This was the path Stone intended to follow. He played the same position and had many of the same dreams. “He was very quick and very savvy,” says Robert Williams, another former teammate, roommate, and longtime friend, “and he looked to shoot first.”
He loved basketball, both playing and watching his hometown Sonics. He took the craft seriously but he spent most of his free time studying for his LSATs. He applied to the law schools at Harvard, Stanford, and Yale “because he wanted to get into the three best ones,” says Andre Burrell, another former roommate and longtime friend. All three schools accepted Stone. He chose Stanford. From there he landed a job at the New York City-based corporate law firm Dewey Ballantine.
Stone has remained in touch with his roommates in the three decades since. They communicate via text chains, monthly calls, and (like everyone else during the pandemic) Zoom sessions. His friends describe him as fiercely loyal, the type of person who, Jones says, “can come off a bit stand-offish at times, especially if you don’t know him, but once he brings you into his orbit, he’ll do anything for you.” For Jones, a story comes to mind, “one that gets to the heart of who Raf is.” Jones got married in 1999. The next day his in-laws held a reception at their home. The party lasted a few hours. After everyone left, Stone approached Jones’ mother-in-law. “He said, ‘Hey, I’d like to help clean this all up,’” Jones recalls. “Every time I bring up his name, they talk about that.”
Burrell recalls a different story, one he believes shows that Stone was always destined for a high-profiled gig. A few years after Stone had joined Dewey Ballantine, both he and Burrell were in Ohio for an event. They went out for drinks one night and, as these things often go, used the time to discuss their respective futures and careers. “He was always really ambitious,” Burrell says, and that night he recalls Stone talking about how he “wanted something different, that he wanted more.” Stone wound up making partner in 2005, at the age of 32. A week later, according to The Houston Chronicle, he quit. The Rockets had offered him the position of general counsel. He called his friends to share the news. “He said it was the chance to live his dream,” Jones says.
To Alexander and Postolos, Morey offered vastly more strategic thinking. Much has been made of Morey’s role in basketball’s analytics revolution—leading to an emphasis on 3-pointers and identifying undervalued players from Shane Battier to P.J. Tucker. The team made a lot of trades and won a lot of games.
In baseball, the appearance of advanced analytics is called “Moneyball.” It’s about a lot of things—seeing the strike zone, fielding with range—but, no surprise, it’s also about money. Morey entered the NBA as a consultant, advising Celtics ownership on the bottom line. His annual conference takes place at MIT’s business school. A lot of the panels are about maximizing ticket revenue or gambling analytics.
NBA lifers who grew up in gymnasiums are aware that, as a boss, Morey is thinking deal-first. Many serious basketball professionals have felt swept aside by the floodwaters of Morey’s strategy.
Morey’s crowning Rockets accomplishment was to collect sufficient picks and players to land James Harden in a trade with the Oklahoma City Thunder. Instead of tanking, the Rockets stayed competitive while scraping together trade assets through years of incremental moves that have been compared to those of a Wall Street arbitrage trader. Instead of commodities, though, the Rockets were dealing people, not all of whom relished the process. FiveThirtyEight reports that, over his time running the Rockets, Morey made more trades than any GM (other than his longtime deputy Sam Hinkie, who went on to run the 76ers).
Morey’s very first trade was for Jackie Butler and a pick. The pick became Luis Scola, a great Rockets success story. But Butler was cut before playing a game and never played again. Like every NBA player, he has feelings and an agent. There were many Jackie Butlers. Morey sent 72 players packing over his tenure.
One rival executive says he has come to avoid calling Morey with trade offers, for fear they will leak to the media. Public pressure might help Morey gain leverage to complete a deal. But the leverage comes at the expense of upsetting both organizations’ stability as players, agents, coaches, and families stress about the future.
At some point, Morey figured out a money-saving trick: Almost every NBA coach has a contract that ends in June. That’s when coaching staffs tend to be built for the upcoming season, and that’s when an in-demand assistant like Elston Turner or Jeff Bzdelik might become expensive thanks to the magic of competing offers.
Morey’s solution? Rockets assistant coaches were given deals that ended in August, when the rest of the league’s coaching jobs were filled. With nowhere else to go, they didn’t bargain too hard.
Last season, Rockets coaches did some back-of-the-envelope calculations and came away believing they were perhaps the 29th- or 30th-highest paid staff.
Morey, it has been reported, made $8 million a year by the end of his time in Houston.
The Rockets and their fans once romanticized Hakeem Olajuwon or Tracy McGrady. For a while, in the Morey years, it seemed like the new administration would substitute Shane Battier as a favorite. In 2009, Michael Lewis published the essential story of basketball’s Moneyball revolution, called the “no stats all-star,” about Battier. Battier’s geeky mind was a godsend to Morey. Unlike most players, Battier loved Morey’s fat packets of stats and used the intelligence to become a defender who knew all the percentages.
Battier solved the essential conundrum of the advanced stats revolution: How do you get the players on board? “It’s so great having Shane on the team,” Morey said in the aisle of one of his early conferences. They talked about everything. When Ron Artest was new to the team, Battier was the one who advised Morey about how to talk to him.
The forward came to be so associated with advanced analytics that by the time of the 2011 conference, a giant image of Battier (in a Rockets uniform, guarding Kobe Bryant) was the backdrop of the conference’s main stage.
What made it less romantic was that not two weeks before the conference, Morey had traded Battier to the Grizzlies for some draft picks and Hasheem Thabeet.

[OC] The Craptologist: Trying to Decode the Strangest Offseasons so Far

“Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth" -- Mike Tyson.
NBA general managers may feel the same way. They likely entered the offseason with bold ambition and well-thought out plans. Let's trade for Bradley Beal! Let's sign Bogdan Bogdanovic! But eventually, you realize that 29 other teams all have those same plans in mind. Plan B becomes Plan C becomes Plan M(ovgov.)
Fans have grumbled about some of the free agency signings already, but the most vitriol appears to be reserved for a select few. Rather than mock them, let's step inside their shoes and try to understand their logic.
CHARLOTTE HORNETS
the puzzle
In his glory days, Charlotte GM Mitch Kupchak oversaw championship teams with the Los Angeles Lakers. He deserves credit for that; it's never easy to win one title, let alone repeat.
Kupchak is on the verge of an even more unique achievement: repeat "worst contracts of the year" awards. His Hornets were universally mocked for overpaying for Terry Rozier last year (3 years, $58M), and he's getting mocked once again for overpaying Gordon Hayward (4 years, $120M) this offseason.
Hayward is a good player and a former All-Star, but he hasn't been the same player since his gruesome leg injury in 2017. Hayward had a solid season (17.5 points, 6.7 rebounds, 4.1 assists) but didn't showcase much explosiveness. The idea of paying him $25-30M could potentially be justified right now -- at age 30 -- but will look worse and worse as the years go on and all those miles keep adding up. There's a chance this contract is rancid by year 3.
Odder still, these Hornets are not "one player away" from making waves. By most advanced metrics, they were a bottom 5 team this season (bottom 5 in point differential, bottom 5 in offensive rating, bottom 5 in SRS power ranking, etc.) Given how big of a hole they're in, it would have made more sense to stay in a holding pattern and look forward to the stacked draft classes in 2021 and 2022.
the answer key
As much as we'd like simple and rational answers to everything, life isn't that clean cut. We can't ignore the human factors at play. The idea of the Charlotte Hornets waiting and adding top lottery picks in 2021 and 2022 makes a lot of sense on paper -- but it presumes that you're going to be around in 2021 and 2022 and beyond. I don't know if Mitch Kupchak and coach James Borrego had that luxury. If they stunk up the joint this season and regressed from their 9th seed (which was an overachievement), then they may have been fired.
Instead, they decided to forge ahead and improve their W-L record without a full-blown tank. In a way, you can understand that, too. The primary reason that teams sag to the bottom is because they want to find franchise-altering superstars in the draft. The Hornets haven't had that since Kemba Walker (if ever.) But maybe, just maybe, they HAVE that franchise player now in # 3 pick LaMelo Ball. I'm skeptical of the kid myself, but there are plenty of smart people who buy into him completely. ESPN's Draft Express crew have been saying he's the clear-cut best prospect in the class, a confidence they had in Luka Doncic a few years prior.
If you're the Hornets, you're gambling on LaMelo Ball being the real deal. And if that's the case, you need to do everything in your power to provide him in a good situation. Throwing him out there to the wolves with a bad supporting cast and a league hungry to humble him may have been a downright disaster. And what then? Would the 19-year-old Ball have handled that well? Would his confidence be shaken? Would the whole locker room turn into a media feeding frenzy? Perhaps the toxic situation would have gobbled LaMelo Ball into the void, in the same way rookie quarterbacks can be ruined by bad setups (google David Carr, Derek's brother.)
In the NFL, teams often find "bridge" quarterbacks to give their young rookies some time to develop. Gordon Hayward's not going to block LaMelo Ball's path to playing time, but he's going to serve as a bridge to take some bullets for him and take some defensive attention away. As a lead dog again, Hayward could flirt with 20 PPG and possibly crack the All-Star team again. With two decent guards in Devonte' Graham and Terry Rozier, a decent big in Cody Zeller, and a promising sophomore in P.J. Washington, this team could potentially chase a .500 record.
Will the Hornets be a .500 team this year? Will they be a playoff team? Who knows. But at the very least, they'll be an interesting team. At least they'll be a relevant team. And for a franchise that may have been the most forgotten and anonymous in the NBA, we can't call this offseason a complete disaster. They made waves. Now it's up to them to see if they can ride them out or crash under the current.
HOUSTON ROCKETS
the puzzle
All season, there were warning signs that the Houston Rockets franchise may be hazardous situation and prime for a potential explosion. Daryl Morey and Mike D'Antoni saw the warning signs, and cruised out of there before everything blew up. There's a chance those two will meet again in the Eastern Conference Finals next year (Morey with Philly, D'Antoni with Brooklyn.)
As for Houston...? They're a fiery mess that's gone from title contender to punchline.
So far, they have not traded James Harden. They have not traded Russell Westbrook. Yet, oddly, they traded away an ideal 3+D partner for those two in Robert Covington. They're effectively still in "win now!" mode, without giving their stars the tools to actually win now.
And oh yeah: Tilman Fertitta is a douchebag.
the answer key
First of all, we have to empathize with new GM Rafael Stone here. Nothing we've seen so far is his fault. He inherited a tough situation and a tough job here. Being an executive under Tilman Fertitta isn't just like working with one hand tied behind your back, it's like working when you're tied up like Marsellus Wallace.
Still, I appreciate that Stone hasn't panicked and traded James Harden yet. It'd almost be impossible to get fair value out of a superstar like Harden. We're talking about a player who has finished in the top 3 for MVP voting for FOUR straight seasons for a reason. He's one of the most efficient volume scorers of all-time. He's one of the most durable superstars in the NBA as well. You can love him or hate him, but having James Harden almost guarantees that you can make the playoffs no matter what. You don't find those guys easily. In fact, the Rockets could own every single draft pick next year (1 through 60) and probably not find anyone who will be as good as James Harden is right now.
Of course, just because James Harden can win 45-50 games with a bad supporting cast doesn't mean he should have to. So what's up with the Robert Covington trade? Why send away an ideal 3+D guy like that?
Essentially, the Rockets gave up Covington and his salary in order to sign Christian Wood. They were hamstrung by Russell Westbrook's salary ($44M + $47M) and forced to make difficult decisions like that. While Covington is a good player, so is Christian Wood. He's been productive every step of his career, and can provide the team with some more size and dynamism in their frontcourt.
Ultimately, that decision may be less about Robert Covington and Christian Wood and more about P.J. Tucker. Tucker's an admirable, gritty player who did well playing "up" at center this year. That said, he's 35 years old right now and will be 36 by the time the next playoffs roll around. It's difficult to ask a 36-year-old Tucker (at 6'5") to match up with the Anthony Davises of the world. If the Western Conference is going to go through the Lakers, the Rockets may need more size to give themselves a puncher's chance.
DETROIT PISTONS
the puzzle
The Detroit Pistons hired a promising executive in Troy Weaver, a long-time lieutenant of Sam Presti in Oklahoma City. Presumably, Weaver would take a cue from Presti's direction in OKC and go for a full rebuilding situation here in the Motor City as well.
The team made all indications of that early on. They traded away Luke Kennard and didn't re-sign Christian Wood. They drafted a teenage PG in Killian Hayes to be the new face of the franchise. Hayes needs some runway before he can be counted on as a starter, but he has a lot of promise to be a leading scorer down the road in 2022 or 2023 or so.
But then... something changed. It's almost like Troy Weaver woke up with amnesia and forgot his own gameplan. Rather than build for the future, he signed veterans like Jerami Grant (3 years, $60M) and Mason Plumlee (3 years, $25M). While I like both of them in a vacuum, they're not exactly young studs. Plumlee is 30 -- Jerami Grant is 26. Both of them are older than the veterans they cast aside (in Kennard and Wood.) The same can be said about another trade acquisition in Delon Wright. While Wright's a good player, he's no spring chicken at age 28.
Odder still, none of these new pieces appear to fit well with the cornerstone players Blake Griffin or Killian Hayes. Whether you're building around Griffin in the short term or Hayes in the long term, those stars need to be surrounded by shooting to maximize their potential. With the exception of Svi Mykhailiuk and (potentially) Saddiq Bey, this is a roster that has very little spacing so far. It's a concern with Weaver's team building so far, especially given how OKC struggled with spacing for so many years.
the answer key
This is a difficult one to figure out, because I'm not sure that I fully understand the grand plan here. Some teams go up, some teams go down. Some teams zig while everyone else zags. Right now, it feels like Weaver is just drawing random squiggles and hope the dots connect somehow.
If you're going to make a defense here, it'd be that the offseason isn't finished yet. And even when the season starts, your plan isn't finished yet either. By collecting this strange hodgepodge of talent, Weaver has at least kept his options open.
If the Pistons roll into next season as is, they at least give Blake Griffin and company the opportunity to be competitive. The last time Griffin played a full season, the Pistons went 41-41 and made the playoffs. With the Orlando Magic presumably taking a step back, that 8th seed is wide open again.
More likely, the Pistons won't be the 8th seed. They won't be sneakily competitive. But if that's the case, they still have options. Blake Griffin's trade value may be low right now because teams aren't sure if he's healthy and back near 100%. If Griffin comes back strong in the first month or two, his value will jump up again. If that's the case (Griffin plays well but the team isn't there yet), the Pistons can pivot and deal him to a contender. They'll also have that option with Derrick Rose (on an expiring) and other pieces as well.
In the meantime, the Pistons are taking a similar approach to Charlotte. They're going to build the team around their draft pick (Killian Hayes), but they're going to try and give him as much of a buffer as they can by surrounding him with decent veterans in the meantime. Is that the way that I'd rebuild? Probably not. But it's not pure insanity; there's a method to this madness. And time will tell whether they're crazy like a fox or just crazy as fuck.

Offseason Blueprint: the Miami Heat have their hands full right now, so we'll take a look ahead to their offseason for them

The Miami Heat are locked in a tough battle with the L.A. Lakers right now, and they need every ounce of focus to pull out of this 3-1 hole. They can’t even think about the offseason right now.
But we can. In order to lighten their load, we wanted to look ahead with the penultimate edition of the OFFSEASON BLUEPRINT series. In each entry, we preview some big decisions and make some recommendations for plans of attack along the way.
step one: don't tinker with the formula
After Jimmy Butler signed with the Miami Heat, fans and pundits expected them to be pretty good. Their oveunder in Vegas extended as high as 43.5 wins. Most predicted that they would return to the playoffs after missing out in 3 of the previous 5 seasons. Some even thought they could be competitive in a R1 series. Turns out, the Miami Heat were much better than we all expected, as they roared past Milwaukee and Boston on their way to the NBA Finals.
Much has been made about how Jimmy Butler is a great fit for the Miami culture. He's tough and rugged. He's well conditioned. He's a "dog." All that is true. However, what's underplayed is how great of a fit Jimmy Butler is for Miami's particular roster.
Butler isn't a very good shooter from deep (down to 24% from three this year), but he excels offensively when he's able to attack the basket. If you surround him with shooters, he becomes a handful. He can draw contact and get to the line -- where he shot 83% on 9.1 free throw attempts per game. He can also utilize his passing ability; this year he averaged 6.0 assists per game.
This roster fits like a glove around Butler's skill set. The team has shooters all over the court, from Duncan Robinson to Tyler Herro to even their stretch big reserves like Kelly Olynyk and Meyers Leonard. When your two best players (Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo) aren't great shooters, that spacing becomes so crucial. The Miami Heat realized that, adding the talent that fit them, and subtracting the talent that did not (like the higher-usage Justise Winslow.)
Going forward, the Miami Heat need to keep that formula in mind. They're going to continue to try and improve, but they don't need to reinvent the wheel here. Adding another player who's going to take the ball out of Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo's hands may be a mistake, especially if that player isn't a great shooter themselves.
step two: bring (some of) the band back together
Everything clicked for the Miami Heat in the bubble, but free agency will test that newfound chemistry. They have several notable free agents, including Goran Dragic and Jae Crowder. Role players like Derrick Jones Jr., Meyers Leonard, and Solomon Hill will also be free agents. In theory, Kelly Olynyk could be as well, but I'd expect him to pick up his $13.6M player option.
Goran Dragic represents a difficult decision. At age 34, he's still a very good player. He can slash and attack, but he can also be effective from deep (37% this year, 36% career.) He thrived as a Sixth Man this year in the regular season, and showed he can still be a viable starter in the playoffs. While he's not a great defender, his 6'3" size helps him hang on that end.
From Miami's perspective, they need to figure out how "replaceable" Dragic would be. With Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo handling the ball so often (combined, those two averaged 11.1 assists), the team doesn't need a traditional playmaking PG. Could they get away with starting scorers like Tyler Herro or Kendrick Nunn? Probably. That depth at guard puts Miami in a position of strength when negotiating Dragic's contract. If he wants to return next year on a short-term deal (1 year, $12M?) then it's doable. If he demands a larger role or a longer deal, then maybe you roll the dice with your younger players instead.
The team has less leverage when it comes to Jae Crowder. Crowder had been struggling over the last few seasons as a SF, but he thrived when switched over to a stretch PF here in Miami. Not only did that help him on defense, but it helped him find some more shooting space on offense as well. He hit 44.5% of his threes in the regular season for Miami. He also matches up well with some of the bigger forwards in the league on the defensive end. Again, no one's going to confuse him with a "stopper," but no one's going to make a point to exploit him either.
Every team is looking for players like Crowder -- a supply and demand problem that will become Miami's problem soon enough. Frankly, he's going to get overpaid. He caught fire at the right time and saw his national profile skyrocket with a strong playoff run. There's a fairly sizable chance that Crowder's shooting will sink down to Earth, and his defense will decline as the years catch up with him (now at age 30.)
Miami will probably need to re-sign Crowder, but they should try their best to keep the deal within reason. Not only will that keep their own cap hit down, but it will also keep him as a tradeable asset going forward.
step three: don't settle for second best
When the Miami Heat traded for Andre Iguodala, I didn't think much of it. Iguodala was probably too old and rusty to be much impact this season. Meh. Whatever. When they extended Iguodala to a big contract ($15M + $15M team option), my eyebrows raised in disbelief. WTF? On face value, a 37-year-old Iguodala is worth half that salary, if that.
Quickly, my skepticism turned into suspicion. Iguodala's $15M salary doesn't make a lot of sense... aside from it being $15M in salary. Suddenly, the Miami Heat have a mid-sized contract to float in trade packages. If you factor in Olynyk's $13.5M, then suddenly the team can match contracts anywhere in the range of $15M-$30M.
Of course, other teams aren't going to trade for empty salary because they want to help Miami win a title or because Pat Riley helped them bury a dead hooker a few years back. They need some motivation or asset in return. R1 picks may be enough. Tyler Herro would be more than enough.
Barring a Herro trade, Miami would be looking at "distressed assets" in return. We may need to focus on teams that are nearing a divorce with their current player. Among the biggest names that fit that bill would be Indiana SG Victor Oladipo ($22M contract.) The fit with Oladipo is better on the defensive end than on offense, where he plays a similar attacking role to Jimmy Butler. Still, if Miami can get him for a modest return, it's worth a conversation. I'm not sure Miami can put enough assets together to snag Jrue Holiday ($26M + $27M), but it's worth a call as well. If the team doesn't re-sign Dragic, Holiday could slide right in and play PG-SG for them.
Lesser players to mention: Chicago SF Otto Porter would make a good replacement for Jae Crowder. Porter's overpaid ($28M option) but is on an expiring deal so he couldn't hurt you too badly. I'd also consider making a call to Brooklyn about Taurean Prince ($12M + $13M). Prince had a bad year, but he has solid size for the wing and could play some SF and PF. You may prefer Iguodala to Prince in a clutch playoff situation, but the difference in age (36 to 26) is hard to ignore.
No doubt, the biggest name (and biggest contract) we should mention is Chris Paul ($41M + $44M), since he's been linked to the team in the past. It's hard to see the math working out here for me personally, but Pat Riley has more tricks up his sleeve than I do.
step four: stay flexible for the future
One reason that I'd be reluctant to commit huge money to someone like Chris Paul is because I'd like Miami to maintain their cap flexibility going forward. Prior to free agency, they have $80M committed on the books this upcoming season, but only $43M the following year.
To be honest, free agency isn't a great gameplan for about 80% of the franchises in the NBA. Superstars aren't flocking to small markets, or cold markets, or bad rosters and shoddy organizations. Miami is the exception to all those rules. They've hit a grand slam in free agency before, and they could theoretically do the same again. Allegedly they're going to be players in the potential Giannis Antetokounmpo sweepstakes, and they're going to be players in the sweepstakes for every star free agent before and after. It's an appealing situation, an appealing roster, and a prestigious coaching staff and front office.
For Miami, that target year of 2021 is crucial. Not only is that the year that Giannis' contract expires, but it's also the time when they'll have to pony up for an extension for Bam Adebayo. If they can grab a star before they sign on the dotted line for Adebayo, then they can vault into the title conversation for the next several years to follow. Giannis is going to be the big prize of the summer, but other stars slated for Free Agency 2021 include Kawhi Leonard, Paul George, and current Finals opponents LeBron James and Anthony Davis.
The fact that Miami can shoot for the stars is another reason they have to be careful about their current offseason. If you overpay Goran Dragic or Jae Crowder, you not only hurt your cap space going forward but you also lock yourself into contracts that may be hard to trade. Miami signed off on quite a few of those in the past (Dion Waiters, James Johnson, etc), and somehow Pat Riley managed to be Harry Houdini and escape from them. As great as he may be, he should avoid trying that type of risk again.
previous offseason blueprints
ATL, BKN, BOS, CHA, CHI, CLE, DAL, DEN, DET, HOU, IND, GS, LAC, MEM, MIL, MIN, NO, NYK, OKC, ORL, PHX, POR, SA, SAC, TOR, UTA, WAS

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How Old Do You Have To Be To Gamble In Oklahoma?

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