Knicks · Around the NBA 2019-20 (page 42)
Nalod wrote:PHilly was a bounce away from winning vs. Toronto. They move on and GSW breaks as they did they are likely champs.
elton Brand has been in charge a few years now. He signed Horford. Simmons is out. Philly not as good as Boston.
The process? It did not really work.
It's really frustrating for Sixers fans. If you have Embiid and Simmons, you just have to surround them with shooters. They've given up Shamet, Reddick. They could have drafted Tatum but instead traded him and a future first for Fultz (and then had to dump him for nothing). They dished out 2 of the worst contracts in the league for essentially 2 PF's, when they needed guards. They lost Jimmy Butler. They were so close to building a perennial contender but blew it at the last stage.
KnickDanger wrote:BigDaddyG wrote:smackeddog wrote:In seriousness, it’s a shame, I was enjoying that Clips vs Mavs seriesMan, Luka could be limp, concussed and have Luke Kornet in place of Maxi and KO and that team will still be a threat.
Funny how some players just have "it," that desire, knowledge, and ability to win. And to raise the play of those around them, which is really how it happens.
It's amazing- he looks a bit tubby, like he doesn't work out, but somehow it makes zero difference. I don't enjoy watching him play, but it's amazing what he's achieving.
djsunyc wrote:i have a different take on philly. i think philly was ready to be the favorite to win it all this year had they re-signed butler. but butler left b/c he didn't like the culture in philly - and this was a culture fostered by hinkie and brett brown. hinkie treated players like cattle and did it for the overall "process" but brown was also the coach during all that time. they never fostered a culture of winning. it went from asset management to "ok, let's go all in with tobias and jimmy". the transition was too quick and jimmy read the tea leaves and left.
I agree, Hinkie was also a terrible drafter and terrible team builder, Embiid fell to him because of injury worries. Even so, they ended up with 2 core players. For me the mistake was last season- they should have drafted and kept Mikal Bridges (would have been perfect at SF- a s3 and D guy), they should have kept Shamet (again a good option at SG). They should never have traded for Tobias Harris. Butler walking might have been out of their control, but you don't turn around and sign Al Horford to an overpaying contract. They could have targeted Bogdanovic, or Brogdon. They just messed up nearly every move last season from beginning to end.
contrast that to Celtics (who lately have also been successful in getting high picks and stockpiling talent). Their superstars are far more quiet, players seem to ge talong well, and the team has an identity. Sixers never had a chance
Going forward Sixers are a mess as far as getting to elite level with no clear fix. Pretty easy to identify plenty of way the Celts can still improve
They kept doubling down to get more picks. Fultz was a ver unusual situation. League owners were frustrated by how bad a draw philly was they Demanded Silver intervene. Hence colangelo’s to cash in some of the chips. Carter Williams, Oka4, Norlens, Fultz all not good picks. Embiid is great. Simmons is still a bit of a mystery. They did not have to hit on the picks and despite some bone head moves still came all so close. They took risks, traded for picks and tried some really cool things. It did not add up.
Thats on ownership.
TripleThreat wrote:Chandler wrote:Regarding the Sixers, Hinkie may have been great at getting high picks and stockpiling tons of 2nds but there isn't a lot to show for it.The 76ers started out with a core of Jrue Holiday, Thad Young, Evan Turner and Spencer Hawes
In three years plus time, they had Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid, Robert Covington, Dario Saric, Jerami Grant, Richaun Holmes, TJ McConnell and Christian Wood and the largest stockpile of draft picks in the modern era plus a shitload of cap space. Many of those future picks were projected very valuable ( i.e. the one that ended up taking Tatum) and RoCo was signed to one of the best value contracts in NBA history. Not just the modern era, in the entire leagues history. Hinkie was ORDERED to take Okafor over Porzingis by his owner. Even still Okafor and Noel were seen as value for slot at the time of their drafts. He traded Holiday who proceeded to get injured almost immediately on his new time. He was criticized for trading MCW and the draft rights to Payton, but how did that work out? MCW ended up a very limited player and Payton is nothing special.
If you told current Knicks fans they could get, in that timeline, Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid, Robert Covington, Dario Saric, Jerami Grant, Richaun Holmes, TJ McConnell and Christian Wood and the largest stockpile of draft picks in the modern era plus a shitload of cap space in three plus years, they'd shit their pants.
What's the crime here? Hinkie is not a people person? That he missed on some picks? (Everyone misses on picks. The great GSW picked Udoh the year after drafting Curry)
Hinkie promised only OPPORTUNITY and NOT ABSOLUTE RESULTS. And he delivered that. He gave the 76ers the best opportunity he could to generate a potential contender. He did so in the worst salary structure in major professional sports with a zero tolerance standard. He did it in a system with ZERO market inefficiencies in place. He did it in a system where a team needs to overcome brand extortion, ref manipulation and a rigged draft system.
The league's narrative against Hinkie is that he should still be responsible for shit decisions made by the Colangelos, whom the league forced onto the 76ers, over two plus years AFTER he was gone from the team.
Lots of Knicks fans would line up and blow any GM who could engineer that kind of asset turnaround in three plus years.
You get a calculator nerd who went balls hard against the systematic dysfunction of an entire sport.
This guy is Keyzer Soze with a spreadsheet but people are pissed that he wasn't completely perfect.
there is no crime here, and compared against the Knicks, they win (but then again so does just about everyone else)
Hinkie thought outside the box (Silicon valley guy IIRC). The point i was trying to make is that despite all of those successes they never really put a "team" together. It was a collection of talent with a somewhat awkward fit.
the celtics who i hate (mostly because i live in Boston, i.e., behind enemy lines) also stockpiled picks -- often the result of sandbagging some team in trades including the Sixers and Nets each of whom should have known better. They also had a lot of mistakes. But at the end of the day they have a team with an identity and still have plenty of room to improve, e.g., at 4 and 5
TripleThreat wrote:Chandler wrote: The point i was trying to make is that despite all of those successes they never really put a "team" together. It was a collection of talent with a somewhat awkward fit.
Simmons can't shoot. He was the best player in his draft at the time and the best value for slot. Hinkie was gone by then, but he would have drafted Simmons. Anyone would. Hinkie had no control over who would be in any given draft. He also had no control over who would be picked before Embiid, leaving Embiid as the best player left in Tier 1 of that draft.The Warriors didn't plan on Curry or Thompson. They had no idea who would be picked before those players. There wasn't a master plan to trade for Iguodala years in advance. They didn't expect Durant would be an option with the largest cap spike in history and with Bogut naturally falling off their salary cap.
Houston had no idea Harden would be on the trade block. They could only put themselves in a position to have assets to strike if someone like that happened. They couldn't predict the fallout of Dwight Howard and the Lakers that lead Howard there.
In the same position as Hinkie, any functional GM would have picked Simmons and Embiid at their draft slots. Having two franchise cores that don't gel together is a nice problem to have. It's a better problem than having no franchise cores at all.
The argument that Hinkie took three big men in a row? He took who he felt was best player available in Noel and Embiid. Okafor was a choice ORDERED by his owner.
The argument that Hinkie traded all his point guards? The lowest positional value in the league at the time and the results were injured Holiday, MCW and Elfrid Payton. People are going to complain about that?
One could make a case that if Hinkie had been left alone, the 76ers could have had Simmons, Embiid, Porzingis, RoCo, Holmes, Grant, McConnell, Saric and Tatum. With a shitload of picks and a shitload of cap space.
With the constraints Hinkie had, he took what he felt was the best player available at the time and place. This is standard for all team building. You see fans screaming this all the time. Just take the best player available at the time and hope to figure it out later. Apparently that's OK for everyone else, and every other GM, but if Hinkie does it, then it's a sin and he needs to be blamed for shit in 2020 when he was ousted in 2016?
Guys here do realize that if the Knicks had gotten a different/higher lottery slot in that Porzingis draft, that this team could have easily ended up with Jahlil Okafor right?
In 2020, it's Hinkies fault that the 76ers are falling apart FOUR YEARS LATER. The current Philly GM is one that retired from playing in 2016 and became the top dog two years later with no actual NBA GM experience but that's also Hinkies fault. That's the narrative here?
not arguing with his drafting or your logic about the choices and what he was able to amass. that's all correct. And totally not absolving current and past mgmt of blame (as an aside by all accounts it seems Phil would have taken Oakafor if he were available)
but whether through lack of trades or player development the team was awkward even if the picks were talented. And yes you need to make decisions in real time as opportunities develop. I think at the end of the day it's fair to criticize the Sixer both past (Hinkie) and present for never creating a team with all of those assets and opportunity. case in point (not Hinkie), they have Simmons and they trade the 3rd pick and a future first to get Fultz where Simmons was already against it. Even if Fultz wasn't a dud that's questionable. they needed a SF. Ainge won! (just as houston won on the Harden deal)
on the other hand, you take a look at Denver. Murray is their highest pick at 7. i think that's a better team with a better future. And this is after they flubbed up and traded away draft slots that turned into Rudy and Donovan. (not only is Utah beating them in the series but they won those trades too)
Or take Utah who has had plenty of misses in the draft yet assembled a very competitive team
both of these teams (for all of their misses) draft ninjas who hit their shots in the clutch, play defense and to my knowledge minimum drama (rudy and donovan get a pass from me for COVID thing)
smackeddog wrote:How did we beat the Mavs twice this season?!
Frank an Mo' stepped up. Speaking of Mo', you can't say he didn't show up this series.
BigDaddyG wrote:smackeddog wrote:How did we beat the Mavs twice this season?!Frank an Mo' stepped up. Speaking of Mo', you can't say he didn't show up this series.
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TripleThreat wrote:Chandler wrote:not arguing with his drafting or your logic about the choices and what he was able to amass. that's all correct.but whether through lack of trades or player development the team was awkward even if the picks were talented. And yes you need to make decisions in real time as opportunities develop. I think at the end of the day it's fair to criticize the Sixer both past (Hinkie) and present for never creating a team with all of those assets and opportunity. case in point (not Hinkie), they have Simmons and they trade the 3rd pick and a future first to get Fultz where Simmons was already against it. Even if Fultz wasn't a dud that's questionable. they needed a SF.
What is "awkward"? What is "creating a team"?Hinkies job was to amass assets and get the best talent possible given the situation. He did that. In three years. He found two franchise cores, a host of useful side pieces and a shit load of picks and a shitload of cap space in three years.
It was Brett Brown's job, like any head coach, to try to take those pieces and try to blend them together and make them work. No head coach is ever going to get a perfect blend of talent that seamlessly match. That's impossible and unrealistic. One could say that's not fair to Brett Brown, he didn't pick those players. Who said it was going to be fucking fair? That's the job. Spolestra, Pop, Carlisle, Coach K, Daly, Phil Jackson, none of those guys were assured of getting players who automatically fit.
You seem to want to criticize Hinkie for not doing Brett Brown's job too.
So it's fair to criticize Hinkie but the only example you are showing is a situation you say is not Hinkie and enacted by a front office when Hinkie was gone and in the areas of a responsibilities of a head coach, which was never Hinkies job.
The best argument you could make is Hinkie could have hired a better coach than Brett Brown, but you didn't start there. You started with holding Hinkie to account for things done years after he was kicked out of the franchise and for things not in his job description.
What is "awkward"? What is "creating a team"?
Let's cut to the chase here. Hinkie was railroaded by the NBA because he exposed how their internal market system is completely fucked up. The league had to change it's entire lottery structure because of Hinkie. OK, assuming the draft is run clean (it's not and I never will believe that, but for the sake of discussion, let's work with the idea that the draft lottery is not rigged), now more teams have more opportunity at franchise changing picks. Hinkie didn't just reload the 76ers, he forced change that BENEFITED EVERY OTHER TEAM IN THE LEAGUE FOREVER.
People can't have it both ways, they can't blame Hinkie for shit done four years later and not give him credit for helping every team in the lottery for as long as the game will be played.
Do you know the kind of onions it takes to be a fucking desk driver and stand up to a billion dollar industry and openly challenge it, prove it's system is fucked then force the system to change because you've embarrassed it so much in the span of three years. That's some of the biggest swag gangster shit anyone has seen in any sport in human history.
What is the league narrative? That this calculator nerd is to blame for shit years later made by a GM with no actual GM experience and for shit that wasn't even in his job description. But hey, he's not a people person because he wouldn't let agents prison rape his team for shit like Noah contracts, Deng contracts, Biyombo contracts and on and on and on. All the guy tried to do was be honest and upfront about what he was doing and did his best to help his team win. Yes, he's the devil incarnate for this. He's the next Rosemary's Baby for this.
Only the NBA could fuck up so badly that they need to turn a calculator nerd into a villain.
here's where i start to disagree with you a bit. Hinkie is the GM. He needs a sense of what they're trying to accomplish and why and build a team accordingly. The draft might not fall that way, but then you need to think about trades or modify the plan
Whitey Herzog for example used to say speed and defense never go in slumps. So he build teams priortizing that. Plenty of other examples, good pitching and 3 run homers was the O's mantra when they were good.
Same too for hoops. GS placed an emphasis on offense with a lot of movement, so too did the SPURs. Houston and Phoenix seven seconds or less. Sometimes it's about mental attributes, e.g., will you priortize smarts and toughness over vertical leap, height etc.
From everything I've seen Hinkie had no rhyme or reason to this. He simply thought the way to win was by assembling the best talent (almost considered in a vacuum) and throwing it together. That rarely works. Good teams need synergies. Just like food: getting the worlds best peanut butter, and worlds best pizza will not make a good dish if you combine them
Hinkie excelled at stockpiling. He did not excel at team-building and that is shown in the record and not blaming him for recent failures. Embid and Ben are two alphas who need the ball. On paper they should crush everyone yet....
the tricky part is figuring out what will work for a team. We're capped which roughly means the team with the most value from players wins. You could get that through the draft since they're capped. if they play better than rookie scale you benefit. You could get that from really elite players, e.g., Lebron is always worth more than whatever he's paid. But for most guys you're roughly getting what you pay for. SO how to succeed. Find system and strategies that work better at exploiting value. For example, perhaps outside shooting is overpriced but wing defenders who shoot poorly are under valued. If so maybe you want to build a team more around Defense. Or perhaps you think you get more value out of a lot of depth on the team with fewer big contracts even if more not cheap contracts. run for 48 minutes. resilience to injury (as opposed to a super star focused team where if the alpha goes down). the great teams seem to think about this and be a step ahead. then when everyone starts to copy that they're onto the next trick selling high and buying low. I don't think it's a coincidence you see dynasties in sports -- even though the rosters turn over again and again
the great teams make a great meal out of simple egg; the loser teams burn the steak
TripleThreat wrote:Chandler wrote:From everything I've seen Hinkie had no rhyme or reason to this. He simply thought the way to win was by assembling the best talent (almost considered in a vacuum) and throwing it together. That rarely works. Good teams need synergies. Just like food: getting the worlds best peanut butter, and worlds best pizza will not make a good dish if you combine themHinkie excelled at stockpiling. He did not excel at team-building and that is shown in the record and not blaming him for recent failures. Embid and Ben are two alphas who need the ball. On paper they should crush everyone yet....
So you are saying that Hinkie, or any NBA GM, trying to assemble the best/most talent as the pathway to winning - that it rarely works.
You are actually saying assembling the best talent towards the goal of winning NBA games rarely works.
What is this synergy noise?
It's not that complicated. Hinkie LOST games on purpose for three years. There was no "way to win" then and in that timeline. No one got to see what Hinkie could do to "team building" since he got ousted right before Ben Simmons was drafted. He was never given an opportunity to further refine the roster around the two franchise players he had.
ANY NBA GM would have picked Embiid and Simmons in their draft slot. What's so hard to understand. Embiid exists in an era where the traditional big has been devalued. It's because what traditional bigs is not the most efficient style of play. Ben Simmons refuses to shoot the ball past five feet from the rim. In an era of three point shooting, he can't and won't shoot them. His free throw shooting is also abysmal for his position. The Colangelos and Elton Brand fucked away all the resources Hinkie stockpiled.
When Hinkie was INTENTIONALLY LOSING, Philly won 19, 18, 10 and 28 games. When Simmons was drafted ( i.e. when the 76ers had enough talent to actually try to win), they won 52, 51 and 43 games (modified for COVID) including three straight playoff appearances and two of those went to the Conference Semi Finals. Even with the front office after him fucking it up again and again, the core he left behind was a young playoff team with two franchise players.
It's not hard to see why the 76ers are not contenders. Because of Hinkie? No, because Simmons refuses to shoot the fucking ball. Even when his coach begs him in public to do it, he won't do it. This creates all kinds of spacing problems where Embiid has to drift from the rim ( where he is the least effective but more than Simmons) or stay in the paint ( to his strength) but clogging the floor spacing and leaving the opponents rim protector there to further clog up Simmons, who again WON'T SHOOT THE BALL FURTHER THAN FIVE FEET FROM THE RIM. Then the Colangelos fucked up the Fultz draft/trade, then burned all of Hinkies asset stockpile to get Butler (without an assurance from Butler to resign later) and Harris, then decided to resign Harris to a max and give Horford big money. Locking in two players who only made the floor spacing issue and balance issue worse. So no, on paper, they should not crush everyone.
This guy converted a non playoff team with one pretty good player ( Holiday) and got TWO franchise players on rookie deals in three years, plus the largest asset warchest in modern NBA history plus the ability to offer two max contracts because of excellent cap management with a legacy that created a playoff team and you blame him for1) Assembling the best talent
2) Not winning when HE WAS TRYING TO LOSE ON PURPOSE. Let's try that again. You want to know why a guy PLANNING TO LOSE WON'T ACTUALLY WIN
3) Shit that happened up to four years AFTER Silver and his cronies forced him out
4) Being forced out before he could actually fine tune the talent he stockpiled
5) League trends that devalued Embiid
6) Simmons refusing to shoot the fucking ball
But here is where the rubber meets the road.How many teams would fucking kill to get two franchise players entering their prime in just three years time plus two open max slots plus a vast array of high value draft picks. There are Knicks diehards on this board who have been waiting for 20 years for what Hinkie pulled off in three.
What's your argument now? That other teams hated him? DIDN'T STOP THEM FROM TRADING WITH HIM DID THEY?
Hinkie was never allowed to finish what he started, so YES, YOU ARE BLAMING HIM FOR RECENT FAILURES. You are just parroting the league's media spin and narrative about Hinkie because it shines the light away from their broken ass system.
Assembling talent is super important and will lead to winning. But winning big and winning it all it's not enough. You can go back to the Lakers when they added Malone and Payton. You can look at last year: raptors were less talented than GS and wasn't even close.
you keep trying to make it sound like i'm faulting hinkie for getting high picks, stockpiling etc. I'm not. I'm not saying I would do it that way if i were supreme ruler but that's a debate for a different day. spoiler alert: i think the unwritten rule is fans are paying for you to compete. i also think you do that all the time -- ala Pat Riley
What i'm saying is it was very one-dimensional -- maybe in line with you Asperger innuendo.
Celts got two key guys (I wouldn't put Brown in the franchise category) and they are a better team with a brighter future and just smoked the Sixers and i am not surprised in the slightest. And i think Tatum and Brown will continue to get better, and Embid and Simmons will play ego games and risk injuries.
Indeed for all of Hinkies ability to stockpile i have a tough time thinking of any team other than the absolute shit shows (e.g., Knicks) who got less return on those assets. MCW, Nerlen, i'll give a pass on Jahill, untold other firsts. Elton has likewise mismanaged.
the process failed because it was incomplete. they got all of these great assets and picks and had no idea what they wanted to do with it. Both Hinkie and Brand
My guess is they try and move Simmons and like the Knicks did with KP will now be selling low.
Butler bolted because he knew they were not 100% about winning. they don't deal with adversity well. they're not doing the unglamorous things
Tanking sucks. Losing on purpose for years in PROFESSIONAL SPORTS SUCKS. What the fuck is the purpose of any sports franchise? To lose on purpose and put out a smelly pile of maggot covered dog shit on display year after year and call it a cute name like "The Process?" When the little asshole was trying to beat the shit out his other hardworking Okies in the gym or on the field, what would he have said to someone who told him, "Hey Hinkster, just lay down and let us win a few games, it will get you better players later on..."
To quote someone both wise and frighteningly ebullient quoting someone else: PLAY STUPID GAMES, WIN STUPID PRIZES. PLAY ... STUPID... GAMES.... WIN ... STUPID ... PRIZES...
So enjoy yourself Philly. Put up statues of Hinkie sticking Hotpockets in a microwave while mapping the future of sports via particle physics. You can put it right next to the Dr J monument. 10 win seasons so you could land in the same place the Knicks were in 2013.
Now you can set fire to it and start all over again.
Wow....That looks like it will go down as an all time playoff classic.
Incredible performance from Doncic. The guy is looking set to become legendary. Mavs so spoiled with drafted Euro talent (both traded for, ironically enough...and then KP)
Clips had some strong performances as well, but the drama of the game was insane.
Wild to see Burke looking so good now. Amazing he was in the D-League and we gave him away and now a key rotation player on a playoff team that is fighting hard against one of the potential favs to win it all.
Kwhai is averaging 30+ppg and it's not enough.
Lou Williams has been around forever.
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He and Knox going head to head in that department
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