I'll have him start. Harkless at the 3 and Zbo at the 4. Then Aminu can be the speciality player he naturally is that excels in defense who can hit the occasional, respectable corner 3. Instead he won't have to do too much that he annoying shit he tries to do now. This of course would be a 1 year or 2 year situation because Zbo is getting older, although still VERY useful. While in the meantime vonleh is groomed to take over the 4 spot since everybody is so high on him. That way his development isn't rushed while at the same time Zbo is keeping us in the hunt for the now..
Honestly, how about dodging two MAX bullets last offseason? Monroe and Kanter have proven themselves ineffectual to winning basketball games. Maybe a max salary 3rd tier player isn't the solution.
I think the one obvious move would be to trade Aminu for a 1st round pick. Clears up capspace and we could look to draft Denzel Valentine, Taurean Prince, or even that Thon Maker kid if he's eligible. Then we'd have, by my estimations $40M (counting Harkless and Crabbes holds) to pursue one or two of the following SG Gerald Henderson SG/SF DeMar Derozen SF/SG Nic Batum SF Chandler Parsons SF Luol Deng PF/C Pau Gasol PF/C Jared Sullinger C/PF AL Horford C Ian Mahinmi I think that we could buuild a top 3 bench in the league, while keeping the guys that are growing the most: Heres 3 examples: Chandler Parsons ($15M) Luol Deng ($10M) Jared Sullinger ($14M) Lillard (35) McCollum (35) / Crabbe (26) Parsons (26) / Deng (20) Harkless (24) / Sullinger (22) / Vonleh (8) Plumlee (20) / Davis (22) / --------------------------------------------- 2.) Batum ($18M) Gasol ($15M) Henderson ($8M) Lillard (35) McCollum (35) / Henderson (24) Batum (28) / Crabbe (22) Harkless (24) / Davis (22) Gasol (32) / Plumlee (18) --------------------------------------- 3.) Derozen ($20M) Horford ($20M) Lillard (35) McCollum (35) / Crabbe (22) Derozen (34) / (Harkless) Harkless (25) / Davis (22) / Vonleh (15) Horford (32) / Plumlee (20) All of those teams would be for sure 50+ win teams. Any combination of those guys taking up the $40M would make us a 50 win team. If we strike out, we can look elsewhere or sign Evan Turner as an Aminu replacement and bring back everyone. In essence we gotta shoot for the moon in free agency, because even if we miss then we'll land amongst the stars (By keeping this bunch together). It's a no lose situation.
They've just proven that you gotta have defensive bigs. Offense is more important for guards, defense is more important for bigs. Swingmen should be able to do both.
Do we have a first round?( forgive my novice fandom ) we should grab a Center cause Meyers ain't worth anywhere near max.
Z-Bo would be a great bench addition. If we can at a decent price and that domestic violence incident clears up.
I remember Michael Eisner in an interview talking about being president of Paramount in the late 70's and early 80's. He said, not quoting him directly but paraphrasing, "What you should realize is that we had no money. So what I did was create a businees model where I hired hungry talented people, directors From TV, actors nobody knows about. And you keep the whole thing going as long as you can.... and then you blow it up! And start it all over again." Funny that Neil Olshey is a former actor.... he kind of operates the same way. He's limited in the amount of methods he can acquire players. So he spends takes chance on underappreciated talent using late round draft picks. And he keeps the whole group together as long as possible.... and then he blows it up! Quite effective really. So I don't sweat not having the occasional draft picks.
