the first 'issue' is not knowing what Jody Allen and the Vulcans want. Will they agree to substantial tax next season? And the answer to that may very well depend on how Portland does in the playoffs. Another 1st round exit may get a no-tax edict delivered to Portland's front office Portland will have 126M in guarantees for 10 players. If they use their 1st round pick to add a player, they'll be at 128M. Jake's cap-hold puts them at 130M, and that likely takes them out of the full-MLE, leaving them with the tax MLE. The cap-holds for Aminu, Hood, and Curry combine for about 23M the 2016 spending spree will really catch up to Portland this summer. And all it would take is one team looking at Jake the way Brooklyn looked at Crabbe to monkey-wrench the entire shit-show
A couple PHX comps come to mind. Dan Mejerle. Shawn Marion. No idea how the stats stack up, but Layman's game reminds me of both these dudes - but with a much prettier shot than Marion!
If you look at actual skillset, he is basically Paul George without the elite defense and less perfected ball handling skills. He can pretty much do all of the other things though. Jake seems to be a hard worker, so he can still get better. Crazy.
Yeah, we're fucked if Jody gives a no tax demand to Olshey. We'd either have to do what Denver did last year and give a team a 2020 1st to take on Leonard/Harkless or we'd have to do something big like trade CJ for lesser salary coming back from a team with cap space. I do believe (hope) that when they got under the tax line the previous 2 seasons at the deadline that they were doing so knowing that during the 2018-19 and 2019-20 seasons that the tax would for sure have to be paid. Getting Nurk on a decent contract made it much less than it could've been but hopefully if Jody is following Paul's wishes that she knew going in the tax was planned for.
I just realized that this poor version of PG I just talked about is similar to the man that Paul George took over for in Indiana: Danny Granger pre-injury.
Definitely. But, Jake still has room to grow on defense and dribbling and a nice work ethic. I'm guessing he never hits that lofty plateau, but there is nothing in the universe that says he CAN'T.
Even Granger created a lot on the iso. Jake's whole offensive repertoire (right now, anyway) is based on off-ball movement. I think Marion is an apt comparison. .
Based on his contributions over the past 15-20 games, I'd be more than happy to buy a celebratory case for Jake.
Mostly true. He has shown the ability though to create for himself after closeouts and such on the perimeter.
Hard to run a stat comp on a player who has only just cracked the rotation against a finished career, so I just ran their 3rd seasons against each other and this is what came out:
I think this is the wrong approach. With Jake, I think you be proactive with him & tell him you want him here long term. Try to get a verbal agreement before he officially hits RFA on $10M-$12M per year. I think that would go a long ways for him.
Yeah, I don't think they're ready to tack on a guaranteed $10 on top of what we have already. Seems like a lot.
Messed around on Shamsports a bit. If we: - let Aminu walk, - re-sign Jake for a 3yr, 30 mil deal, - re-sign Rodney for tax payer MLE, - sign our 1st round draft pick to rookie scale (#23 pick) - sign 2 minimum players - let Seth walk - let Skal walk We'd be at a tax payment of about 12 mil. It's not that bad.
Think of it as giving Aminu a $3M raise - and "Aminu" instantly becomes 2x better than he was. Money well spent, IMO.
