Using TPE's to build a key piece of your team is a "dream on" kind of move. Likely, NOT to happen. Not many players have so little value that their team will give them away for "free/TPE". However, we did find Harkless and Napier similarly cheap. I don't expect any deal. It would cost more money (tax) and we'd be forced to cut a player under contract. But, we can dream!
It's yet another mis-managed asset. Neil kept it too long and its value diminished. Nothing new here.
I don't think that's necessarily the case. I do think that NO oversold it as an asset prior to the draft. It's the kind of asset that's only of value when you can make a deal with the right team in the right set of circumstances. As I understood him, Olshey intended to try to package the 24th pick in this year's draft with the TPE to bring back a veteran player instead of drafting another rookie. You need a trade partner that is looking to cut salary and doesn't mind moving an experienced player for a chance at a late first round draft pick. The Blazers couldn't find a team willing to make that trade so they drafted Simons. Once the draft was done, I think any realistic shot at using the TPE went out the window. Short of using it to take on somebody else's bad contract, the only way both teams come out with something they want is if you can find some sort of multi-player deal where the TPE becomes one element of a couple of trades. Those are pretty tough to engineer.
Agreed. It's better to let a TPE expire then to misuse it on a bad contract (ET the sequel) just to do something.
Neil had the TPE for 11 months before the draft. He is going to get nothing out of Allen Crabbe. He is going to get nothing out of paying Andrew Nicholson nearly 20 million to stay away from the team. Why don't you call it what it is? It's horrible management of the cap and PA's money.
I'd rather call it unrealistic expectations on your part. Teams let players go for all kinds of reasons without getting significant compensation for them. Olshey (Paul Allen) was willing to pay one year of Crabbe's contract to see if he was ready to step up and fulfill some of the promise he'd shown the previous year. He wasn't, so he dumped him back to the Nets and Nicholson was the cost of that one year looksee. TPEs are hardly ever used. That's reality.
20 million for a "one year looksee." Not to mention the 2.8 mil opportunity cost hit on the cap for 7 years and the luxury tax implications. Should be grounds for a firing even if you look at this instance in just a vacuum. What leverage does Neil have on Paul to keep his job still?
Maybe the leverage of simply having done what he and Paul agreed to do? What would his leverage have been to keep his job if he'd let Crabbe walk despite PA's objections (let's assume that was the case) and then Crabbe blows up in his first year with the Nets?
Again all i'm reading are excuses. Predicting whether or not Crabbe can blow up--- that's his job! Along with determining the right roster to build, and the right players to pick in the draft, etc etc. He clearly misjudged that asset too. I don't know what's more annoying. Neil messing this up, or people coming to his defense. I get the Collins loving crowd or the people supporting CJ being untradeable -- those are all defensible to some extent. This, I don't get how even the staunchest Neil supporter can spin as a positive.
Maybe it's the heat, maybe it's the NBA doldrums, but people on this board are sure prickly these days. You're the one insisting that everything be put in a negative light so that you can justify throwing more wood on the fire around the pole that you're tying Olshey to. I am not trying to defend Olshey, I'm simply stating what I think is the case regarding the TPE. I think that NO and Paul Allen were impressed with the season that Crabbe had prior his RFA summer. I also think it's Paul Allen's standard mode of operations not to get outbid for an RFA. It turns out it was a bad decision to match the Nets' contract. Crabbe didn't play any better the year after the Blazers matched and so the decision was made to dump him. There are good and bad decisions made by every GM. Until the bad decisions start to annoy Paul Allen, who gives a rats ass how many people on this board are intent upon him being fired? Our opinions don't matter. Do you really not have that figured out by now?
I'm not giving up! Ha ha, just kidding, I'm sitting here crying right now. Layman and Swanigan for Thon Maker and Tony Snell (using the TPE) Blazers get a more athletic big man to pair with Collins in the 2nd unit and a wing who shot +40% on 3-pointers the last two seasons. Bucks clear over $10 million in salary this season and the 3 years left on Snell's deal. Dame/Baldwin/Turner CJ/Curry/Trent/Simons Harkless/Snell/Stauskas Aminu/Collins Nurk/Maker/Leonard
Sure why not. I'll do that I have a hot take: Thon is a better prospect than Zach. Both #10 picks in consecutive drafts.
It occurs to me that the number of things that don't work out the way Olshey has anticipated are staggering: Free Agency and team play and LaMarcus and trades materializing and ET's integration and [insert grievance] and now (probably) a good use for the AC TPE. I say this not to beat the proverbial dead horse. We are usually arguing about how he's failed or succeeded or whatnot, but maybe we're all right. Maybe his intentions all along are to do what he says. And yet, his expectations of the market, say, are just off. Maybe he isn't gaslighting everyone around him, but infecting them with this super-optimism that has no realistic chance of materializing. That being said, I'm sure we can all agree, he shouldn't use it just to use it.
Considering Maker's 2nd year wasn't really better than Zach's rookie year, I'd have to respectfully disagree with that hot take. Both have a similar ceiling if they achieve it though. I think they'd form a pretty solid tandem on the front line.
