I think both Melo and Kanter are good players that can have roles on other teams BY THEMSELVES, and surrounded by better defenders. As much as I hated Melo I think in the right place he can contribute to a championship team in a limited role. Same with Kanter. Both will also win you games in the regular season against bad teams that cannot expose them defensively. On this team though, I see no combination of players that would have led to a better result. We could have made the second round, but nothing more, and that's not really an accomplishment considering Denver was missing Murray. Maybe if he played Nassir more the whole year and Nassir turned into a better player than he looks like at the moment. But no tinkering with lineups with RHJ, DJJ, and Giles would have made us a much better team overall. I'm fairly confident in that statement.
Also, I don't care if the guy is a dick if he's good at producing results. Olshey answers questions like he's Gregg Popovich, except without the 5 rings.
What this presser made me think; is that Olshey is not really a big picture guy. Every year he reacts to what happened the year before, instead of having a vision about the kind of team he wants to build.
I saw a huge pivot on CJ today. He has never grouped CJ in with the rest of the roster and he did today. He has always said that CJ was the second superstar with Dame that can win a championship he explicitly said we could use one of those today which means he no longer sees CJ as that. The other thing is he didn't talk CJ up for one second and he talked up Norm a lot. Yep, in the past he wouldn't include CJ but now I think he's open to a lot of things that he wasn't to save his own skin. If he'll throw out Stotts, he'll throw out McCollum.
I think it's meaningless he's an asshole, and a bad GM, but he's not an idiot. He knows CJ played like shit against Denver. And he knows CJ got booed off the floor Thursday night. So he also knew he couldn't come out and give CJ the same kind of cover he always does. He had to include CJ in the possible changes. He had no choice I don't believe for one second he intends to trade CJ. And if it comes down to a choice between Powell and CJ, which it very well could, he'll take CJ I predict Olshey will do what he's done before: that is give the new coach no alternative but to play CJ and Simons lots of minutes. And he'll re-sign Zach for too much money and make it hard for Zach not to get lots of minutes
Of course he did. Olshey put together the roster. It MUST be the coaches' fault. If I had to pick between firing Stotts and firing Olshey, I would have fired Olshey.
I actually disagree, somewhat. I think if he had the option of just keeping one, and he had to give up the other, it would be Powell. But factors like Powell's free agency and CJ's contract means he's going to be more than likely forced into keeping CJ. Like you said, he's not an idiot, he saw that Powell was better than CJ.
To this point, i think this has to do with roster construction and pairing with Dame more than anything. I believe Dame + Norman > Dame + CJ. But in a vacuum, CJ > Powell. And given their contract situations, the value CJ brings back > value Powell brings back.
Talking up Norm so much in this press conference was really really stupid if your last sentence is correct. If he wasn't ready to move on CJ and keep Norm then I think he would have said nothing about Norm. Instead Norm was talked about in the press conference more than anyone else... I seriously think that Olshey brought up Norm on his own more times than he brought up Stotts or Dame and he didn't bring up any other person on his own besides Jody Allen and Bert Kolde.
Olshey never tires of self-marketing. Just keep telling everyone how great you are and enough people will believe it. (Not mentioning any names....)
If keeping CJ means losing Norm and the best we can get for CJ is Tobias Harris while adding a pick... Norm and Harris is so much better than just CJ that I think even Neil's cocky ass knows he'd have to do it or something like it.
I don't disagree with that. But I also don't think the talent discrepancy in a vacuum is that much in favor of CJ. Maybe just a bit. There are plenty of teams that would rather have Powell than CJ even if both were being paid 30M per year. Part of me wants to believe a new coach that holds CJ accountable for dribbling 18 seconds of the shot clock away will actually be able to turn him into a better player. It's wishful thinking, but there is no other positive thoughts I could have about CJ. We are more than likely stuck with him, so I'm hoping for the best...
That's fair. But I think if you gave any of the eastern championship contenders the option of a 30M bench shooter, they'd take the one with the better defense.
Having a vision is fine and dandy but this isn't a video game where you can trade for anyone and sign whatever free agent you want.
• Mike D'Antoni won't be the Coach • He used to say best Backcourt in the league, not today, but even if he wants to trade CJ, i dont think teams are interested in him. His options are very limited • to me doesn't seem like he wants to make a big move and he hopes a new coach will fix everything, well we need a big imo
I thought he said Plus he will have a built in excuse for the team's failures: The coach (not the roster).
