This is what is called a roster tank. They know what they are doing. Not getting this team a starting caliber center, while knowing the defensive inefficiencies of the roster, is calculated.
They are trying to limit the ceiling of this team so that they can maybe be in play in convo but still be able to pivot and be in the lottery.
I am pretty concerned about our defense, it could be worse than last year. BUT our offense should be improved even with having essentially 0 centers that are reliable with the ball in the paint.
Again, I feel it is all by design. Maybe they had a trade lined up for a big and it fell through. Reminder, this upcoming draft is being touted as generational, we will see how that develops.
If Lamelo stays healthy, I think we will have no choice but to go for play in or above because he will elevate us to that level over the course of a season despite everything I said above.
That 13th pick for “guaranteed worse pick (number)” while trading Mark twice inside a year (before he even wraps his rookie scale contract) has to be in contention for all-time worst Hornets/Bobcats draft decision making. Add that we cut NSJ and surely it will not be easy to knock off the podium. Kind of strange how little the league has put and kept us on blast for that - maybe with no NSJ now, they will turn the eye of Sauron on us. … if NOP can take the heat they are for this year’s draft, we deserve some of that too.
I wouldn’t say that. I think they definitely want to start playing winning basketball now, as evidence by so many veterans, especially ones that can shoot. I just see it as they’re collecting pieces knowing that they’re still going to have make a trade, but are giving themselves flexibility to go in different directions. I think assuming we stay healthy, we’ll make a couple of trades by the deadline that sure up deficiencies. If our rookies pan out, we have a lot of usable pieces– veterans and youth– to potentially trade now.
You just defined a strategic roster tank scenario where they can choose to go and get assets to be better this season or play it by ear and then ultimately go status quo which could result in lottery pick. Just sayin
Fair, but I don’t see it as intentionally limiting the potential for the team. Rather, I see it as not overspending on pieces just yet. To me there’s a difference.
Ok I do agree with you there. Better way to label it than roster tank. I do think they are stockpiling assets and looking to pounce at the right opportunity to use some of them.
I would rather see them do this than go all in with something that was too much of a quick fix that ultimately hurts us long term. I mean due to injuries we really don’t actually know what we have.
I would bet that if the team over performs through a couple of months then maybe we would look to upgrade at center. I am pretty excited about our offense, should be our best in a long while.
Dude I cannot express enough how good and underrated he was, he was on a 2 million dollar contract, if you needed him to score 15 points he would do it in less than 20 minutes on 50% fg percentage (ATLEAST) I wish we played him more
