Originally Posted by
Jabberwalker
I had a busy week and haven't gotten a chance to give my two cents on the Asik trade. Sorry to interrupt the Pistons comparison discussion.
I think the trade is bad. Maybe not awful. Maybe not as bleak as some trades that have happened but it is bad. What's so funny is that I like Omer. HE could be awesome on a lot of teams. He has a great niche. He is one of the best defensive bigs in the game. Yet he is totally the wrong player for us. I have been critical of many of Dell's moves at first but then they end up growing on me. This one however hasn't gotten any better since it was reported. To me there are several issues with the trade:
1- It handcuffs us financially and puts us in a terrible position to trade with no leverage.
2- It's not a good fit.
3- It fills the lesser of two needs.
4- It shows either inconsistent ideology or a complete change in it which makes me question how much of a plan Dell has.
5- It adds more chaos to the program and hurts chemistry.
1 - As Macnamara pointed out, we have to dump salary for the trade to go through. There is a possibility there is one that has been agreed to that isn't public yet. If that's the case, this point is moot, until we see that though, I have to assume that we are now in a situation where we HAVE to trade a player and the other team has all the leverage. Other teams can demand more from us because we are in a position of HAVING to give up the player. Gordon probably isn't going to be traded unfortunately. So tht leaves Rivers or Ryno. I don't think either of their trade value is where most people on here think. Even if we trade Ryno, I'm not sure we get anything of serious quality back. Everyone says he's on a good contract. I think he is on a fair contract and I feel like any sane GM would see it the same way. I love Ryno. He is one of my favorite players on this team and I don't want to see him traded at all but that might have to be the move and if it is then we just traded Ryno and a pick for whatever we get back and one year of Omer Asik and the inability to fill any other needs.
2- Monty said that the Center they go out and get couldn't be an offensive nonentity like Steamer was. Have you guys seen Omer's shooting chart? He can ONLY score on tip ins and dunks. He is as bad or worse than Kendrick Perkins offensively. He shot under 30% at over 3 feet away from the rim. He was averaging over 20 minutes per game when he began whining about not getting enough minutes. How many minutes should we give him? How many minutes should we be giving Tyreke? These two won't play well next to each other. Omer is a worse offensive player than Aminu or Steimsma. Do you think Monty will suddenly figure out spacing and play Omer and Reke seperately? He'll play them at the same time and whatever lumbering guy who apparently was too big for AD to guard can now stand firmly in the paint when Reke drives.
3- Unless Dell pulls a rabbit out of his hat and dumps Gordon for nothing we just lost out at acquiring any decent SF. You know what the craziest part of that is? We now can't play our five best players at the same time. Jrue, Reke, Some Scrubb, Davis, and either Omer or Ryno will be on the floor. Small Forward was the position of need. We needed a stopgap center who could rebound. We needed Reggie Evans. We instead dedicated ourselves so completely to the need at center that we may have to trade away good players just to try and have marginal small forwards.
4- This is concerning. AFTER we got the number one pick and knew we'd be getting AD guess who the first player Dell grabbed to build around him? Ryno. The young vet stretch four. On a reasonable contract for a long time. You know what that move says? Either Dell just wanted what he thought was an asset, even if it meant nothing to your new pick, which is concerning since you just got your franchise cornerstone, or he was trying to begin building around AD and thought AD was a center. Did Dell change his mind? All of us here were looking at players who won't be getting huge contracts, we were looking at players like Okafor and Blatche, because we had our two starting bigs. We had the two game changers. Omer does a lot more than any of the guys we thought defensively, but its complete overkill when all those resources are put into it. We very well may have to trade Ryno, moving AD to full time PF. If that was the play, then why did we have Ryno in the first place? Why didn't we roll with AD at PF to begin with? Why confuse things with that? Or did Dell change his mind? Is now, three years into AD's career, the time to start changing your mind about how to build around him after signing long term contract after long term contract? Like I said before, Reke and Omer are an awful pair. Why give Reke that huge deal if you're going to go get a lane clogging center who demands to be a starter or he'll sit and pout? You can't hope to change your ideology half way through your best player's contract and hope it turns out for the best. Was Dell unready for the player AD is? If so why?
5- We were excited to hear that Monty had only instilled a small percentage of his playbook. His offensive creativity is astounding and it makes us all excited to see what it's potential is once he gets the whole thing down. But now we know that there will be a guy who can't shoot playing most likely 30 minutes a game. That changes a lot. Everyone thought we'd run, and with the few games the core 4 had together, they did. What now? We just watched the Spurs win a championship based off of chemistry more than talent. Seriously. Go down the Spurs roster and assign a number to each player based off of their overall skill as a basketball player. It's probably not even as high as you'd give the Pels right now. Yet they won the championship. You know why? Because they know their system. They know each other. They aren't improvising. They play as a team because they know it will help them win. When you change things every year you don't get that stability, you don't get that chemistry. Our guys barely got to play together this year. This upcoming year things will be different because we're now playing a lumbering center where we used to play mobile guys who could shoot (hell, Steamer can kind of shoot throughout his career). Now we change things completely. As an overreaction to the disappointment Steamer brought on Dell has traded our hope of fixing the hole in small forward with a player who will change how we play offense. And now after we likely lose him next year to free agency, what will we have to show for it? The West is again going to be incredible. The Nuggets just got better. Dallas just got better. The Suns have a year of chemistry. If we're healthy we might compete with that group. Maybe if injuries hit a couple other teams we can compete for the 9th spot. I hope, but doubt we are good enough for 8th in the west. So then Asik walks at the end of the year, we lost Anderson/Rivers, and what do we have to show for it. We need one healthy year of chemistry before we can challenge for a playoff spot in my opinion. Even when healthy this last season we didn't play great. We had times when we showed we could. The players and coach need time to figure each other and themselves out. We have a real lack of BBall IQ. That needs to change through playing as a team instead of self. Nothing about this move makes that better. Nothing about this move will be a net positive long term. We want Asik to play 20 minutes a game. He'll want more. Monty will probably play him over 30 and we'll get upset because he'll play him as much as AD or Ryno. To me the move all along was to go after Okafor, Dalembert, Blatche, Hill. I know all those guys have flaws but you also don't have to give up pieces, you could retain chemistry, get a three and D SF, and maintain your current trajectory to the top of the WC in a couple years.
I've been trying to find the silver lining here. Like I said, I like Asik. I like what he CAN be. But I think he is a poor choice for this team for that price.
Contributor 
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
