2016-2017 NBA Season Thread [ARCHIVED] Basketball • Page 120

brogdon is filling that role well, hope he plays his way into keeping solid minutes when middleton gets healthy

 

Big game vs Utah at home.

 

I feel like there are some Bucks fans on here. Interested to hear how you feel about Delly? Cleveland misses him badly as our back-up PG situation is a joke and his hustle and grit are hard to replace. I haven't seen him play yet for MIL but have checked his stats quite often. Looking forward to seeing him play Tues vs Cle.

Delly is a great (bench) piece to a winning team, but I'm not sure he's a great fit to be a starting PG for a mediocre team.

 

I love Delly as a backup. He's an effective player. Like any role player he is going to be more effective on a contender. That said, I wouldn't say Cleveland is missing him badly. Yes, they are doing it by committee, but it hasn't really been an issue yet. I think Cleveland is buying time until the December and February deadlines to determine which way they want to go. And as shaky as the backup PG is, their wing depth is a bigger issue for me, considering the lack of production from RJ and Dunleavy.

 

DeMarcus cousins has attempted 71 threes this season and made 40.8% of them, dear god

 

I keep hearing hes really out of shape, like is he? Idk

 

As a die-hard Clevelander who watches every dribble, I don't think I'm overstating it by saying we miss him badly. Our back-up PG situation is a mess, and you're right that it's not a big deal right now, but come playoff time, it'll be an issue. Yes, the playoffs don't start until April, but the sooner we get someone in here to gel and learn how to play with the guys, the better. I don't want to wait until mid-February to force someone in here a few weeks before playoffs. Especially the point guard position.

Currently, they've been using Shump, McCrae and (gulp) Liggins as their back-up PG and Liggins and McCrae are completely lost out there, which I don't blame them because they are D-Leaguers who are not prepared to help a championship team. I don't care for Shump either, as a back-up PG or a role wing player. With as fragile as Kyrie is, getting a back up PG sooner rather than later would be very beneficial.

As far as RJ, not sure if you remember, but RJ was pretty bad in the regular season last year too, but turned it up a ton during playoffs. He was like a different player. I could see him just kind of mailing it in throughout the regular season because a) his age and B) he's not really needed for more than 5-10 half ass minutes per game. I never really expected Dunleavy to be a prime role player on this team.

 

Looks like the Dante Exum era is officially dead in Utah.

 

Nah, they're just trying to showcase Mack for a trade. They have too many guards now and burks is returning soon.

 

I don't think anyone who watches these games would say our backup PG position is settled. I just think there are multiple reasons why they have not done anything yet. I think LeBron taking a lot of those minutes in lineups where Kyrie and Love are out is a factor. And then trying to get other guys some minutes is the other basketball reason.

From a pure basketball standpoint, I am with you, but you know it's not that simple. There is the cap, but also the players available and the ammunition we have to execute a move. We are a cap team, so we by default have to overpay a free agent in tax dollars while paying them the minimum (depending on NBA years of service). The guys out there now willing to take the minimum probably don't justify the luxury tax dollars the move would cost us. Chalmers and Cole, the most obvious names are either rehabbing or in China, thus not available till February or March. Dec 15th (or there about) teams can trade free agents signed this past summer. That could add new names to the mix. What can we trade besides Shumpert or Cedi Ossman? And is backup PG what you use those assets on now? Shumpert is restoring his value and Ossman is sort an upside unknown. We have to keep our pick this coming draft, but can trade our 2020 first rounder. Again, probably not the best use of that asset at this time.

The next big deadlines for us are the trade deadline to absorb a contract with our $9Mish TPE, for say a guy like Augustin in Orlando. The other deadline I think is in March for veteran buyouts. That is really the most likely option for us, all things considered. That's how Miami got Joe Johnson last year. This potentially could net us someone like Derron Williams if he wants to leave his hometown team and compete. Maybe some other names surface too, but that is the sort of guy you are looking at.

That's Cleveland's reality and you are aware of that I'm sure. We used a lot of assets and jumped through a lot of cap loopholes to get the team we have. We are stretched thin and the increasing cap reduced the value of our TPE. It's not as easy as we need to make a trade let's get someone on the horn, and Sam Hinkie if we need to make money work. Is it ideal to wait on the PG issue? Not at all. But it beats using the remaining few trade assets we have for a backup that likely won't be a long-term piece.

 

You might be right, but it still seems like a pretty bad move to be sitting him. Seems like a pretty quick way to kill the confidence of a guy who was really just starting to be consistently more aggressive like the team wants him to be.

 

I agree with everything you said. Which is why Delly is badly missed because we have no real other options. The trade exceptions are our only real hope of making a somewhat OK deal. I think Gilbert messed up by not matching Delly's deal, which after seeing all the deals made this summer, Delly's contract doesn't appear to be as big/bad as initially thought. Gilbert was stubborn with the Felder pick. Paid $2-mil plus to draft him and he's obviously not ready/able to contribute. Gilbert was live on the Fox Sports broadcast on Friday and was gushing over Felder and kept making comments about Lue not playing him. I think he thought Felder could just come in and take over Delly's role. I bet in hindsight, Cavs regret not matching Delly's contract. I know they would have paid more in luxury, but now we have a gaping hole, imo.

 

Idk, I just read what their beat writer said lindsey said. I mean you have to ease a guy in a little after experiencing a season ending injury, I'm sure once that's settled he'll get more minutes and what not. He got a good amount the last week or so but he wasn't putting up star numbers or anything, its still his second year. I dont think its fair to assume he lacks confidence, if sitting for longer kills your ability to play that much than youre already a bust.

 

I agree with you about Felder. The luxury tax implications probably made that move not the most attractive one out there, given the production. I would have liked it more if there was a wing player they felt good about developing in the D-League. I understand buying some young legs, but there are not many players at his size that make it, let alone in the second round. The Isiah Thomas comps are just not fair for him. I wish we had the 2-way contracts so we could just let him get his down in Canton, but we outright gave him the 3-year rookie deal! Not even the typical second round partially guaranteed deal that you see offered.

And I agree there is an argument to be made about Delly and retaining him. However, he simply got two offers the first day that were beyond what our max was. We just tipped our caps and tried to make the most of it with the TPE. The real kicker for us is that we could have re-upped Delly for around half per year what he has in Milwaukee if we didn't go the one-year qualifying offer route like we did and just extended him. We gambled in an effort to save on luxury tax dollars via long-term commitments. I don't get too mad about it bc Delly is getting more money and a bigger role than he ever would have gotten here. There is some goodwill in not holding him hostage so to speak. We developed him and he got too effective in the right free agent year. Good for him. I think we are still trying to cut costs where we can (not all that dissimilar to the Heat or any luxury team) and may have a chance to avoid the repeater tax if things go right. That's probably the biggest thing to watch with Shump and his performance is whether he's worth it. I think he is. We aren't due for the repeater luxury tax rate, but it's looming. No team has gone through with it yet and I'm curious how we handle it. I think you are already seeing our front office draw a line at some point where they decided they can't pay everyone. They shelled out contracts to LBJ a couple times, extended Kyrie and Love, re-upped JR a few times, and paid Shump. That's a lot of money and I think Griffen is just trying to cut where he can. I am sure we are keeping tabs on the PG market. I do expect someone to come in at some point.

 

I'm not positive some Wolves fans deserve a good team tbh

 

Did you happen to see Gilbert on Friday's broadcast with Fred and Austin? For starters, he was drunk. He stayed on the entire second half and Fred and Austin kept trying to get rid of him. Half the time, he was playing a game called "second round draft pick or former US President?" It was kind of funny, but Twitter was having a field day with how weird/drunk Gilbert was. He also kept erroneously saying the Cavs were only (insert # here) away from NBA record for threes in a game.

Anyway, he was seriously going on and on about Felder, asking why he doesn't play to Fred and Austin (this was when we were up 40 vs Dallas) and he kept making comments like "isn't this a big enough lead for Felder" and then when Felder did get in the game, Gilbert had the audacity to say that he will be better than Isiah Thomas. It came quite clear to me that Felder was definitely a Gilbert pick/decision.

 

I did see that piece during the game. To be fair it was a big blowout so I thought it was pretty funny and broke up our very home leaning broadcast (Austin can really get bad imo). $2.5M for a sub 6-ft guard from a Detroit area school? That always screamed Gilbert to me. I thought it passed the time fine for me and I was surprised at the random drops of history Dan would sneak in. That man has put a lot of money into Cleveland. If he wants on a broadcast during a blowout to talk out of his ass about Felder and McCrae, I will give him that latitude.

 

Oh don't get me wrong, I thought it was hilarious. There was one moment where they came back from break and Fred and Austin were talking for about 30 seconds - leading people to believe Dan was gone and then Dan just said "By the way, I'm still here." I lost it. His commentary was much more entertaining then the game.

 

Haha yeah that was funny too. I thought the cast of characters and the situation that it was a unique broadcast.

 

Good luck to all of the Bucks fans in here. I know there is a group of you all. I fully expect Giannis to do his thing. Hopefully we can see him and LeBron go back and forth. Cleveland is playing good defense at times, but with the offensive pace/execution, it's been hard to maintain good defense for long stretches.

 

God Mike Felger is fucking worthless. Taking shots at a man for missing ONE basketball game to see the birth of his daughter? Fuck you.

 

Looked him up and he seems like a POS

 

"A generic child birth" might be one of the dumbest things I've ever heard.