2018 NBA OFFSEASON

the kawhi mouthpieces in the media have been as blatant as anything i can remember

this deal seems to be a carbon copy of the PG trade where the raptors basically figure if kawhi walks they at worst are getting off the derozan contract... we’ll see if that thinking burns them the way it did OKC and oladipo (tho i guess OKC wouldn’t trade PG for oladipo so they’d prob disagree)

pretty interesting the spurs opted for this route. i think they’ll be pretty good and derozan will be placed in the best possible context there. don’t have much of an opinion about poertl. maybe it was the best offer out there.

i guess we don’t know what we’re getting out of kawhi but lowry-green-kawhi-OG-serge crunch time 5... not touching boston still but could easily be put no. 2 in the east over the sixers

kawhi cant risk missing any more games "injured" without seriously torpedoing his value

if he just wants to go to LA it still prob won’t matter. i don’t think the clippers are in a position to turn down kawhi cuz he sat out 2 years being a baby.

spurs def went short term with this one pop doesnt want to spend his twilight years in a rebuild but they prob cldve been in a long term higher upside situation if they took draft picks from the celtics or whoever, pretty great trade for toronto they got out from under that derozen contract that was taking them absolutely nowhere, now theyve got kawhi for a year a shot at retaining him for longer and if he leaves they can start their rebuild

apparently the clippers thing was bs and kawhi still wants to go to the lakers, lebron will be 35 by the end of the 2019-20 season btw

would have liked to see OG anunoby and danny getting shipped out is a bummer. altho i think danny can have a little bit of a resurgence in TO since he'll have some spacing

BUT demar is still v productive. it's a weird fit right now, but if he can improve his 3pt shooting to at least league average it wont be a total log jam in the midrange for lamarcus.

poeltl is v v v good and getting better. if you like advanced state, he had a 122 ORtg and a 104 DRtg, and almost 6 WS for a guy who played like not even 20 MPG.

congrats to the best player in the eastern conference, kawhi leonard

i’m so dead lol, bro threw a tantrum (basically) to go to LA...they finna send him to a whole other country

— Zay 🌹🤘🏽 (@ZayGxld) July 18, 2018

its funny how no nba players want to play in toronto which is a legitimately huge city thats easily better than like 75% of nba cities

yeah for real. it def adds an extra layer of annoyance to your life traveling in and out of canada so often and im sure for taxes and stuff but they all have ppl taking care of that anyway. it’s prob one of the top 5 NBA cities honestly tho i guess it’s super cold during the season.

It’s gonna cost Kawhi about 5% of his income in taxes to go from home games in Texas to home games in Toronto.

torontos like as cold as boston fwiw, slightly colder than ny

feel like any analysis of this trade should factor in how mad kawhi will be this year as a plus

idk will def be curious to see where his head is at

man I love this move by toronto

I love it for the Spurs

it's good for the spurs if kawhi had truly given up on the team. don't love it for Toronto, feel like they need to win the east now to justify it

no I think they realized they’re at a crossroads and need to shake things up. someone other than lebron is going to win the east for the first time in 9 years — they just traded for the best player in the east (assuming giannis doesn’t have an MVP season I guess) and gave themselves a legit shot at making the finals, regardless of what happens next summer. if he decides to stay, awesome. if he decides to leave, the process of blowing it up becomes a lot easier because now you’re out of derozan’s contract

actually I forgot avout the part where they're getting rid of the DeRozan contract, I like it for them because of that

tbh I would bet on giannis being the best player in the east

toronto doing this while keeping anunoby and siakam is pretty nice

Yeah Kawhi can't afford another lost season so I think that he'll give his 100% this year to be a Laker next season, if things go south for the Raptors, they do have a decent trade asset.

I'm going to miss DeRozan, he is huge part why I went from casually following basketball to being a fan and I'm wishing him the best at SA.

gimme some raptor news

maybe we’re in for a kawhi vengeance tour? I dunno I worry that he might just be broken

Pop gonna have to rewind the clock to the pre 3 pointer discovery era I guess

Or maybe demar x the god chip engellund = magic I dunno

I wonder if Kawhi will hold good on his threat of sitting out the year if he's not a Laker. Would be hilariously dumb so I kinda want to see it happen.

Good for Toronto tho they had to break up that core it just had a hex on it courtesy of bron and now they have a shot plus kept most of their best young dudes

I wonder if Kawhi will hold good on his threat of sitting out the year if he's not a Laker. Would be hilariously dumb so I kinda want to see it happen.

― EZ Snappin, Wednesday, July 18, 2018 11:44 AM (three minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

wld be amazing for toronto the league and in fact all of humanity

sad to see the spurs "dynasty" cut short like this but maybe they can pull another MVP level player out of their ass who knows

true it has only lasted [checks records] my entire adult life

ive just watched 5 minutes of jakob poeltl highlights and im now going to say the spurs won this deal.

poll: if kawhi's career goes full grant hill, is he a HOFer?

naw needs a few more years of allstar level production

poeltl is no domantas (I actually think he'll be good, I was just mad when the raps took him over domantas)

poeltl is... ok, already 22, might not have a spot in playoff rotations, weird name pronounced with an r even thos its spelled poeltl

poeltl reminds me of a prototypical spurs center (oberto, splitter) only way more mobile and vertical. guy who will do a ton of screen and roll action and catch lobs/entry passes to get some high percentage shots, and he can anchor the defense. gasol's defensive numbers have been good but he's a liability on switches bc he's so slow.

I think the spurs without an MVP probably end up being a current pacers or jazz type team who always outperform expectations of the roster but still struggle to crack 50 wins

idk about poeltl being a defensive anchor he seems p soft from what ive seen

i think poeltl will have a much better role on the spurs than he did competing for playing time with valanciunas

in the context of "the spurs" he will prob be overall "solid"

his advanced stats are rly strong and didn't get as much playing time. his age 22 stats look a lot like clint capela's and steven adams'.
https://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/pcm_finder.fcgi?request=1&sum=0&player_id1_hint=Jakob+Poeltl&player_id1_select=Jakob+Poeltl&y1=2018&player_id1=poeltja01&idx=players&player_id2_hint=Steven+Adams&player_id2_select=Steven+Adams&y2=2016&player_id2=adamsst01&idx=players&player_id3_hint=Clint+Capela&player_id3_select=Clint+Capela&y3=2017&player_id3=capelca01&idx=players

yeah idk capelas upward trajectory has been about as steep as possible and adams is just a beast physically

those are good points, altho (a) the capela season i highlighted above was 16-17 and those numbers were not that far off from his next season's improvement and (b) adams has 25 pounds on poeltl, but same height.

kinda wild that 'getting off the contract' of a current all-nba player (who is healthy) is considered a resounding success. that level of player doesn't grow on trees. and his contract isnt that bad at 27m per year. i think both teams did well honestly.

the spurs losing danny green, slo mo and kawhi is going to really kil their defensive versatility. pop is gonna have to come up with a new identity for this team yet again.

I trust the Popcess

Pop will be an excellent coach right up to the day he packs it in and starts a winery. I, too, trust his ability to wring whatever wins can be wrung from his roster next season.

spurs will be worse defensively for sure, although getting murray more minutes in place of defensive negatives like parker and mills should mitigate that a little. but the spurs offense sucked last year. demar should help a lot in that regard, and if he's used more as a slasher and kickout guy as opposed to a midrange jump shooter, it should open things up for 3 point shooting.

Both Derozan and Aldridge made moves to improve in 3pt land last season too and they will only continue I reckon this season. Interested to see how much Pop gets out of Demar defensively.