The Charlotte Bobcats are currently 9th in the Eastern Conference standings. And since only eight teams make the playoffs, this means the Bobcats are currently scheduled for a date with some lottery balls in May.
Although the Bobcats would not be in the playoffs if the season ended today, the team is fairly close. The Bobcats are currently only one game out of the 8th spot. Given how close this team is to a playoff appearance, one might expect the Bobcats to be doing everything in their power to get better. But that doesn’t appear to be the case.
What did Wallace mean to the Bobcats? From 2004-05 (the Bobcats first season) to 2009-10, Wallace produced 70.0 wins and posted a 0.226 WP48 [Wins Produced per 48 minutes]. This season – as the following table indicates – Wallace is again an above average player (average WP48 is 0.100).
In fact, Wallace leads the Bobcats in Wins Produced. And when we look at the entire cast of players employed in Charlotte this season, Wallace is one of only five players to post a WP48 mark that is above average (average WP48 is 0.100).
Of these five, Derrick Brown was waived on February 24 (to make room for the players brought in at the trade deadline). Tyrus Thomas has missed most of the season due to injury; but he may return soon and take the place of D.J. White, who has been above average in the 102 minutes he has played this season.
The other above average player is D.J. Augustin. Not only has Augustin posted the highest Wins Produced on this team (after Wallace), with Tyrus Thomas hurt (and Derrick Brown off the team), Augustin is the only player left on the roster who has played more than 102 minutes and posted a WP48 mark above 0.100. And with a mark of 0.110, Augustin is only slightly above average.
With so little production left on the roster, we should not be surprised that the Bobcats have lost five consecutive games by a combined margin of 91 points. Yes, just when Charlotte should be driving for the playoffs, they are playing some of the worst basketball – from any team in the NBA – we have seen all year.
Of course, Jordan says that this all part of the plan.
In a brief interview with The Associated Press, Jordan said “I love the trade” that sent the former All-Star Wallace to Portland. While the backup center Przybilla was the only likely rotation player Charlotte got in return, Jordan says it gives his club “flexibility” to make future moves because it acquired two first-round picks and cleared salary-cap space.
“I think it’s one of the best trades,” Jordan said.
Jordan said he’s not content with jockeying for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. He believes the deal puts the franchise in better shape ahead of perhaps a lower payroll ceiling in the next labor deal as he tries to build a contender
“We don’t want to be the seventh or eighth seed,” he said.
Jordan appears to be doing his best to get his wish. Even if Thomas comes back and produces, the Bobcats are going to have a hard time making the playoffs. And even if the Bobcats make the playoffs, there is little chance this team could advance against the top teams in the East.
So what is the plan? The Bobcats sent their most productive player to the Blazers for two non-lottery first round picks and two players who don’t have contracts beyond this season. Jordan says he is going to take this salary cap space and draft picks and go acquire players who can move the Bobcats past the 7th seed in the Eastern Conference. Given that this is the person who drafted Kwame Brown and Adam Morrison, this seems like a dubious plan.
Then again, maybe Jordan is simply trying to learn from Mark Cuban. Cuban recently confessed that once Dirk Nowitzki retires he expects the Mavericks to lose, and, if he gets his way, they’ll lose badly. In other words, Cuban is arguing that the Mavericks success under his ownership is mostly about Nowitzki (not sure that is entirely true, but the Mavericks success is certainly not – as we just saw this past weekend – about Adjusted Plus-Minus). So the Cuban plan is to be very, very bad and then hope to build your team through lottery picks and salary cap space.
We should remember that Jordan completed the Wallace trade before Cuban’s comment. But the thinking seems quite similar. And the thinking – for fans of the Bobcats – is that Charlotte is better off giving away their most productive player for some chance to acquire productive players in the future.
Who are these productive players? We don’t know.
Will Jordan know these players when he sees them? The past doesn’t give fans of this team much hope, but that is what fans of this team are being sold.
Yes, Wallace was traded for a vague hope for tomorrow. As the Bobcats struggle to win games across the last month of the season, fans of the team should keep this vague hope in mind.
- DJ
Not sure being very, very bad is the key to becoming very good. Celtics got very, very bad for the Oden/Durant draft, but they did it by shelving Pierce for various injuries. The Spurs got Duncan by being very, very bad with the Admiral and others out with various injuries. No one became very good by trading away their best players for late first round picks and middling players to become very, very bad. That may have been the Memphis plan with the Gasol swap.
For Charlotte fans, I hope they can come away with some sort of Camby-type contract give away because they are under the cap. With a reportedly lousy draft next year, that seems to be their best option.
Chicago fans know it as the Reinsdorf/Krause plan. Blow up the team. It took 12+ years to recover. Not recommended.
But Bulls fans are rooting for Jordan’s doubtful plan now, because the worse the Bobcats play over the next few years, the better the Bulls’ pick received from Charlotte will get. The pick is top-14 protected in the 2012 Draft (no problem there), top-12 protected in 2013, top-10 protected in 2014, top-8 protected in 2015 and unprotected in the 2016 Draft.
Isn’t Pzyrbilla better than Wallace over, say, the last 3 years? Or at least very similar? At least according to your metric.
So to pick up a couple draft picks and a player who’ll give you 90% of Wallace’s production should be a pretty big win.
IMO it has been obvious for a very long time that the worst position a team can be in is “a marginal playoff team” with no cap space. You have no room to add key FA players, can’t get a top pick etc… You are basically doomed to mediocrity unless the team is very young.
The idea is to become really really bad and accumulate as much cap space and as many top picks as possible to either build from scratch, trade for high level players, get FAs etc… depending on the market.
Unless you already have most of the pieces needed to make a serious run and just need to tinker at the edges, the goal should be to blow it up and start all over.
Drewggy, Przybilla hasn’t been the same since he ruptured his patellar tendon twice last season. He was a good center but he can’t get any lift anymore. In his 70 minutes with the Bobcats he has posted a -.213 according to Dr. Berri. The thinking around Portland is, he is going to retire after the season when his contract runs out or sign for a modest sum.
“No one became very good by trading away their best players for late first round picks and middling players to become very, very bad. That may have been the Memphis plan with the Gasol swap.”
You are mostly arguing against dumb trades and not the strategy. A sound strategy can still go badly if it’s executed poorly.
@Italian Stallion I agree with @TBall
The key to creating an NBA championship roster is, IMHO, to get 2-3 over .200 WP48 players, have no piss poor players (negative WP48), and fill in the roster gaps with players one standard deviation from .100, who fit together well (e.g. are not all wings).
If you don’t have those two or three great players, you are kinda screwed, but if you have one and lots of poor players (Minnesota with Garnett), you are also screwed.
As the hardest part is to get those .200+ WP48 players, the “being very, very bad” strategy requires that you are very, very bad BUT with key assets in place to keep (Paul Pierce, Kendrick Perkins, Rondo, The Admiral) or space to sign them (Cap space / MLE). Trading away ~.100 players to be so bad you can draft Lebron gets you where Cleveland got – one star and bit players – or worse, where Mmephis got (the Lottery balls didn’t save them the Lebron year).
Boston had Pierce, grabbed Garnett and already drafted Rondo – the underrated part of the rebuilding – and was well supported by Ray Allen and Perkins for a formidable starting lineup. They also had backups that were not terrible and fit well together (James Posey, Leon Powe, PJ Brown, Sam Cassell, Tony Allen, House etc).
My team the The Suns have used a similar trade for players method. We started the year with a poor roster that was a mismash of small forwards all ~.100 WP48.
And then we traded for Gortat.
Nerd numbers
is downshows the Suns have 7 current players at or around .100. Pre-Gortat we had 6, and only one above .200 in Nash, we played Turk badly out of position at 4 (his move to the three in Orlando is partly what saved his season) and played Earl Barron and his -0.328 WP48 (Yes that is NEGATIVE 0.328 WP48) biggish-minutes. We also used Frye or Lopez at 5 – both poor options. Replacing Barron (-0.328) and Lopez (-0.055) with Gortat (.229), is HUGE, and the loss from JRich (.151) to VC (.106 and getting better as he heals) was minimal, making the trade oh so much better. Mix in less minutes for Frye at 5 (he is better at 4 – moving from negative WP48 early to 0.025 now – a massive improvement) and vastly improved D and the Phoenix Suns are a real darkhorse in 2011 IMHO.Provided we make the playoffs of course :P
I thought the Mark Cuban plan was giving huge contracts to mediocre bigs.
Mike,
I agree that you need 3 key pieces, but it’s virtually impossible to accumulate a good enough combination of 3 stars and solid role players to contend for a title unless you get very good players cheaply via the draft and/or have loads of cap space to add star FAs. The only way to get into that position is to be bad and gut the team.
It’s relatively easy to get as good as the Suns, but IMHO the Suns are not a serious contender now and never will be until they blow up that team. Of course if the goal is to just make the playoffs, fill the seats, keep most of the fans happy etc… that’s OK too.
You could always get lucky in the draft, have superstar get injured for a full year, get a great pick and then the star come back, have someone give you a star for nothing in a lopsided trade etc…, but that’s more or less random good fortune and not a strategy.
Here’s an example of the potential problem.
Setting aside whether Melo and Amare are actually stars, the Knicks have a hole at C, a whole at backup PG, and a very weak bench. They are way too good to get a lottery pick (assuming they didn’t trade a lot of their 1st round picks away) and are going to be extremely hard pressed to fill all those needs under the cap.
If the goal was to turn the Knicks into a solid playoff team, sell more merchandise, fill the seats, and get better ratings on MSG, no one has done a better job than Isiah and Dolan ( excuse me I mean Donnie Walsh).
If the goal was to win a championship, they could be a in a tough spot.
They have a 45-50 win team, not much upside, no picks, a lot of needs, and not much space. I’m already thinking about the 2016 rebuild when they realize they have blow up the team after several failed attempts in the playoffs.
bq. It’s relatively easy to get as good as the Suns, but IMHO the Suns are not a serious contender now and never will be until they blow up that team. Of course if the goal is to just make the playoffs, fill the seats, keep most of the fans happy etc… that’s OK too.
I disagree – they are one piece way. Gortat + Nash + ?? is a GREAT big three. Before the trade, they were Nash + ??
The question is how to get the the three great players, and fill a roster. If you think blowing up a team works, you need an example and I can’t think of a single one.
Lets got over the winners since 1980:
LA – N – traded for Magic Pick and Kareem – no blow up.
Celtics – Y – Blew up team after drafting Bird.
Philadelphia – N – Traded for Malone – previous 5 seasons > 50 wins.
Detroit Pistons (Isiah era) – N – Trade for laimbeer
Chicago Bulls (HG era) – ? – Drafted Jordan, traded for Horace Grant + Pippen. (Half – were bad to get Jordan but NOT Pippen)
Houston – Y/N – Sucked to get Olajuwon , everyone else was there after they were good.
Bulls (Rodman Era) – N – Trade for Rodman made them great.
San Antonio Spurs – N – They used injuries and one bad year, but here is the thing, they were GOOD and PRETENDED to be bad.
LA (Saq era) – N – Shaq Free Agent – traded for Kobe.
Detroit Pistons – N – Traded for: Wallace, Hamilton, Wallace.
Miami – N – traded for Shaq, sucked to get Wade.
LA (Gasol Era) – N – The trade for GAsol, never sucked between 200 and 2011.
I think there is strong evidence that the stink it up isn’t the only way, and in fact the key really is to KEEP good players, and get extraordinary players (by any means).
Mike,
Virtually every single great team I can think of drafted a great player in the lottery (Magic, Bird, Jordan, Duncan, Hakeem, and Kobe were all drafted).
Some of those teams were bad enough to earn the pick.
Some got lucky (Duncan was drafted because San Antonio was horrible for one year while Robinson and other players were hurt).
Some gave away quality players to move up and get a great pick.
The reason it’s so important to draft a star is that it’s extremely difficult to fit everything you need to win a championship under the cap with just FAs and trades. But if you get a great player and fill a few other needs in the draft, you have some of what you already need cheaply (for awhile) and can add whatever else you need via FA and trade. They you can grow your way over the cap from within as players improve and are resigned, but it doesn’t matter.
IMO, being able to make one of those rare one sided trades (like Gasol or Garnett) is not a strategy. You are basically hoping that some team gets into financial trouble or has a very upset superstar and you are the team that gets to rape and pillage his former team.
IMO, hoping you are the team lucky enough to find a star late in the first or second round in not a strategy.
IMO most negotiated deals are reasonably fair. They don’t occur because one team feels it is robbing the other. They occur because both teams have a surplus/gap of something and feel if they swap players they can both improve.
IMO once you get to the point where you are already capped out with players with little upside and you know you are more than just a couple of tweaks away from winning it all you are doomed.
IMO if winning a championship is truly the goal, you have to get rid of all the highly paid veterans and try to bring in draft picks, young players with upside etc…. That usually involves getting worse as a team first and then rebuilding.
I understand you love the Suns, but they are way more than just a couple of tweaks away and have several aging players. IMHO, the smartest thing they could do would be to trade them all away for expiring contracts, picks etc…
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