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Leonard is injured now, but this hypothetical wouldn't take place until the summer and at that point, if he hasn't returned this season, he won't have to play a meaningful game again until mid October.
Confident in his being healthy or re-signing? If it's the former, again, due diligence will obviously have to be done. If it's the latter, the only player who has left a situation as good as Celtics' would be, is Durant and Warriors would be the only team more promising, but Leonard couldn't sign with them even if he wanted to and Irving and him are 3 and 4 years younger than Curry and Durant, which means they should eventually overtake them.
If you think you're being misunderstood, be more clear and concise instead of trying to sound like the smartest person in the room at all times.I've said it could be one in the same in every post during this debate. That you bring that up as if it's a new take is silly. Anyway, you keep on missing the point that I'm making then having the gall to condescend about my ignorance. Tatum objectively has more value than, say the 10th-overall pick in the upcoming draft. LAC would trade such a pick for Tatum, and Boston would not. Therefore doing a trade where he's the centerpiece for Kawhi is more valuable than a trade centered around the 10th pick. If the guy at 10 is a player the Spurs like/believe in more than Tatum, then they should go with that, value be damned. If the guy they would have picked is a better player in five years than Tatum, it does them no good to have gone with value in June. The draft isn't an actual crap-shoot like so many folks argue it is. There's real skill involved in scouting and navigating the board. PATFO has been crazy good at outperforming their draft slot. They shouldn't be expect to get a guy as good as Kawhi at 10, but they damned sure could do better than Tatum or Ingram.
Tatum wouldn't be the outright centerpiece in this proposal and the odds of a 10th pick having his or Brown's upside is extremely slim and far too risky to turn down 2 high quality assets along with 2 other decent ones, in the hopes of plucking the next Leonard or Antetokounmpo from relative obscurity.
Those picks aren't likely to be good "valuable" as they may be.
These are them:
2019 first round draft pick from L.A. Clippers
L.A. Clippers' 1st round pick to Boston (via Memphis) protected for selections 1-14 in 2019 and 1-14 in 2020; if the L.A. Clippers have not conveyed a 1st round pick to Boston by 2020, then the L.A. Clippers will instead convey their 2022 2nd round pick to Boston [L.A. Clippers-Memphis, 2/18/2016; Boston-Memphis, 6/23/2016]
2019 first round draft pick from Memphis
Memphis' 1st round pick to Boston protected for selections 1-8 in 2019 and 1-6 in 2020 and unprotected in 2021 [Boston-Memphis-New Orleans, 1/12/2015]
You have a LAC pick that will either be non-lottery or seconds and a Memphis pick that will be late-lottery until 2021 at best. Those are middling assets, not really worth comparing to Tatum and Brown in terms of how much Boston seems to value them.
I was talking about what Celtics would be left with around their core and you go and leave out their most valuable pick.
You just got done lecturing me about the potential value of a 10th pick, but are now downplaying the significance of a potential 9th, 7th or unprotected pick. Way to be consistent.
Of course you would because you don't know understand blockbuster trades work. There's almost always some certainty involved for obvious reasons. Recent examples include Hield, LaVine, Dunn, Williams, Beverley, Oladipo, Sabonis, etc. Say what you want about them, but most were already clear rotation players and the others were on track to be.I find this pretty indefensible. The Spurs already have a baseline of mediocrity to work with in the form of this Aldridge-led team. You don't trade a star and worry about getting a base hit. You swing for the fences. They can make the playoffs and be decent even if they draft busts with the potential Leonard picks.
You go for whomever you think can get you above the ceiling. And no, I'm not basing value off anything. I'm saying your argument is illogical. If Brown and Tatum are unable to score at a competent NBA level (as Bradley did), then they haven't really proven anything elite yet. Comparing Thomas to them is foolish, given that Irving already replaced him. Brown and Tatum replaced Bradley and Crowder. That shift has apparently led them to an offense so bad that Stevens hasn't been able to save it. Or whatever. It's your argument, not mine. My argument is that Stevens runs a system friendly to player's production and that looking good in Boston isn't a stable sample. I sure am not using it as a foundation to project future production on other teams.
This wouldn't be a base hit, this would be a high ceiling and floor return. You can't do better for a superstar short of getting a draft pick that becomes one and considering there's less than 10 at a given time, that's damn near impossible.
Brown and Tatum are already scoring at a competent NBA level. Since you love ppg so much, they're at 14 and 13.5, respectively, with .589 and .547 true shooting percentages, which is good and decent efficiency, especially for such young players.
If the Spurs are a Walker trade away from taking down the Warriors, then leaving "to contend" makes little sense. That trade is only going to get more possible as the season draws to a close. The avenues the team has to complete such a deal are much more open factoring in July cap space, including just letting Danny walk, trading Kemba into cap space and trading Gasol for bad salary from Charlotte. However, this thread and any impact that can be drawn from it said nothing about Kawhi leaving for LA because he thinks they're closer to a le. He's apparently keen to be a Laker and to be back home. So I see Boston being a "true contender" with him appealing enough to persuade him if the Spurs being just one player away and able to offer so much more money isn't.
Agreed, but we're operating under the assumption that Leonard wants out. Also, a Walker trade is obviously far from a sure thing, though I've already said it gets more possible around the draft.
Just like George wanted to go back home and is now at least strongly considering otherwise and this is on a lesser team, in a smaller market.
