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Clearly the Spurs are extremely happy with their off-season development from the three-point line, because they went through the draft valuing picks more than a single person who could shoot.
The worst part is, that's the deal they were looking for?
Clearly the Spurs are extremely happy with their off-season development from the three-point line, because they went through the draft valuing picks more than a single person who could shoot.
this. End of the day it might turn into literally two unprotected top picks, when Wemby is just entering his prime.
and no matter how much some ridicule the fact that the picks won‘t materialize in this decade, it was the right decission to go for 2030 and 31. Might have been the Spurs to demand exactly those two drafts. they just needed to look at the moment, when Ant‘s contract is over (2029). There is a good chance the Wolves will screw this once more, like they did with KG, like they did with Butler, Thibs, Kat and Wiggins.
So when will the train derail?
it will happen when they start talking about the extension in 2028 (or is it already 2027?) and a possibly unhappy Ant doesn‘t want to take it. Then they will have to trade him and start from ground zero. That will be 2028 or 2029. So, there is a good chance that 2030 they are one of the worst teams in the league.
And the best thing would be this: Spurs might be the team that could offer the best package for Ant, because they can offer control over the Wolves own picks in 30 and 31.
yes, this is just a fantasy, that the Spurs already work on the possibility to trade for Ant in 2029. but you might also call it a plan.
and just for the sake of discussion……..what would it be called if it did work out five years from now and Spurs turned an 8th pick, they didn‘t even like what it would have got them, into a Superstar to team up with Wemby? best investment of all time?
Last edited by Vienna; 06-30-2024 at 05:12 AM.
A nbaspurs reddit thread on who the Spurs might have wanted at 8 had they not traded:
https://www.reddit.com/r/NBASpurs/co..._four_players/
Not sure if the writer is anyone here, but this is really provocative. Works from LJ's own article here that mentions the four players the Spurs never said anything about: Risacher, Sheppard, Castle, Knecht. Suggesting that these were their targets.
Since Knecht was the only one still available at 8, by this logical elimination, that could be who they were prepared to take before Minnesota swooped in.
Spurs lucked out with Victor. Their subsequent moves indicate they weren't planning on being serious yet, even as much as some media folks seem to think it was a CIA Pop moment. It's like winning a new sports car in a drawing and not being able to even pay the taxes, needing to sell it and taking half price.
Starting to wonder if that one consensus pick at # 8 the brain trust decided on days before the draft was Clingan instead of Salaun
Salaun was already gone by 6 but Clingan went right before 8 and the express news article says they took MINs call while on the clock.
CHA and POR wipe out potential SAS targets for 8.
The recent article says that the player they decided on three days before the draft was the one they were prepared to take on the clock at 8. We can call that into question, of course, but judging by that , the player they picked three days in advance was not taken yet.
Seems weird to enter a draft with such a narrow focus on one player at #8 *UNLESS* that one player was a Primo-level reach and they had a super high level of confidence that he'd be there. Given our history, this would make a lot of sense. Which in itself causes its own concern. Why does this FO get so laser focused on guys that they just dismiss the possibility of opportunistically adding other talent as well?
Let's just imagine for a moment that the other guy they liked and were prepared to take at 8 was Ja'Kobe Walter (who wouldn't quite be a Primo-level reach, but they would probably have a high level of confidence would be there at 8). The cost of moving back in was relatively low if you have that much a hard-on for Walter (which obviously, they didn't, since they were fine with taking no one).
They just didn't prioritize adding talent this year... which isn't the direction I like, but it's not an unreasonable direction (I've been consistent in that I don't hate the idea to move out of the draft in a vacuum, I just hate the return we got).
They didn't prioritize adding talent and that's a good question why. Whether they should have used the 8 is a separate, if related, question.
It looks like the #8 player they settled on was Dalton Knecht. I find this a reasonable deduction, as discussed in another thread. They were prepared to take him, but the MN package attracted them more. I don't think it's unbelievable that two years from now they'd rather have the MN package instead of Dalton Knecht. Nothing against him, but his scoring boost would probably be short-term while he doesn't do much else and they're trying to move players past him into the lineup who are younger and have multiple skills. More, when Dalton Knecht is 30 and is a good scorer but his value has (likely) never improved, would they rather have that MN swap and the next year the MN unprotected? I would say almost assuredly.
I think they liked Knecht's hard work, determination, size, skillset, scoring, but they opted for the longterm and saw the mid-term with him as just okay.
I'm okay with all that.
My question is why they effed around with the early 2nd. My guess it gets into cap stuff. And it could get into not wanting to futz around with starting from scratch with yet another very young guy who needs a lot of bringing-up-to-speed. That's a fine player to get down the line, but not now. I guess.
I'd reverse it, perhaps. At no point in Dalton Knecht's career would you be able to get an unprotected first round pick and an unprotected swap for him.
Knecht is a good hypothesis, and the only real speculation that he would go before #8 was to to CHA, so if he went there, then Salaun would be available... though there are scenarios where Clingan goes before 7, CHA takes Knecht and Portland takes Salaun...
What throws me off is this idea that the Spurs had decided who they'd take at 8, as though they were certain he'd be available. Was the backup plan to just punt at that point? What if the MIN deal doesn't materialize? Do they just take anything?
Ultimately, none of this actually matters - it's just interesting to speculate.
Maybe the MIN offer was the only one on the table and PAFTO tried to squeeze everything they could out of MIN and this is it... we'll never know. Just feels like we could have gotten more. Wright's comment that "MIN offered the deal we were looking for" is just weird, almost like the Spurs had set a super low bar and jumped as soon as someone met it. But again, all speculation because none of us were in the room.
It's just so crazy to me to scrutinize over these prospects for so long and then to be right there to add Carter/Williams/Dilly but to punt out.
Like the level of discipline it took not to just grab one of those names and give it a go is off the charts. I'm not crazy about the BPAs at 8 but there was some good still left.
Talk about Brian Wright but he is not some buster.
I find it damn near impossible that Wolves 2031 was the best offer they could get for 8.
Did they really offer it to all NBA teams? No one wanted to move up to 8 or trade other then the Wolfies for 2031?
Or more gross incompetence by PATFO?
Oh, I'm sure they had a second or third choices. And you're right, they could have had Salaun or another player before Knecht. I'm only going by the article that seems to lay out that the player they decided on three days prior was the same player they were going to pick when Minnesota called on the clock. That's all we have for now, as far as I know.
And it's not to say a lot of people in that three-day-before room had different favorites. It's (again judging by the article) they came to a consensus that might have been Knecht.
Thinking about the article more (and too lazy to look it up), theoretically there's a phrase that's left out like "who they decided on if their other favorites were gone."
Dunno. There are mysteries. I do find the theory that it was Knecht as their target at that point pretty convincing. The overall point I was making a few posts ago still stands as far as that goes: that he's not a bad pick, but not really a long-term pick, and as he'd get older, that Minnesota package left behind would get more and more attractive.
What a roller coaster for the TOR pick to start off top 6 protected, to hit 8 on lotto, to convert into unprotected first + a swap
Starts off as a pick you might not even get and turns into one you're guaranteed to get plus another swap
That's a bountiful conversion and would definitely be the deal I was looking for if I was SA
Spurs might've directly asked for the delayed pick date from MIN
We talked a lot about development logjams and spacing out some of these FRPs and then the team did that and everyones mad lol. Not sure I'd use a #8 for that purpose lol, but it being a valuable #8 was probably what earned SA the nice unprotected status plus a swap.
We've got at least 2 FRPs again next year so be ready for the same thing.
Those are the first picks MN can trade, if I have that right. Everything up to then belongs to Utah as swaps or outright.
Like you mention, there are multiple layers to this, and I don't think it matters if it's Knecht, Dilly, or anyone else. It still comes down to prioritizing that draft capital (whether its to use it in a trade or to have to use in 2030/31). There are plenty of reasonable rationalizations for doing that. But whether to take a player now or punt is layer 1.
Layer 2a is what's the return on punting, with Layer 2b being what player you would have taken. I won't focus on just Knecht, because if any player(s) they passed on turns out to be an all-star (maybe one that could return better than a 2030 swap and a 2031 pick), then you have to ask why the Spurs didn't see that... the same way we'd ask questions if they took Knecht and someone else behind them turns out to be an All-Star (it's be the same Primo-Sengun/Bowie-Jordan conversation).
It's all just message board fodder at this point... all we can do is judge this FO on the paths they do take.
IMO this is flawed thinking. It doesn't matter that the TOR pick once had (low, tbh) potential of not conveying. Once it conveyed, that history is forever irrelevant to its value going forward. That would be like the Nuggets taking one FRP in return for Jokic and saying "we turned a SRP into a FRP, what a great return!"
They didn’t say anything about Buzelis either. And it was later confirmed that he worked out for the Spurs.
Sure. The one flaw I'd say in your thinking here is that you're balancing the entire field of the 2024 draft after pick 7 against the Minnesota package.
That's a small fallacy. The Spurs had to make a selection of only one player. They did, whether it's Knecht or not.
The Minnesota package only has to beat the Knecht pick in their estimation. It's impossible to beat the field because it's impossible to draft everyone.
Of course they may not have come to the right consensus on a player, but that's a different question.
one thing people forget is that the 8th pick in this draft is like the 15th in a regular draft and we got an unprotected pick and additional swap for that. It's not that bad although I also think that there were some players available who would've helped our team right away. On the other hand we might also draft 2-3 guys in the loaded 2025 draft, in that case it would make sense to trade this one.
For the Spurs, that's the only comparison they need to make at the time... but for a post hoc evaluation of the FO, then you do have to compare it against the entire field. It's the same as criticizing the FO for taking Primo over Sengun. Maybe the Spurs had zero interest in Sengun and their next choice was Kai Jones. The FO still gets criticism for passing on Sengun, not Kai Jones.
It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that Salaun was not the Spurs’ Plan A, yes.
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