Cavaliers need to emulate OKC & how they were built

[Jon]

Again, the only time tested method for winning a championship is a combination of making smart moves and getting lucky at the right time.

For all the high draft picks that the Bulls brought in all it did was lift them up to a peak of 49 wins. They'd already been bleeding off that talent for years by the time they had a crappy season, won only 33 games, and then got lucky and ended up with Derrick Rose. Alas that only got them back up to 41-wins until they brought in a coach who could get them to play defense.

Losing begets losing, but adding a terrific player to a good team with the right system/coach can push it up to championship contender.

While NBA champions tend to have great players, having a great player does not guarantee you a championship.

There's no doubt having assets to help make deals is important ... but look at some of those "assets". The Celtics traded away the rights to Jeff Green, Gerald Green, Sebastian Telfair, Al Jefferson, Wally Szerbiak, Delonte West, Rasho Nesterovic, and others they'd picked up with all the draft picks to bring in KG and Ray Allen. Ultimately they really didn't give up all that much. At the time some worried they were giving up their future for a 3yr window, and while the concern about the window was probably right ... the players they gave up weren't going to be their future.

You can draft a Yao Ming, or a Tracy McGrady and win nothing. You can draft a Shaq or a James and come up short of a championship only to see them walk. The paths to failure far outnumber (30:1) the paths to success.

Any championship plan needs to start with building a winning culture, a defensive culture, building assets, developing players, and looking for any opportunity to improve via trade. If done right these things things will lead to success sooner and not later. Some of you guys are just going to have to deal with that.

 

[Jon]

The perfect storm had to happen for the Pistons to dominate the way they did. Much easier to build around superstar. Paxson struck out on how many lottery picks? He hit on one, and we were back.

The only thing easy to do in the NBA is lose.

 

[RikSmits]

Who needs stars, 3Ball? I mean, Sasha Pavlovic and Daniel Gibson led us to the Finals!!

Where did I state that we shouldn't draft high picks, or good players with star potential?
I'm talking here about the minute chance to draft and keep a Superstar.
But ridiculing is easier than reading properly and coming up with good arguments, I guess.

 

[QuadrupleDouble]

Another thing abot Detroit is that I'm not sure they would have won without the whole Shaq/Kobe thing going down and ruining the chemistry on that team

I'm with everyone who says there is no true model other than making smart decisions and building a quality team

 

[Pavlovic3Ball]

Another thing abot Detroit is that I'm not sure they would have won without the whole Shaq/Kobe thing going down and ruining the chemistry on that team

I'm with everyone who says there is no true model other than making smart decisions and building a quality team

Plus, Karl Malone's injury was huge. They were playing Slava Medvedenko and Luke Walton (rookie) huge minutes. That Lakers team started the season off like 25-3 when everyone was healthy. Which was amazing considering they had no depth and Gary Payton is the absolute worst kind of PG for the triangle offense. The Pistons aren't the world beaters some think they were. They probably lose to the Nets if Kidd was healthy in 04. Yea they got to the Finals the next season, but if Shaq doesn't injure his calf and Wade doesn't get hurt, they probably don't beat Miami. Like I said, a lot of thing had to go right for them. You can say that about a lot of past championships, but the Pistons had a good amount of luck on their side.

 

[Huber.]

Why is this 7 pages deep? This season needs to start.

 

[PIP]

Everything is case by case specific.

You simply cannot build your team like another team unless you can guarantee acquiring the same type of talent which you simply cannot do....So you can build through the draft and trade like OKC has done...But then again every single gawd damn team has done that too.... Some succeed and some fall on their face..

Moral of the story is to draft better and get lucky... Or start planting some palm trees...

 

[Chris]

Where did I state that we shouldn't draft high picks, or good players with star potential?
I'm talking here about the minute chance to draft and keep a Superstar.
But ridiculing is easier than reading properly and coming up with good arguments, I guess.

Actually, myself and multiple others have taken your argument to the shed several times over the last page. You just refuse to admit it, as most people involved in online arguments usually do.

Draft superstar/stars. Keep them by making your team a title contender. No, that doesn't mean surrounding them with 35 year old role players and overpaid veterans with nominal contributions like we did with James. Get this stupid notion that small markets can't keep their stars out of your head. Good management wins championships, not market size.

 

[TheDudeAbides]

yes just make sure you tank when kevin durant is in the draft. then make sure durant is not good enough to win on his own so that you have another top 5 pick. make sure this next season has someone like russell westbrook. then make sure both players together are still horrible so you can tank again so you can get harden. sounds like a pretty easy formula cavs lets get to it. i just dont understand why more teams dont try this.

 

[Chris]

Can we just close this thread and delete every post except for:

Again, the only time tested method for winning a championship is a combination of making smart moves and getting lucky at the right time.

For all the high draft picks that the Bulls brought in all it did was lift them up to a peak of 49 wins. They'd already been bleeding off that talent for years by the time they had a crappy season, won only 33 games, and then got lucky and ended up with Derrick Rose. Alas that only got them back up to 41-wins until they brought in a coach who could get them to play defense.

Losing begets losing, but adding a terrific player to a good team with the right system/coach can push it up to championship contender.

While NBA champions tend to have great players, having a great player does not guarantee you a championship.

There's no doubt having assets to help make deals is important ... but look at some of those "assets". The Celtics traded away the rights to Jeff Green, Gerald Green, Sebastian Telfair, Al Jefferson, Wally Szerbiak, Delonte West, Rasho Nesterovic, and others they'd picked up with all the draft picks to bring in KG and Ray Allen. Ultimately they really didn't give up all that much. At the time some worried they were giving up their future for a 3yr window, and while the concern about the window was probably right ... the players they gave up weren't going to be their future.

You can draft a Yao Ming, or a Tracy McGrady and win nothing. You can draft a Shaq or a James and come up short of a championship only to see them walk. The paths to failure far outnumber (30:1) the paths to success.

Any championship plan needs to start with building a winning culture, a defensive culture, building assets, developing players, and looking for any opportunity to improve via trade. If done right these things things will lead to success sooner and not later. Some of you guys are just going to have to deal with that.

and

These arguments are so silly. What model does everybody think all the other non-contending teams are trying to follow? You try to draft the best players, make smart trades, and use FA to fill in the holes. As many have said, the "OKC Model" is not some sort of secret formula pioneered by Presti, nor have the Thunder won a sausage to this point (or done anything the Lebron Cavs did not). You think other GMs don't want to draft the best players available at their draft positions? And really, in the draft that turned it all around for the Thunder, they even "missed" on the second pick - what if they had had the Celtics draft Noah for them instead of Jeff Green?

Skill and luck, just like everything else. Big/destination markets seem to need less luck because the allure of the franchise acts as a bit of a safety net. But either way you have to have an owner willing to spend, a GM with an eye for talent in the draft, a solid vision of how the talent should fit together, and the foresight to put the team in a position to take advantage of opportunities in the future, and the luck that only a fraction of the billions of things that can go wrong actually do go wrong. The specifics of the "model" change based on circumstance. Ainge's decision to trade his team to put together the Boston big 3, along with a nice pick in Rondo, both requiring an enormous amount of luck, got them to the promised land and Boston has had fun watching basketball since then even in the years when the team came up short. Yet San Anton went the complete opposite direction, incredibly lucky circumstances giving them the opportunity to draft one of the best big men the league has ever seen just before their former superstar big man's star faded, then skillfully picking and luckily succeeding in finding great international talent. How bout the Lakers? Or the Heat? What models are those?

Make sound decisions, take advantage of opportunities to get better when they arise. I hope the Cavs continue to gather assets to be able to make moves to get better. As a bad team, I hope they keep trying to get as many high picks in the draft as possible. I hope we get awesome players with those picks. And I hope Grant has a vision and makes smart decisions--based on specific opportunities available to him--to get over the hump to actually win it all. What model is that? And are any teams following some different model?

 

[TheDudeAbides]

Draft superstar/stars. Keep them by making your team a title contender. No, that doesn't mean surrounding them with 35 year old role players and overpaid veterans with nominal contributions like we did with James. Get this stupid notion that small markets can't keep their stars out of your head. Good management wins championships, not market size.

Shaq going to LA.
Kobe refusing to play anywhere but LA before the draft. Forced trade.
Corrupt Gasol trade by former Laker West that should have been vetoed.
Corrupt Garnett trade by former Celtic McHale that should have been vetoed.
James, Bosh tampering to Miami
Anthony forces way to NY
Williams forces way to Brooklyn
Paul forces way to LA
Howard to...

But at least Detroit did it. And of course SA with #1 pick HOF centers.
Dallas is a huge market but wanted to mention they followed the formula that you said that no one should do with older players- Kidd, Marion, Terry, etc. Admittedly they are all better than anyone LeBron ever had in Cle.

 

[Noonan]

Then again, anyone who tries on defense probably looks impressive to Jamison.

====

WFNYScott Scott @ WFNY
Antawn Jamison is nothing but impressed with Tristan Thompson. "He's going to be a household name." <S class=hash>#</S>Cavs

 

[The Oi]

Lot's of things that aren't very good are household names:

Root beer barrels, wax lips, black licorice...

Everyone knows their names and yeah...they've got their place in the world, but they're pretty blah and they're not as good as the candies that are sitting right next to them.

 

[MoFlo]

The answer is simple: There is no "model" to build a championship team. We've seen teams do it in various ways in the past 10 years:

1.) Trading/moving pieces like crazy around 1 guy until they finally click enough both offensively & defensively to win the title (Dallas)

2.) Surrounding their star with a lottery pick, then an all-star post presence via trade, and using FA to fill in the voids (Lakers)

3.) Creating a "Big 3" via trades, then signing solid free agents for depth (Boston)

4.) Striking it rich by not only winning the lottery, but by having the chance to team up their new #1 overall pick with their previous #1 overall pick. Then using the draft wonderfully, without lottery picks, to surround their star #1 pick(s) with all-star level talent, and using Free Agency to bring in pieces that fit absolutely perfectly. (Spurs)

5.) Bringing in a future hall of famer to team with their star, then using trades to strengthen their supporting cast, while adding a couple pieces in FA to strengthen their depth. (Miami)

6.) Using a combination of the trade market with a key free agent signing & a couple of strong non-lottery picks to mold their nucleus, then making a key mid-season trade for a 2x all-star to put them over the top (20-6 [.769] record post trade) (Detroit).

*Note* This isn't the 1st time Detroit made a key mid-season trade for a multiple time all-star to put them over the top. In the middle of the 1988-89 season, Detroit traded for Mark Aguirre and proceeded to go 31-6 the rest of the way.

7.) Signing a star FA, then using the draft to trade the guy their star FA is replacing for what would become another future HOF (Lakers 1st run w/ Kobe)

Yes, you can say most of those teams had 1 or more superstars on their team (with Detroit being the exception). However, since having a superstar doesn't necessarily = a championship, it really depends on how you build your role players and supporting cast, and there's no set way to get to that championship level.

If you notice, out of those 7 different ways, only 1 team did it by signing a superstar Free Agent, and they added another eventual superstar via the draft that greatly helped them get there.

Since the Cavaliers won't be signing any superstars in Free Agency anyway, and don't have the assets to trade for a current superstar, we'll have to make key trades & really put that much more effort into the draft. Since you don't know who will or won't end up being superstars or where you'll draft, it's imperative that you make those trades you do make worthwhile.

While I do agree there's no point in us getting the 8th seed right now or coming close to making the playoffs, I will say it's more about making smart choices with your draft picks no matter where you draft than it is making sure you pick high.

 

[QuadrupleDouble]

Lot's of things that aren't very good are household names:

Root beer barrels, wax lips, black licorice...

Everyone knows their names and yeah...they've got their place in the world, but they're pretty blah and they're not as good as the candies that are sitting right next to them.

Root beer barrels and black licorice are two of my favorite candies. Does that make me the Paxon/Kahn of candy pickers?