The Kevin Love Safari™

[wildfan]

After years of believing the way to build a winning team in Cleveland was to develop our young players. And thinking free agents were unlikely to sign with a small market team. I now have a hard time converting to win now and the future is now thinking. Not saying the new thinking is wrong. I just get heartburn when we trade draft picks and young promising players. Although by no means a future stars, I hated we traded players like Zeller and Sims and trading draft picks like the 2016 1st. And not so sure what players like Allen, Marion, Jones and CB have left in the tank.

 

[bobcat22]

I think the closest scenario would be if the Lakers traded James Worthy after the 1982 draft for Moses Malone. Malone was 26 at the time and wanted out of Houston. He left for free agency that summer of 1982 and signed with Philly. Malone just came off a 31 and 14 season, but had not won a championship yet. The Lakers already had a young Magic and an older Kareem so it would have made sense. It's an intriguing trade. The main difference in these scenarios is Worthy would not have played behind Kareem whereas Wiggins would play behind LeBron.

 

[LeBro]

Re: The Kevin Love Safari™

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Kobe Bryant: “ Cleveland is making the same mistake that Charlotte made with me ”.</p>— 2014MrBasket (@2014MrBasket) <a href="https://twitter.com/2014MrBasket/statuses/499949154232459264">August 14, 2014</a></blockquote>
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Kobe just won't shut up

I agree. Check this out:

In 1996, Bryant, a teenager exiting high school for the N.B.A., was not the first pick, but he exuded self-importance when he refused to play anywhere but Hollywood.

With the 13th selection, with a deal to trade Bryant to Los Angeles in pocket, Charlotte chose him. But there was a point where it looked as if the Lakers’ Vlade Divac would retire rather than take part in a trade that would send him to Charlotte for Bryant.

Couldn’t Bryant be a Hornet? Could he grow to love Southern sweet tea?

“That is an impossibility,” Bryant’s agent, Arn Tellem, said at the time. “There are no ifs. It would not happen. He is going to be a Laker, and that’s the only team he’s playing for.”

http://www.sportsgrid.com/nba/kobe-...-write-history-but-he-cant-fool-the-internet/

 

[AZCavs]

Kobes just salty because he along with the rest of the dumbass Laker fans thought they were getting Kyrie and Love. Not only did they have to settle for Lin and Boozer:chuckles:, but Irving and Love ended up on the same team anyway. Only in Cleveland and Not LA. Who would've thought right? Frobe's just jealous because no more superteam for him

lulz at "Frobe"

 

[Pioneer10]

This is the same Kobe that wanted to trade a pre-injury Bynum for a past his prime Jason Kidd right :chuckles:

 

[CalBuckeyeRob]

Divac was 2.5 years older at the time of the trade, had never made an All Star team, never averaged more than 16 points a game, rebounds were about 10 per game compared to Love's career average over 13, and he was traded to a .500 team. Clearly Wiggins is a far more valuable trade piece than Kobe was at the time, but with the Bulls flying high Divac was nothing more than adding a quality vet to push you into the playoffs where you would get crushed by the Chicago. Love makes Cleveland the immediate Eastern Conference favorite which is what you should be demanding if you trade a very high quality piece. It is a trade that perfectly serves the goals of both franchises.

 

[RapsCavs]

Looks like the tweet about Kobe's opinion on the Wiggins trade was deleted so it's safe to say that the tweet was fake.

 

[kovanovich]

Looks like the tweet about Kobe's opinion on the Wiggins trade was deleted so it's safe to say that the tweet was fake.

That's fine. It got us through a couple more otherwise uneventful news cycles and two days closer to the deal being official. I'm waiting for the next "controversy."

 

[col63onel]

Looks like the tweet about Kobe's opinion on the Wiggins trade was deleted so it's safe to say that the tweet was fake.

How many people saw it, thought Kobe was a dick, then never realized it was fake? That is pretty irresponsible of whoever tweeted it.

 

[SalvadoranCavsfan]

How many people saw it, thought Kobe was a dick, then never realized it was fake? That is pretty irresponsible of whoever tweeted it.

Considering most people already think Kobe is a dick, this just reaffirmed what people already believed :chuckles:

 

[col63onel]

Considering most people already think Kobe is a dick, this just reaffirmed what people already believed :chuckles:

But LeBron likes him

 

[chuck0609]

Let Kobe give Wiggins a shout out, the kid can use it after this drawn out fiasco. I hope he does well in Minnesota.

The CAVs are getting the best stretch 4 in basketball entering his prime to combine with the best player in the game and two very good young wing players.

This is nothing like the trade Kobe was a part of.

 

[CosmoKramer]

Considering most people already think Kobe is a dick, this just reaffirmed what people already believed :chuckles:

To be fair, the whole being taken to court for sodomizing a girl didn't exactly help Kobe's image.

 

[kovanovich]

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Love can't wait to be a Cav. Extra motivated this summer. <a href="https://twitter.com/Gunnar">@Gunnar</a> says, &quot;He’s a beast! You know that! Hasn't missed 1 workout!&quot; <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/twolves?src=hash">#twolves</a></p>&mdash; Darren Wolfson (@DarrenWolfson) <a href="https://twitter.com/DarrenWolfson/statuses/500663615662592000">August 16, 2014</a></blockquote>
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[AllforOne]

Re: The Kevin Love Safari™

After years of believing the way to build a winning team in Cleveland was to develop our young players. And thinking free agents were unlikely to sign with a small market team. I now have a hard time converting to win now and the future is now thinking. Not saying the new thinking is wrong. I just get heartburn when we trade draft picks and young promising players. Although by no means a future stars, I hated we traded players like Zeller and Sims and trading draft picks like the 2016 1st. And not so sure what players like Allen, Marion, Jones and CB have left in the tank.

It is definitely a shift in thinking to go from "we're collecting young players for some greater future" to "the future is here." But that's a good thing. It means that the Cavs are moving in the right direction. Most rebuilding projects become perpetual rebuilding projects (Kings, Clippers until they got CP3 and Blake, Wolves, etc.). For all the talk on this board of the "treadmill of mediocrity," the "lottery treadmill" is at least as bad, if not worse.

I would bet that a year from now, we won't even remember Zeller or ... shit, I've already forgotten the other guy's name. Without the Zeller trade, we don't have LeBron. So I can live with trading a young backup center.

As for Marion/Jones/Allen/CB ... I'd suggest a different angle of viewing them. Other than maybe Marion, none of those guys (if they even come here, in the case of all but Jones) will be here to be valuable rotation players. They'll be at the end of the bench, and often won't even be among the 12 players dressing for that night.

In other words: they won't be here because of what they can do on the court. They will be here for what they bring off the court.

For the past three years, Kyrie and Tristan (and Dion, for the past two) have been surrounded by ... other young players. All of them players who haven't played a single playoff game. All of them players who do not understand what it takes to win, and what winning brings with it (media attention, interviews, all at a much higher intensity than anything they've experienced). Shit, these guys probably don't know where to find the best titty bars in 30 NBA cities.

That's why we're seeing the Cavs sign Jones. And pursue Marion. And be linked to Billups and Shuttlesworth. After signing James and Miller. The young guys (Irving, Waiters, and Thompson for sure; we can extend this list to include Delly and Harris as well; and we might even want to throw Love on there, as a 25-year-old who has never sniffed the playoffs) are going to be surrounded by veterans who have won (all of the guys mentioned have at least one ring). Veterans who know how to walk the walk. Veterans who, if there's so much as a mouse fart of trouble between Irving and Waiters this season, will shove the ball so far up their asses, their shit will say "Spalding" for a week.

That's why those guys would be here -- to build that culture that Gilbert and Griffin talk so much about. And if Ray or Jones can come off the bench and hit a game-winning three along the way, that's just gravy.