Knixkik wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:He's breaking down in year 1 of 5 though

He has an injury. Do you consider every player who has an injury "breaking down." Is Durant breaking down? Westbrook? Lebron?

fishmike wrote:its loose cartilage from the meniscus. So what happens is when your active (running) it causes friction. That causes swelling. That causes soreness and a drop in performance (athleticism). The surgery would be to clean that out.

As these things go its on the side of good. I would be much more worried if it was shoulders

Exactly. These are basic injuries that happen to all players. It's mind boggling how concerned people are with Melo's health.

Knixkik wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:He's breaking down in year 1 of 5 though

He has an injury. Do you consider every player who has an injury "breaking down." Is Durant breaking down? Westbrook? Lebron?

Within the same season, there's been discussion of him having a bad back and a bad knee. That's not good.

And these things get exaggerated by media and fans. It's just added drama. Minor injuries.

Vmart wrote:Trade him to the Bulls for Butler, Gibson and McDermott or pick.

Trade rape of the week.

(onto the orginal discussion)Why the hell would Melo want to go play in the middle of nowhere in minny

BRIGGS wrote:Put it this way, either I get a haul assets for Melo or I'd be more than happy to keep him.

I feel we can get 2-3 highly valuable drafted players who can help now AND a combination of FA that will help fill out the roster nicely. The one thing I want to keep open is money for a super max contract for 2016 because Im not sure Kevin Durant is all that happy in OKC.

Lets say we draft two really good bigs and a guard sign a really good guard and gives us a foundation of a big 4 with 2 upfront and 2 on the wing. KD may like the opportunity in the east. That would give us two elite scorers from the wing--lets say we have two really good 1.5's and two promising 4/5's ---a few smart smaller moves and were right there.

durant is from dc. dc will have space. dc has wall/beal. why does durant go to ny in 2016 over dc?

While I can't speak for melo, Im going to assume Minny is not a place he will waive his no trade clause for. I can see the attraction for Briggs as they have a "Treasure" of young players but I doubt they will cash them in for Melo, nor would they pay a good price for a dude just off surgery. The salary considerations of such a deal also has ramifications for a small market teams owner. If Glenn Taylor somehow wants to now starphuch and bring a big name for a roster then depleted of its yoot is not something I'd see them do.

Personally I love the Idea and would hope something like this would happen but its fantasy......

BRIGGS wrote:Put it this way, either I get a haul assets for Melo or I'd be more than happy to keep him.

I feel we can get 2-3 highly valuable drafted players who can help now AND a combination of FA that will help fill out the roster nicely. The one thing I want to keep open is money for a super max contract for 2016 because Im not sure Kevin Durant is all that happy in OKC.

Lets say we draft two really good bigs and a guard sign a really good guard and gives us a foundation of a big 4 with 2 upfront and 2 on the wing. KD may like the opportunity in the east. That would give us two elite scorers from the wing--lets say we have two really good 1.5's and two promising 4/5's ---a few smart smaller moves and were right there.

We will just end up keeping Melo. And we won't get what we gave up for him simply because we got him at age 26, and he is now 30. He still has great years left, but won't improve as a player. I'm hoping we can eventually surround him with another 2 or 3 capable scorers, so eventually his minutes can be reduced to 32 or so, and he doesn't need to score more than 20-22 per game. Maybe then he will remain fresh, and all of the breaking down talk will go away. Adding Dragic, Okafor or Towns, and Millsap or Monroe will go a long way. Not sure if we have a chance at Durant, but we will see.

smackeddog wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:Put it this way, either I get a haul assets for Melo or I'd be more than happy to keep him.

I feel we can get 2-3 highly valuable drafted players who can help now AND a combination of FA that will help fill out the roster nicely. The one thing I want to keep open is money for a super max contract for 2016 because Im not sure Kevin Durant is all that happy in OKC.

Lets say we draft two really good bigs and a guard sign a really good guard and gives us a foundation of a big 4 with 2 upfront and 2 on the wing. KD may like the opportunity in the east. That would give us two elite scorers from the wing--lets say we have two really good 1.5's and two promising 4/5's ---a few smart smaller moves and were right there.

The freed up $25 mil per season in cap space is the boatload of assets.

Too much cap space is counter productive- no talented FA wants to sign with an empty team- thats why the Sixers can't get any free agent. I'd be all for the cap space IF we had our pick in 2016, but not having that royally screws us.

This is exactly right. We need to have some sort of foundation, can't be 100% bare. Having an all-star on the roster and a top 3 pick is a good place to be, but you dont want to be less than that, it's extemely counter productive and the Sixers are a great example of that. The Sixers will have to rely solely on internal improvement the next few years, and since they are willing to trade players who become too productive too quickly, i am not sure what the turning point is there, or if there ever will be one.

Bonn1997 wrote:

smackeddog wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:Put it this way, either I get a haul assets for Melo or I'd be more than happy to keep him.

I feel we can get 2-3 highly valuable drafted players who can help now AND a combination of FA that will help fill out the roster nicely. The one thing I want to keep open is money for a super max contract for 2016 because Im not sure Kevin Durant is all that happy in OKC.

Lets say we draft two really good bigs and a guard sign a really good guard and gives us a foundation of a big 4 with 2 upfront and 2 on the wing. KD may like the opportunity in the east. That would give us two elite scorers from the wing--lets say we have two really good 1.5's and two promising 4/5's ---a few smart smaller moves and were right there.

The freed up $25 mil per season in cap space is the boatload of assets.

Too much cap space is counter productive- no talented FA wants to sign with an empty team- thats why the Sixers can't get any free agent. I'd be all for the cap space IF we had our pick in 2016, but not having that royally screws us.

No talented FA wants to come to a 5 win team either.
Rebuilding a .100 team is a long-term process.

It's how you sell them on turning it around- in the offseason, they can say Phil is here, Melo is here, hopefully the number 1 draft pick is here (which is why it's crucial to win the lottery- not just for talent, but also to sell hope to free agents), plus the prospect of signing multiple good players to accompany them. Thats not going to convince guys like Gasol, but it might win round the 2nd tier guys we're targeting. Take Melo off the team, and you'll scare away even those guys unless you massively overpay them.

smackeddog wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

smackeddog wrote:

Bonn1997 wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:Put it this way, either I get a haul assets for Melo or I'd be more than happy to keep him.

I feel we can get 2-3 highly valuable drafted players who can help now AND a combination of FA that will help fill out the roster nicely. The one thing I want to keep open is money for a super max contract for 2016 because Im not sure Kevin Durant is all that happy in OKC.

Lets say we draft two really good bigs and a guard sign a really good guard and gives us a foundation of a big 4 with 2 upfront and 2 on the wing. KD may like the opportunity in the east. That would give us two elite scorers from the wing--lets say we have two really good 1.5's and two promising 4/5's ---a few smart smaller moves and were right there.

The freed up $25 mil per season in cap space is the boatload of assets.

Too much cap space is counter productive- no talented FA wants to sign with an empty team- thats why the Sixers can't get any free agent. I'd be all for the cap space IF we had our pick in 2016, but not having that royally screws us.

No talented FA wants to come to a 5 win team either.
Rebuilding a .100 team is a long-term process.

It's how you sell them on turning it around- in the offseason, they can say Phil is here, Melo is here, hopefully the number 1 draft pick is here (which is why it's crucial to win the lottery- not just for talent, but also to sell hope to free agents), plus the prospect of signing multiple good players to accompany them. Thats not going to convince guys like Gasol, but it might win round the 2nd tier guys we're targeting. Take Melo off the team, and you'll scare away even those guys unless you massively overpay them.

yr 1 that got us Jason Smith

We'll see what happens in yr 2

Knixkik wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:Put it this way, either I get a haul assets for Melo or I'd be more than happy to keep him.

I feel we can get 2-3 highly valuable drafted players who can help now AND a combination of FA that will help fill out the roster nicely. The one thing I want to keep open is money for a super max contract for 2016 because Im not sure Kevin Durant is all that happy in OKC.

Lets say we draft two really good bigs and a guard sign a really good guard and gives us a foundation of a big 4 with 2 upfront and 2 on the wing. KD may like the opportunity in the east. That would give us two elite scorers from the wing--lets say we have two really good 1.5's and two promising 4/5's ---a few smart smaller moves and were right there.

We will just end up keeping Melo. And we won't get what we gave up for him simply because we got him at age 26, and he is now 30. He still has great years left, but won't improve as a player. I'm hoping we can eventually surround him with another 2 or 3 capable scorers, so eventually his minutes can be reduced to 32 or so, and he doesn't need to score more than 20-22 per game. Maybe then he will remain fresh, and all of the breaking down talk will go away. Adding Dragic, Okafor or Towns, and Millsap or Monroe will go a long way. Not sure if we have a chance at Durant, but we will see.

I like Melo--I have zero qualms about keeping him. The fact is he was on a playoff team that avg a nearly a ..600 regular season record for 11 straight seasons. I really think he should take car of whatever problem is ailing him. At this pace we have a high probability of getting one of Towns or Okafor and maybe the Knicks can be savvy enough to be able to acquire players like Portis or Kaminsky if they are around 16-18. Chicago has 17 and two picks--perhaps theyd like to shift that to 2018.

Whatever it is--we are going to improve next year-but if it was me--Id make sure the cap space for 2016 is there for KD. Im not one of those people who think this team cant be really good with Melo--hes already proven he can be a main cog and win 54 games here. Its not his fault that we had bad secondary parts.