Posted by fishmike:
There is no ONE way to build a team. It's about building a group of complimentary players and a coach who can maximize their potential.
actually your wrong except for one team. Larry's Pistons. Aside from that there is ONE way to build a CHAMPIONSHIP team. Its DRAFT a superstar player and build him. If you take the Detriot team out of the equation only the Lakers and Shaq (who used cap space) have been different, and draft day trade aside Jerry West picked Kobe Bryant.
Isiah/Dumars x2
Jordan/Pippen x6
Shaq/Kobe x3
Duncan x3 (if you want to add Robinson go ahead)
Hakeem x2
Wade x1
17 of the last 18 titles won by a team that drafted their best player. I do smell a trend. Do we have a star player worth building around? Do we have the cap space in the future to lure one? Do we have the draft potential this year or next to draft one?
The thing that elevates good players into a great team is usually defense. There's a reason the Knicks gave $50mm to Larry Brown. Everyone knows we can score. Isiah figured if he could get these guys to actually guard we would win a lot of games, so on paper the LB signing makes complete and total sense. Its what happened next that was ugly. Regardless LB is still the only guy suited for this job. If he wants some grinders then go get some. There is such a thing as making trades that fit both the future needs of the franchise and fits the style of play the coach wants as well.
Actually, if what you're saying is true - the Brown signing made no sense. You're saying we don't have a championship caliber player to build around, yet we should start treating a team of young talented players as if we are playing for a championship. Wouldn't it make more sense to develop the players then package them in trades with some of our stickier contracts to get cap room?
As for every champ drafting their best player, I don't remember the Lakers drafting Shaq, maybe I'm wrong. If you're saying Kobe was their best player, that's laughable, but they traded for him on draft day anyway.
My point was that the Heat didn't plan their approach, they made the best of circumstances. The Spurs didn't plan to lose Robinson for a season, they got extremely lucky in what originally seemed like a bad situation.
You're talking about the best players in the entire NBA, of course they are going to be high lotto picks. Yes, Shaq, Jordan, Hakeem, Duncan have accounted for 17 of the last 18 championships. But unless you hit the motherlode in the draft, and we're essentially talking about 4 players over the last twenty years, the draft is just as hit or miss as anything else. For the next ten years we'll probably be talking about Wade and Bron and maybe Dwight Howard and Oden.
Some excellent teams have been built in other ways: this years Mavs, the Nets that got to the Finals, the Pistons, the Kings from the early 2000s, the late 90s Blazers teams, the 90s Utah teams. If it comes down to those teams just not being good enough to beat the elite elite superstars, then I think we already missed our chance this decade.
