He’s an unequivocal hall of famer who in his prime was for sure better than the worst member of any Big 3 in recent history, including Chris Bosh and Kevin Love and, yes, Draymond Green and Klay Thompson. This is the sort of take you’d expect from someone who’s unaware basketball existed before the rise of Golden…

All Cousins has to do is play up to his standards and not act like a dick in the locker room and he’ll absolutely increase his market value. Your first and second sentences are contradictory, and you seem to halfway acknowledge it without realizing it undermines your argument. Cousins’ ‘market value’ didn’t matter in…

Right, and I understand that’s part of the allure. And if BKN 2017 turns out to be the fifth pick, maybe there’s some regret, and certainly its value depreciates. On the other hand, it’s a strong draft, you can get an excellent prospect with that pick which maybe couldn’t be said about past years’ drafts. Either way,…

I think the Celtics drafting is fine, nothing exceptional, but a little above average. I disagree that the assets from the Nets trade have expiration dates though. On the contrary-those players will be just entering their primes as Jimmy Butler, who’s played a million minutes in his career thanks to Thibs, begins his…

Yeah, but that ignores the fact that among Jaylen Brown and the two forthcoming Brooklyn Nets picks, one of them has a high likelihood of blossoming into a star. They’re probably going to get three shots at a top-5 pick, at worse; it’s not too often that a front office as sharp as Boston’s whiffs on all three. With…

This is a curious argument. You compare Boston and Philly in favor of Philly by dismissing Boston because of its “very pointless #2 ranking in the East.” What is desperate about a situation where a team with tons of assets has the #2 seed? Philly has Joel Embiid (a huge injury risk) and Boston has a host of other…

I more or less agree. (I also like the idea of trading IT if you can get something like top fifteen value for him, which seems unlikely even though he’s been playing astonishingly well.) But I think IT’s been a much better and more efficient scorer than Carmelo this season, and if you add him I think it’s a marginal…

Yeah, and Steph also averaged over 17 points, 6 assists, and 2 steals as a 21 year old rookie. Ingram’s a million years from that.

That’s fair, and I understated Kupchak’s moves during the aughts. And the old Kobe move was awful but probably driven by ownership. I guess it’s more that I’ve been unimpressed by most of Kupchak’s recent moves. I agree Magic doesn’t show any sign of being a brilliant GM; his lone asset seems to be his ability to lure…

Probably the hope is that he doesn’t give Mozgov and Deng $130 million on the backside of their careers. The franchise pretty clearly needed a reset after struggling to recruit free agents. Clarkson took a step back this year; Russell isn’t quite as good as you’d expect after escaping Kobe’s shadow. Ingram’s looking…

I mean, Russell and Ingram are both #2 picks who at this extremely early stage of their careers don’t exactly look to be living up to the hype. Sure plenty of players improve and mature but most of the late bloomers still looked better than this in the early going. Clarkson, Nance and Zubac were solid choices, but a…

the bulls aren’t totally brain dead? hmm.

That seems like an awful lot to me. The 2018 pick and jaylen and maaaybe avery is a pretty healthy return for Butler, and arguably too much.

They traded so little it would’ve been worth it if they knew for a certainty he was leaving after the 2018 season.

I think it’s unequivocally worse. The Nets trade was abysmal, but that’s mostly in hindsight. At the time, Pierce and KG were at least, in theory, the finishing pieces to a championship contender that let Brooklyn clear their roster of all their dead weight in the process. (Of course, they’d have nothing but dead…

1 - True, but it sort of feels like, starting maybe last season or the one before, that LeBron isn’t getting quite as many of those all-star calls. Back in 2009-2014 or so it seemed like it was over the top and you couldn’t breathe on him, but lately I feel like it’s swung back the other way a bit. That might just be…

I think Crowder’s ankle injuries have just cost him a half-step and some explosiveness, which is especially noticeable on defense, where he’s slipped markedly this season. He’s sort of made up for it with his great 3 point shooting, but it’s definitely a concern when he’s the best bet to slow LeBron (though I suppose…

Oh, I agree about the Ainge reports-which always strike me as mostly fabricated to keep the fan base placated. Although they shouldn’t be necessary, I think Ainge is a top-5 GM, even if he’s enjoyed extraordinary good fortune and taken advantage of personal ties for some of his best moves. And this has to be…

All of that will probably come to pass, but I don’t fault Ainge for passing on making a big move. The Celtics have a chance to create an incredible team over the long haul if they just retain their current players, add a mid-level ‘star’ in free agency, then add two top-5 draft picks over the next few years courtesy…

I know. Just didn’t feel like being called a homer by saying it.