lipoli390 wrote:I hope Flip is just posturing. But I think Flip fully intends to keep Love. I think that would be a mistake. There is a window of opportunity here to turn a lemon into Lemonade as a number of teams foam at the mouth at the prospect of adding a young all-star PF to their roster. Unfortunately, I think Flip believes his own rhetoric about the team being close and just needing a tweak or two. I remember McHale and Babcock telling us for years in season ticket holder meetings that the team was "close." Sadly, they actually believe the line they were feeding us. I suspect that Flip, Babcock and Flip's lackey from Washington have all similarly deluded themselves into believing they can turn last year's team into a playoff team and a successful enough team to keep Love. Here are some problems with that thinking:
1. The Wolves were remarkably healthy last season. Our two best players, Love and Ricky, played almost every game without being seriously hobbled by any nagging injuries. Kevin Martin was unusually healthy - something we can't count on again given his track record and age. Memphis lost one of their top two players, Gasol, for nearly 30 games and had to adjust to a new head coach, yet they still won 50 games. Memphis will likely be even stronger next season and the rest of the Conference will likely get stronger.
2. The Wolves have no cap room and no attractive assets other than Love and Rubio to trade. We have one other very good player, Pek, but he has an expensive, long term contract and ongoing ankle issues. The rest of the roster players have contracts that exceed their on-court value.
3. As much as many of us complained about Adelman, he was a hall-of-fame head coach and we can't count on hiring anyone as good, much less better.
Love is hot asset right now and we need to strike while that iron is hot. The risk of losing him after next season is far too big a gamble given the situation we're in. A decision by Flip to roll the dice on keeping Love would be reckless.
We don't know what Flip is thinking, of course, but I tend to think you're right, lip...that he thinks this team is close and some tweaking can get them into the playoffs, and maybe even convince Kevin to stay. But I also think he is holding on to realism too, and knows that the prudent thing to do is to listen to all possible offers, and strike if something is really good. Maybe I just think that because that is the way I would be thinking.
My concern is that the rumored deals are better than what is actually going to be offered, and in that case I would like Flip to wait. I think a guy like Ainge is more likely to offer something like Sullinger and unattractive pieces (to balance out the $), the 16th pick and the protected Philly pick. Or Cleveland holds on to the #1 pick and just offers players. In these cases, I think Flip has to be patient and not pull the trigger. It's going to be a realaly interesting process.
