How bad would we be if....

[bleedspeed]

We didn't trade Love.

I think we would have been about the same. Love would have got his numbers, but we wouldn't win. I do think last night was a game we would have won with Love playing for us.

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

Yeah, probably about the same...the Wolves' record with Love and without Rubio hasn't been very good. I do think that Love, Dieng, Brewer, Shabazz and Williams would have beaten Philly last night though...Philly is that bad.

[bleedspeed]

The injuries are killing us for sure. The Rubio one really hurt and was a surprise. Pek and Martin were expected to a degree. I think we know it can't get worse. It will be interesting how this team improves with we get some players healthy.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

If we kept Love while having the coaching change from Adelman to Flip? We'd be the same!? Fuck no. Take that nonsense elsewhere you Love detractors.

Assuming Rubio, Martin and Pekovic got hurt in the same manner. That also leaves Young, Bennett and Wiggins off the team without a Love to Cleveland trade. Though, I actually think Flip could have still pursued Young to be a SF here. Would have been a good fit with Love.

BUT for sake of argument, let's say Flip doesn't do a Shved/Mbah a Moute/Super protected 1st round pick for Young trade during the off-season...

We're left with Williams-Brewer-Muhammad-Love-Dieng starting lineup with minimal adjustments to the bench as it stands now. That's still a star player there guys. That's got the offensive juggernaut we sorely lack. It's got a knockdown shooter we sorely lack. It has a go-to option we sorely lack.

We keep it very interesting against Memphis, Chicago, Miami, Orlando, Dallas, Sacramento and New Orleans with Love on the roster (with normal starters healthy for first five games).That's four added wins at the least. I'd say we beat Memphis OR Chicago, Brooklyn, Orlando, Miami, LAL, Sacramento and Philly with Love and close losses to New Orleans and Portland. Basically, we'd be .500 right now with Rubio, Martin and Pekovic on the bench. That's making it through the storm waiting for reinforcements. Our biggest problem has been scoring the goddamn basketball. We put up 70ish on Philly for crying out loud. Our defense stays shitty with Love, but I'll be damned if our offense wasn't supremely better.

[bleedspeed]

Cam, I don't think he has us at .500 ball. I think we have closer games, but I don't see us winning a lot of these games. I just don't think the team would have been good enough with or without Love.

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

There's no way Love has us even close to .500 if he's playing with Williams, Dieng, Muhammad and Brewer. That would be the worst defensive starting lineup in basketball, and Love couldn't score enough points to overcome the lack of defense. And we would still only have 1 real PG and 1 real center and really no scoring options on the bench. Take a look at the Wolves' win/loss record after Rubio went down two years ago even though Love was healthy...it was atrocious. The Cavs have been fortunate enough to play almost twice as many games at home as on the road so far this season, and they play in the weak East. But still they are barely over .500, and Love has the best player in the world playing with him as well as another all star. There's a little bit of a drop off when you compare Irving and LeBron to Mo and Corey! Love has never been able to lead the Wolves to a winning record, and it's preposterous to think he would be doing it this year with three starters hurt.