Minnesota Sports Forum

Imagine the cap flexibility with Beverly and 30-32 million to spend.

I'm not high on the Lowry signing either, even though I mostly dig him as a player.

And even though I mostly scoffed at the "but it messes up our timeline talk"... I agree when it comes to Lowry. He's small and on the wrong side of 30 and trying to fit in as either a #2 or #3 or even #4 option on a team that hasn't won 41 games in 13 seasons.

With Butler, the Wolves can make the playoffs. That's Step 1... reassess what needs to happen to win in the playoffs from there.

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:I've always liked Beverley's defense, but his offensive game isn't strong enough for me to love this deal. I still want my PG to be primarily a distributor, and if not a great distributor, at least a great scorer...Beverley is neither. Rubio's 9.1 assists per game is more than double Beverley's 4.2. The only way I would love this deal would be if there was a specific reason Thibs needs the extra $10 million he saves by swapping contracts for the next two years, but I don't think cap space is our biggest issue. I'll take the younger player here...Rubio vs. Beverley.

The rub is that Thibs obviously likes the idea of a wing who can create. He force-fed that into Wiggins a bit last season. And Butler arrives with that in his DNA... only he's much better at it.

Beverley would give the Wolves a viable candidate behind the arc (38% career) who doesn't need the ball to be at his best. Rubio does need the ball because his passing is ELITE. But is that needed as much on a team with three guys gifted at creating their own shots (KAT, Wiggins and Butler)?

Plus, there's a different element to his defense... Rubio is a fine defender. At times, he's an absolute joy to watch. Beverley is a punk... a pest... an on-court troll. I can see why a team would want that type of guy on the roster.

All that being said... why would Houston do this?

They're trying to clear cap space to sign a big name FA this summer. There have been salary dump talks since the draft for them.

Yes. I know. I even mentioned that earlier in this thread. How much do they need to clear?

Lou Williams makes $7M... more than Beverley.
Ryan Anderson makes $19M... nearly 4x more than Beveley.

Beverly and Lou get them to 20+ million in cap space. I don't think any team is taking Anderson off their hands. I would expect to see Eric Gordon to move before him. But they need to clear 3 guys or their two whales in Anderson and Gordon and I don't see anyone eating Anderson at 19 million.

Any contract can be moved. Mozgov's contract was just moved... AND the team got D. Russell out of it, too.

And yet Deng is sitting there on that roster still. Not every contract can be moved and they don't have a young upside guy like Russell to throw in a deal with Anderson. Don't be mistaken. Mozgov was only moved because Brooklyn got Russell. If Russell doesn't come with they don't do that deal. What does Houston have that they can send with Anderson to make it worth it to the team taking on his bloated salary?

Lip,
I don't get the window with lowry's age argument at all. Players can be plenty productive at 31-34 years old. When Lowry's 20-25 million would come off the books Kat and Wig and 25 and 26 years old. That's a perfect scenario if you ask me. You're still going to get very productive year from Lowry.

And if you wanna quote everything Jon and Dan talked about and be literal with everything said. Jon said the Bulter acquisition excellerated the timeline. No more years wasted and assessing.

khans2k5 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:I've always liked Beverley's defense, but his offensive game isn't strong enough for me to love this deal. I still want my PG to be primarily a distributor, and if not a great distributor, at least a great scorer...Beverley is neither. Rubio's 9.1 assists per game is more than double Beverley's 4.2. The only way I would love this deal would be if there was a specific reason Thibs needs the extra $10 million he saves by swapping contracts for the next two years, but I don't think cap space is our biggest issue. I'll take the younger player here...Rubio vs. Beverley.

The rub is that Thibs obviously likes the idea of a wing who can create. He force-fed that into Wiggins a bit last season. And Butler arrives with that in his DNA... only he's much better at it.

Beverley would give the Wolves a viable candidate behind the arc (38% career) who doesn't need the ball to be at his best. Rubio does need the ball because his passing is ELITE. But is that needed as much on a team with three guys gifted at creating their own shots (KAT, Wiggins and Butler)?

Plus, there's a different element to his defense... Rubio is a fine defender. At times, he's an absolute joy to watch. Beverley is a punk... a pest... an on-court troll. I can see why a team would want that type of guy on the roster.

All that being said... why would Houston do this?

They're trying to clear cap space to sign a big name FA this summer. There have been salary dump talks since the draft for them.

Yes. I know. I even mentioned that earlier in this thread. How much do they need to clear?

Lou Williams makes $7M... more than Beverley.
Ryan Anderson makes $19M... nearly 4x more than Beveley.

Beverly and Lou get them to 20+ million in cap space. I don't think any team is taking Anderson off their hands. I would expect to see Eric Gordon to move before him. But they need to clear 3 guys or their two whales in Anderson and Gordon and I don't see anyone eating Anderson at 19 million.

Any contract can be moved. Mozgov's contract was just moved... AND the team got D. Russell out of it, too.

And yet Deng is sitting there on that roster still. Not every contract can be moved and they don't have a young upside guy like Russell to throw in a deal with Anderson. Don't be mistaken. Mozgov was only moved because Brooklyn got Russell. If Russell doesn't come with they don't do that deal. What does Houston have that they can send with Anderson to make it worth it to the team taking on his bloated salary?

They've had Deng on the books for less than a year. Recent NBA history is filled with terrible contracts... and many of those contracts have been moved at one point or another.

I'd give your Deng take more merit when (1) LA is still stuck with it in Year 3 or Year 4. (2) We have a lot more evidence that they've failed in their attempts to move it.

Unlike Deng, Anderson still has a place in the NBA, even if it has a lower ceiling... and he costs entirely too much money.

Holy shit, adding Lowry would be going ALL IN on competing deep into the playoffs right now. That would put us right there behind the Warriors and maybe the Spurs in the West in my opinion, depending on how the Rockets, Clippers, and Spurs offseasons go.

I don't really like the balance with so many scorers of adding Lowry. I'd aim to trade Wiggins for a guy more like Avery Bradley if we actually landed Lowry. Or maybe Wiggins for Deandre Jordan?

The whole thing seems crazy, but a part of me thinks, "What the hell, we've waited 12 damn years for this team to be relevant, why not?!"

Lowry, (anybody), Butler, Towns, Jordan

or

Lowry, Bradley, Butler, Gorgui, Towns

Damn.

SameOldNudityDrew wrote:Holy shit, adding Lowry would be going ALL IN on competing deep into the playoffs right now. That would put us right there behind the Warriors and maybe the Spurs in the West in my opinion, depending on how the Rockets, Clippers, and Spurs offseasons go.

I don't really like the balance with so many scorers of adding Lowry. I'd aim to trade Wiggins for a guy more like Avery Bradley if we actually landed Lowry. Or maybe Wiggins for Deandre Jordan?

The whole thing seems crazy, but a part of me thinks, "What the hell, we've waited 12 damn years for this team to be relevant, why not?!"

Lowry, (anybody), Butler, Towns, Jordan

or

Lowry, Bradley, Butler, Gorgui, Towns

Damn.

The market for D. Jordan seems to be cooler than expected. Teams weren't willing to concede a lottery pick for him. I don't think the Wolves should concede Wiggins for him.

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

SameOldNudityDrew wrote:Holy shit, adding Lowry would be going ALL IN on competing deep into the playoffs right now. That would put us right there behind the Warriors and maybe the Spurs in the West in my opinion, depending on how the Rockets, Clippers, and Spurs offseasons go.

I don't really like the balance with so many scorers of adding Lowry. I'd aim to trade Wiggins for a guy more like Avery Bradley if we actually landed Lowry. Or maybe Wiggins for Deandre Jordan?

The whole thing seems crazy, but a part of me thinks, "What the hell, we've waited 12 damn years for this team to be relevant, why not?!"

Lowry, (anybody), Butler, Towns, Jordan

or

Lowry, Bradley, Butler, Gorgui, Towns

Damn.

The market for D. Jordan seems to be cooler than expected. Teams weren't willing to concede a lottery pick for him. I don't think the Wolves should concede Wiggins for him.

I'd rather have Bradley anyway, although I doubt the Lowry signing will happen, and I doubt Ainge would trade Bradley for Wiggins too.

If a guy like Lowry was willing to change his role in Toronto playing with the bench unit more for the betterment of the team I don't see how it'd be a problem adding him here. You stager minutes so after the start of the game you have 2 out of the 4 of Lowry/Butler/Wiggins and Towns on the court until the last 8 minutes when all 4 should play. I think people are too focused on stats when we know Wiggins doesn't care about them and Lowry was willing to change his role for the team to have better success. Everything falls into place when you start winning. Guys sacrifice for winning. Honestly the only person I'd worry about is KAT because of his stat chasing and he's gonna be a top 2 player on the team anyway so I don't see his stats falling off like a Kevin Love. I don't think it would be a problem and if it is something that matters to a guy like Lowry he wouldn't come here anyway knowing he'd no longer be a top 2 option.