Minnesota Sports Forum

It's early but does anyone have any value or cheaper FAs they would be interested in? What about throw some decent money at a young guy like Harkless to be a possible true SF for this team?

Brandon Jennings could be a bargain pickup. I like Harkless. Not sure why he has not fit anywhere yet though.

Festus Ezeli, Andrew Nicholson, Tyler Zeller, James Johnson. Those are some quality players that I don't think will be too expensive given what they provide to a team.

Also, I'd rather throw an offer sheet at Allen Crabbe for $7-10M per than give Harrison Barnes the max.

Camden0916 wrote:Festus Ezeli, Andrew Nicholson, Tyler Zeller, James Johnson. Those are some quality players that I don't think will be too expensive given what they provide to a team.

Also, I'd rather throw an offer sheet at Allen Crabbe for $7-10M per than give Harrison Barnes the max.

Good list

How "Cheap" will Festus be?

Crabbe has been really effective. Why can't we find a guy like that? And when I say that I mean we need to find guys like that but not have to pay them that big money at first.

Camden0916 wrote:Festus Ezeli, Andrew Nicholson, Tyler Zeller, James Johnson. Those are some quality players that I don't think will be too expensive given what they provide to a team.

Also, I'd rather throw an offer sheet at Allen Crabbe for $7-10M per than give Harrison Barnes the max.

+1 on Nicholson, has a relationship with Wiggins too, can hit the 3. I like his game, and would be a great 2nd unit guy.

The problem is a cheap/value FA play doesn't move the needle much for us. We need to start making plays for high quality players so we can start hunting for a playoff spot next year. Does Ezili make us a playoff team next year? Highly doubtful because of the role he plays. I'd rather overpay really good players who may not end up being great, than try to hit the jackpot on cheap/value based moves. Barnes is an elite 3 and D guy. At worst that's what he would be for us and he could be more in a bigger role. He would never be our alpha dog though. He'd always be behind Wiggins and Towns.

I just want more quality NBA players on the team so that we can finally climb to .500 and go from there. You can't give a guy a max contract in our situation and not know EXACTLY what you're getting. To me, that's irresponsible leadership. Barnes is an elite 3 and D guy and hasn't shown anything that says he'll be more than that.

Camden0916 wrote:I just want more quality NBA players on the team so that we can finally climb to .500 and go from there. You can't give a guy a max contract in our situation and not know EXACTLY what you're getting. To me, that's irresponsible leadership. Barnes is an elite 3 and D guy and hasn't shown anything that says he'll be more than that.

He's not getting a max. Nobody is gonna pay him $22+ million and hope he lives up to it because he won't. The Warriors offered him 16. I think he'll get 18-20 and they won't match because that's too much for a 4th option with Steph's deal up after next year. A guy who's elite at our two biggest weaknesses who has room for improvement (I'm most interested to see what Ryan could do with his handle after watching how much Wiggins has improved this quickly) is probably worth that money considering our two best players are on rookie deals so his deal would never stomp on any major toes.

So...are we supposed to pay Barnes 18 million or more and then in a couple years be paying Towns Wiggins and our other stud we draft this year (or some other player) all a ton of money? Good teams find value players. If Barnes doesn't get max money he is going to get a lot from someone. Book it. I am all for quality over quantity, but you still have to be smart on how you spend. Its all a gamble just in different ways.

monsterpile wrote:So...are we supposed to pay Barnes 18 million or more and then in a couple years be paying Towns Wiggins and our other stud we draft this year (or some other player) all a ton of money? Good teams find value players. If Barnes doesn't get max money he is going to get a lot from someone. Book it. I am all for quality over quantity, but you still have to be smart on how you spend. Its all a gamble just in different ways.

Here's the thing. We're talking a 1 year overlap with Towns and 2 with Wiggins if we sign Barnes to the max 4 year deal (not max dollars) we can offer him. It's not like a big deal to Barnes also stays with Wiggins and Towns' deal long-term. That's when you add the value guys around Towns and Wiggins. Why are we saving money for guys when the money will be there almost regardless unless we add multiple big money guys which we can't really do anyway due to Ricky and Pek's deals? Pek's deal expiring covers most of Wiggins' raise when it starts and Ricky's expiring could cover most of KAT's if needed. If you wait to offer someone the max then you really tie up cap space with that deal overlapping multiple years with Wiggins and Towns and our draft pick this year. What if we did a 3 year max deal for Barnes and it overlaps with only 1 Wiggins year and no Towns years? I think too many people are worried about what the payroll will look like in 3-4 years and beyond when that's exactly when his deal will expire and not matter on those other deals anyway. Meanwhile we get better right away for the next 3-4 years and don't fully bank on the Towns/Wiggins bandwagon carrying the team by themselves with value role players around them for the next couple years.