Every Rebuilding Scenario Requires Drafting Well

by David A. Arnott on Nov 21, 2009 10:25 AM EST Comment 20 comments

Fickleness is a funny thing. Maybe the first three games of the Stephen Jackson Era have given us buyer's remorse, but in comments here and elsewhere, I'm seeing pleas to blow it all up and start over. The only problem is we can't.

One of my college friends writes Cleveland Frowns, a blog about Cleveland sports, and one of his go-to points about the Browns is that rebuilding them properly necessitates getting worse before getting better. Our situation is similar. Right now, if we decided we wanted to blow up the team and start over, the easiest thing to do, from a roster management point of view, is to simply ride out the contracts we have, only sign low-cost one-year free agents, and draft as well as possible until we have some homegrown stars who form attractive enough a team to bring other players who can support a championship caliber team.

We could also simply overpay for non-superstars and hope we hit the jackpot, like the Magic did with Rashard Lewis's contract. If we do nothing else, in the summer of 2011, we'll have shed Tyson Chandler's and Nazr Mohammed's contracts, which will probably be enough space to overpay for the likes of J.R. Smith, Troy Murphy, and David West. We'll have to draft well in order to make this work, because knowingly overpaying for someone only works when we're knowingly underpaying a bunch of guys, as draft picks are invariably underpaid.

The third option is the most unlikely. We could trade away every attractive player we have, from Gerald Wallace to Stephen Jackson to Boris Diaw, for unproven upside projects. For instance, Toronto might figure their offense is so good this year that they just need a defensive stopper to complete the championship picture, and Gerald Wallace would make sense. Maybe Washington is willing to take a chance on Stephen Jackson. I don't know what other teams will want from our roster, but I do know that those teams won't want to give up their most valuable lottery tickets in exchange for our proven non-superstars.

In the end, every single scenario requires the Bobcats to draft well in order to rebuild. We have to trap players here. Milwaukee showed us one way to do it. Say Brandon Jennings becomes the next Dwyane Wade. They've got him under control for years, paired with Andrew Bogut (another draft pick), and shrewd pickups like Hakim Warrick.

Of course, the current Bobcats brass isn't exactly noted for its drafting acumen. The real change probably starts there.

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Good Post...

I think drafting from now on will be super important..I think not drafting Brook Lopez will haunt is in the long run…but regardless whats the point of drafting well if LB is gonna play them any of them???

by jay23 on Nov 21, 2009 11:23 AM EST reply actions

exactly how does he expect them to turn out well when they dont even have any experience

Gerald Wallace is the best player the Bobcats will have..... EVER

by raysfan81 on Nov 21, 2009 6:13 PM EST up reply actions

Conditional draft picks

I may be dead wrong here – it’s well out of my area of expertise – but it’s my understanding that we have at least one or two conditional draft picks already promised to other teams because of prior trades. Does anyone know how this works? A few days ago I did some reading on them and just wound up confused. It would suck to get one of the first 3 picks next summer only to be forced to give it over to another team because of fine print in a prior deal.

David, I think this post is very astute and it’s understandable that most here, myself included, are starting to get desperate. I think we all realize that this season is looking like a wash and we don’t want to wind up in lottery limbo as we have the past several seasons. It gets us nowhere. If nothing changes we’re going to spend a couple of seasons in a very nasty Twilight Zone with these contracts.

We can hold a fire sale to unload the multi-year paper we’re holding but we all know that will also mean saying goodbye to the few bright spots on the roster. Teams that have done this in the past haven’t seemed to have a lot of luck with it and the rebuild takes as much time as just standing pat.

The Bulls did a gorgeous job of trading and dumping and wound up with about 1/2 dozen first round picks as a result. I’d suggest studying the types of moves they made to position themselves and copy it closely with the Cats, but it didn’t exactly buy Chicago a title in the long view.

I think it’s okay for us to spend a little panic, but hopefully the front office is looking at the same nightmare with level heads. Dare we dream?

One thing is for sure, the next several weeks are going to involve some changes – lineup changes, personnel changes, and quite possibly a shocking trade or two as we lose someone we love like Crash Wallace in yet another mystifying shuffle. It’s a bit scary and the 5 Cats taking the floor come Christmas will likely look completely different than the group walking out to center court to face Indiana on SUnday afternoon.

by Ourdaywillcome on Nov 21, 2009 11:35 AM EST reply actions

I believe Portland is better team to copy simply b/c they built a better team then Chicago and they did it strictly through Draft…ofcourse their draft choices panned out but they did an excellent job

by jay23 on Nov 21, 2009 2:05 PM EST up reply actions

Two outstanding trades involving our picks.

We owe a 1st-round pick to Minnesota (through Denver) from the trade for Ajinca’s draft spot. It’s top 12 protected this year, top 10 next, top 8 in 2012 top 3 in 2013, and then finally unprotected in 2014.

Phoenix owes us a second-rounder next year, although there are some conditions attached to that pick that I can’t find (top-40 protected is a pretty standard 2nd-round condition, though.

And I’m sorry if you truly believe this front office has the capacity to drag us out of NBA hell, “level heads” or not. Nothing they’ve done indicates they can.

Remember when the Panthers had a good offensive line? Yeah, me too.
--Darin Gantt

by MichaelProcton on Nov 21, 2009 3:52 PM EST up reply actions

I'd love t see this blown up....

and built around young talent. But that ain’t gonna happen.

Blogging at Ridiculous Upside, where my terrible writing meets people's eyes.

by Aisander D on Nov 21, 2009 1:48 PM EST reply actions

Not when your coach refuses to play anybody young.

Remember when the Panthers had a good offensive line? Yeah, me too.
--Darin Gantt

by MichaelProcton on Nov 21, 2009 3:52 PM EST up reply actions

I will never be able to bear seeing Gerald leave

He has been one of the only bright spots in the history of this franchise (along with Okafor and you see how we treated him)

Gerald Wallace is the best player the Bobcats will have..... EVER

by raysfan81 on Nov 21, 2009 6:16 PM EST reply actions

This just in: Drafting well helps team in the future...

In other news, ball must go through the hoop to score points.

Tell us something we don’t know David!

by and1droid on Nov 21, 2009 8:08 PM EST reply actions

Bullshit.

The Lakers don’t have to draft well. They just buy free agents to fill out their rotation.

Remember when the Panthers had a good offensive line? Yeah, me too.
--Darin Gantt

by MichaelProcton on Nov 21, 2009 11:06 PM EST up reply actions

Now this is the type of Rufus conversation I've come to know and love....

bitterness, anger, and venom spraying!

Blogging at Ridiculous Upside, where my terrible writing meets people's eyes.

by Aisander D on Nov 21, 2009 11:32 PM EST up reply actions

It is none of that

Cats have no cash to buy quality Free agents…
Procton is correct
All we got is bargein basement players….a medeocre d league team…..

I wonder if Oprah would buy the cats from Bob Johnson…then we’d have a bottomless budget that would be wiling to buy what we need.

Stern would like it because there would still be a majority Black owner, Oprag could buy the players we eed, and she could do like she used to on her talk show, and just give away some tickets to fill the arena for games…even give away some season tickets…

I can see it now…

All our games televised on OWN (Oprah Winfrey Network)

I gotta stop…tearing up here…

by andrewlail76 on Nov 22, 2009 8:54 AM EST up reply actions

Is it even a possibility?

But if it that would be sick…she could easily put us back on the map and attract a superstar to come here…

by jay23 on Nov 22, 2009 10:10 AM EST up reply actions

I wasn't being bitter, just having a little fun w/ David

As for the Lakers, most of their stars and rotation guys weren’t drafted. That’s not exactly the league norm though.

Most of the good and even average teams that I can think of have benefited from great draft picks (Houston (Yao), S.A., Miami, Cleveland, Orlando, Portland, Toronto, Utah, OKC, Denver, etc.).

Here’s the thing though, despite what many hindsight bloggers want to think, the draft can often be a crap shoot. If Cleveland didn’t happen to get LBJ would they be anywhere near contention right now? Same could be said for Orlando. Sometimes the obvious pick falls in your lap (Durrant to OKC), and sometimes you look like a genius for having a prospect pan out (Indiana and Granger). There have been enough bad draft picks by most every team to make the “Draft Well” idea kind of useless.

Charlotte certainly did make a big mistake by picking Morrison, and the UNC draft of 05 can be criticized (though both players fit Bickerstaff’s vision at the time), but the simple fact is that the Bobcats are part of the same crap shoot that ever other team in the NBA is in. Charlotte just hasn’t struck gold yet.

by and1droid on Nov 22, 2009 10:21 AM EST up reply actions

Bobcats don’t have the money nor do they have a desirable roster or city or basketball traditional to attract a superstar…so we only have an option of developing a draft pick and hope he turn into a superstar…

If I was a rising superstar I wouldn’t mind coming here…b/c I could be that player that took a bad team over the hump and be remembered as franchises best player ever and also get recognized around the NBA…

by jay23 on Nov 22, 2009 10:09 AM EST up reply actions

I don't disagree that that's a possibility.

But players don’t get remembered for turning franchises around. They get remembered because they were great players.

Remember when the Panthers had a good offensive line? Yeah, me too.
--Darin Gantt

by MichaelProcton on Nov 22, 2009 12:31 PM EST up reply actions

they get remembered for both

Gerald Wallace is the best player the Bobcats will have..... EVER

by raysfan81 on Nov 22, 2009 2:36 PM EST up reply actions

man I need to get my glasses...too many typos above

by andrewlail76 on Nov 22, 2009 8:54 AM EST reply actions

KEEP Gerald Wallace !!

Honestly, I don’t care what the hell we do with our roster, but whatever we do, Wallace needs to stay. Period.

I don’t like hearing talk suggesting he should leave.

Our current roster could obviously use a few tweaks, but I will say this: I think our picks this year were good (although they obviously could have been better)—we’re just not taking advantage of them, me thinks.

And about the mentality of “getting a lot worse before getting better” —-at this point in time, I don’t even think that matters anymore. People have been saying this for like five years now, and nothing really comes of it anyway. Work hard, play hard, and above all, be patient. Unfortunately, the way the sports world works today, there is little room for patience.

by Roger, Roger on Nov 22, 2009 6:32 PM EST reply actions