The Season Never Ends

  The NBA season ended earlier two weeks ago and not soon enough for me. After my basketball prediction program crashed and burned with its first losing season in the six years I had applied it to seasonal data I found myself $110.50 down at the end of the regular season with half of this losses coming on the last three days of the season. I made up $47 in the first three rounds of the playoffs with a 60% (30-20) success rate with only the finals left to complete my comeback story. I decided to make $5 bets on the first two games to get a feel for the series. I picked the Warriors giving 12 points in game one which turned out to be the only game in the Finals that the Cavaliers managed to cover even as they threw the game away in the closing seconds. I picked the Cavaliers to cover in the first half of the second game which turned out to be a Warriors blowout. I remember how the Cavaliers hung tough in games three and four of last year’s finals so I picked the Cavaliers in the third game but they once again threw away the game in the closing minute and threw away the cover to boot. In game four I was down $84.5 and picked the Cavaliers on the money line for $20 getting 1.55:1 odds. My idea was the Cavaliers would win and get my losses to under $55 and I would go double or nothing on the Warriors to cover in Game five. It seemed like a good idea but the game turned out to be a Warriors blowout and I finished the playoffs only $6 ahead of where I started with a total 148-152 record and $104.50 in losses.

  During the playoffs the Supreme Court made a decision that allows any state to legalize sports betting. The NBA has been ahead of the curve on this issue and Commissioner Adam Silver has long been a proponent of the NBA receiving a percentage of all bets as an ‘integrity fee’. I thought this was an insane idea but after the revelation that Cavaliers superstar LeBron James played the last three games of the finals with a self-diagnosed ‘broken hand’ after punching a whiteboard following the game one debacle I think the league is in dire need of integrity. Warrior bettors got a gift because of the lack of transparency on this injury. I probably wouldn’t have changed my picks but I certainly would have gotten more points on the Cavaliers in games two and three if it had been known James had a broken hand.

  I still plan on placing wagers on next year’s NBA season but since my computer prediction program is in a state of disrepair that I cannot fix by retrograde analysis due to schedule and changes and changes in how players are rested I will leave my prediction program in the ashes of history. I will not be blogging about my betting adventures since I deservedly received no subscription income for my advanced picks. I may move my wagering to a United States betting site as soon as one makes its way to Iowa. I can see sports gambling and the Internet combining to make a betting experience where gamblers will not only bet on games but gamble on the result of a play, what team or player makes the next score, etc., etc., etc. Gambling is going to be the next big revenue stream for sports as soon as they can figure out how to cash in.

  The next big events on the NBA calendar after yesterday’s draft is the free agent signing period which starts July 1st. I don’t follow college basketball and find the draft to be a big guessing game where every year players are picked in the top ten but fail to make a meaningful impact and are shipped off to another team in a couple of years while some passed over players become contributors to winning teams. I’d much rather wait to see which players pan out before congratulating a team for managing to draft a highly touted player who has yet to play an NBA game.

  While I don’t pay much attention to the draft I do pay great attention to the free agency and trade period where teams shuffle their rosters and star players pick their next destination. The top free agent is once again LeBron James Four years ago I wrote that James had two years of being the best player on a championship team. James has proven me wrong as he is still playing at a championship level after 15 years in the league. Like any superstar player he needs to have the proper team around him to win the championship but James is still the best player in the game. There are rumors that James will attempt to create a new super-team with the Lakers or join the talent laden Rockets or 76ers in his quest to get a fourth, fifth, or sixth championship. James career arc reminds me a lot of the great Wilt Chamberlain. Chamberlain was a supremely talented player that generally played on flawed teams most of his career and was maligned for being a loser since his team’s only beat the Bill Russell Celtics one time just like James’ Cavaliers could only get past the Warriors once in four tries. At this stage of his career Chamberlain forced a trade to the Lakers to join Jerry West where he one 1 more championship in four finals appearances. I can see James following the Chamberlain path to the Lakers but think it is more likely that he would join the Rockets since they are already a championship caliber team that could have beaten the Warriors in the playoffs without the inopportune injury to Chris Paul. If I had to place a bet I would pick James staying with the Cavaliers since that is where his family lives but time will tell.

  Time will also tell on the destination 2014 Finals MVP Kawhi Leonard of the San Antonio Spurs. Leonard has one year left on his contract and the Spurs are in position to offer him a ‘supermax’ deal worth $219 MILLION DOLLARS. This is $40 million more than he can get from any other team. Despite this, Leonard he has reportedly demanded a trade from the Spurs. Leonard missed all but nine games of the past season with a quad injury. He was cleared by the Spurs medical staff but he claimed he had lingering pain and continued his recovery with his own set of doctors in New York., there seems to have been a lot of acrimony about the misdiagnosis about Leonard’s injury with his teammates and coaches taking veiled shots at him. If Leonard doesn’t trust his team’s medical staff I can’t see him ever playing for the Spurs again. There are rumors that Leonard wants to go to the Lakers and there will surely be a host of teams looking to make a deal for his services. Leonard was the best player on a championship team in 2014 but that was five years and an ankle and quad injury in the past. I would be very leery about trading draft picks and star players to get a player that missed an entire sason due to injury. As disparate as the Lakers are for a superstar player I don’t see them mortgaging their bright future for Leonard. The teams I can see making a pitch for him are the 76ers who have young players, draft picks, and after the Brian Colangleo twitter fiasco the franchise may be looking to make a big splash. The other team I can see making a big play is the New York Knicks. The Knicks don’t have much in the way of talent to offer but it would be a very Knick thing to do to mortgage any semblance of a future for a superstar’s scrapbook.

New Challenges for New Challengers

  American/Italian Fabiano Caruana won the FIDE candidates chess tournament last month which gives him a match for the world championship against Magnus Carlsen of Norway later this year. This will be the first championship between players from the Western Hemisphere since the 1937 match between Max Euwe of the Netherlands and Alexander Alekhine of France. If you consider Alekhine Russian since that is his country of birth and only left for France after the 1917 revolution than this is the first Western Hemisphere match since Jose Capablanca of Cuba and Emmanuel Lasker of Germany battled for the crown in 1921.

  Caruana was nearly the challenger two years ago when he entered the last round tied with Sergei Karjakin for the lead and playing Karjakin in the final round with an idiotic tiebreak system that was going to have another game decide the tournament winner if the players drew without a playoff. Caruana had the black pieces and as the events in the 'non-deciding' game unfolded needed to play for a win in order to become the challenger. Karjakin won the game and with it the right to challenge Carlsen for the world championship and even held a lead in the championship match with four games left before losing the match in tiebreaks.

  This year’s edition of the Candidates started as Carauana’s to lose as he took the lead in round 4 of the 14-round tournament and held it until round 12 when he lost to Karjakin. Karjakin had lost two of his first four games but with the round 12 win tied Caruana and held the tiebreak in case of a tie with two rounds to go. It looked as if the stage was set for a collapse but Caruana rebounded with two wins in the final two rounds to easily win the tournament. And if winning the candidates tournament wasn’t enough, the very next week Caruana played in the GRENKE Chess classic in Germany and won that tournament with four wins and five draws ahead of Carlsen who managed two wins and seven draws.

  Over the last month it seemed to me that Caruana’s opponents were in the habit of over pressing promising positions and falling prey to counterstrikes but that is just my impression and I am likely not qualified to judge. Winning the last two rounds of the candidates tournament following his losing the sole lead speaks volumes to Caruana’s fighting abilities and grace under pressure. It was certainly a far cry from January’s Tata Chess tournament where Caruana finished 10th out of 14 players with one win and four losses while Carlsen tied for first and won the tournament in a playoff.

  While Caruana has shown flashes of exceptional form and is playing in tournament after tournament, Carlsen has seemed to be enjoying himself. He has been playing in the increasingly popular online blitz tournaments on lichess.org and chess.com. Carlsen has not been beaten in his two classical tournaments this year but has not seemed able to pull out the same amount of victories using his normal strategy of outplaying his opponents after an innocuous opening. I wouldn’t say he seems bored but I don’t seem the same level of effort on his chess than the past.

  In the NBA, the Golden State Warriors do not have the NBA’s best regular season record for the first time in four years. The Warriors have seemed unmotivated all season long with enough talent to still win 70% of their games but the Houston Rockets with their 65 wins have captured the best record in the league and conference and the Toronto Raptors won 59 games to give both teams the home court advantage in a conference finals or NBA finals against the Warriors. In addition to their disinterest, Warriors' two-time MVP Stephen Curry has suffered a series of ankle sprains and will miss the first round of the playoffs with a ligament sprain in his knee. The Warriors have made the last three finals and won two championships which could have been three if they hadn’t had a meltdown for the ages in losing a 3-1 series lead to LeBron James' Cavaliers in the 2016 Finals and it seems the grind of 100+ games per season has gotten to them.

  Will Caruana be the man to take the championship from Carlsen? He is certainly the only one with a chance this year. Caruana has beaten Carlsen in the past and outpaced him in tournaments like the 2014 Sinquefeld Cup and this year’s GRENKE Chess Classic. Caruana has shown the ability to string wins together so the possibility exists that he could just take two or three early games against Carlsen and draw his way to the championships in the current era of 12 game championship matches. Two years ago I felt that the only person that could beat Carlsen was Carlsen himself. This year I think Caruana has a chance of taking the title if he plays at his top level no matter how Carlsen is playing with the big question being whether Caruana will be able to retain the tremendous form he has shown over the past two months.

  Can the Rockets win the NBA title? They seem like a hungry team to me, scapping for wins long after clinching the best record in the league. They also carry a lot of baggage. Superstar James Harden disappeared in last years playof loss to the Spurs with what was purported to be ‘a mysterious illness’ while celebrated new addition Chris Paul has never been to the conference finals as his Clippers teams seemed unable to maintain their poise for more than one playoff series per year. Head coach Mike D’Antoni went to the conference finals twice with the ‘7 seconds or less’ Suns and was seen as being outcoached twice. The team reminds me a lot of the 2011 Dallas Mavericks team that had a crew of hungry experienced players that came together to win a championship but they also remind me of the Maverick teams from the mid 2000’s that consistently underperformed in the playoffs. I tend to think these Rockets are for real and the Warriors will have trouble flipping the switch but the Rockets' collective past failures makes them far from a sure thing although still the favorite.

  The Rockets have much more to prove than Caruana. While Caruana has only one (large) step before claiming the championship, the Rockets have to win four playoff series. The only thing their regular season record has earned them is the right to open each series at home and play a deciding game seven at home is a series comes down to a single game. Caruana has earned a level of immortality by becoming the challenger while the Rockets are only an asterisk at this point.

Panic In Detroit

  The NBA world was rocked by the Los Angeles Clippers trade of Blake Griffin and some spare parts to the Detroit Pistons for Tobias Harris, Avery Bradley, and a protected #1 draft pick. Griffin was arguably the greatest Clipper ever. He was the first overall pick in the 2009 draft, the 2010 Rookie of the Year, and a five time all-star. In the offseason Griffin signed a five year $171 million dollar contract that will take up between a third and fourth of the salary cap of any team he plays for.

  The Clippers were one of the NBA’s most successful regular season franchises since the arrival of all-star point guard Chris Paul in 2011, making the playoffs six straight seasons and winning a playoff series three times. The franchise was scarred when losing to the Houston Rockets in the conference semi-finals after having a 3-1 series lead along with a 25 point lead in the second half of the fifth game. Paul forced a trade to the Rockets this season and the Clippers remade their team around Griffin and center DeAndre Jordan surrounded by the role players received in the Rockets trade and some free-agent pickups. After a 4-0 start, the team started suffering injuries and Griffin missed over a dozen games. The Clippers lost 11 out of 12 but started winning again when Griffin returned and are currently in a battle for the final playoff spots in the Western Conference. This trade signals the start of newly hired consultant and NBA legend Jerry West’s housecleaning as he attempts to rebuild the Clippers into a contender for championships instead of hoping to make the conference finals one of these years.

  Normally getting a five time all-star is considered a steal but there are serious questions about Blake Griffin. He made the all-star team his first five years in the league but was not chosen the last three years mostly due to injuries that have cost him at least 20 games a year. In a salary cap sport like the NBA teams whose top paid players can’t play tend to struggle, much like the Detroit Pistons who started the season with a 14- 6 record including wins over the Warriors and Celtics and then lost 20 of their next 28 games in no small part because point guard Reggie Jackson (the second highest paid player on the team) suffered an ankle injury.

  The Griffin deal is the either the last gasp or the crowning moment of Detroit’s Stan Van Gundy’s tenure as the Coach/GM of the Pistons. This is Van Gundy’s 4th year with the Pistons. The first three years have netted one winning season (44-38) which gave the Pistons the 8th seed and a sweep at the hands of the eventual champion Cavaliers in the opening round of the playoffs.

  Now one playoff sweep in three years may not be seen as an abject failure except that in the NBA most coaches with that sort of record don’t make a fourth year. There are four current NBA coaches that have had one playoff appearance (or less) in the past three years: Steve Clifford of the Hornets who made the playoffs twice in the past four years (losing both times in the first round) but once in the past three years; Quinn Snyder of the Jazz who made the playoffs in his third season and won a playoff series; and Brett Brown of the 76ers who was hired to oversee a team that was purposefully trying to lose as many games as possible. Van Gundy is the fourth. There was not one coach fired from an NBA team last season. This season Phoenix, Memphis, and Milwaukee made coaching changes. The shelf life of an NBA coach that doesn’t make the playoffs on a regular basis is short. Very few coaches get a fourth year with the record Van Gundy has had with the Pistons but he does have the advantage of not only being the coach but also the General Manager.

  Van Gundy's record as a General Manager has been mixed. His 2015 pickups of Tobias Harris from the Orlando Magic and Reggie Jackson from the Thunder worked out well enough. The pickup of Jackson could have been franchise-altering except that Jackson has proven to be injury-prone the past two season which leaves a $14 million player (1/7 of the cap) on the sidelines. He has not proven to be able to develop role players into above average starters and his drafts have been abysmal. His highest pick was the 8th pick in the 2015 draft Stanley Johnson. Johnson has a world of athleticism but has barely been able to crack the starting lineup after three seasons. The 18th pick in the 2016 draft was Henry Ellenson who has barely been able to stay out of the G-League. His 2017 top pick Luke Kennard (12th in the draft) has been a rotation player which may or may not be due to Jackson’s injury and the need for Coach Van Gundy to show that GM Van Gundy has hit on a draft pick.

  Van Gundy received an endorsement from the Pistons owner Tom Gores earlier this year but the team has just moved into a new arena in downtown Detroit and won’t sell tickets without the excitement a winning team will bring without even mentioning the millions in revenue the team gets for having home playoff games. Van Gundy’s 5 year $35 million dollar contract runs out next season and it would not be unreasonable to expect a consistent playoff team by the fourth season. The Pistons had lost eight straight games before the trade (they beat the Cavaliers at home the day the trade was announced). The Griffin trade is an incredibly risky move. Griffin has not proven he can stay healthy for a full season and has missed the last two playoffs with injuries as well. Committing so much of the salary cap for a player that can’t stay healthy could hamstring the franchise for the next decade but Van Gundy does not have to worry about the next decade of Pistons basketball if he cannot turn around this season and he has only 30 games left to do it.

To Stop a Tank

  Lost in the recent ‘revelation’ that shoe companies are bribing collegiate coaches to bribe teenage players to attend the universities that are paid millions of dollars to wear the apparel supplied by the shoe companies and the hubbub over whether professional football players are kneeling, standing, or locking arms during the national anthem was the National Basketball Association changing the draft lottery rules in an attempt to prevent teams from losing on purpose in order to get better draft picks.

  The practice of ‘tanking’ or being as bad as possible in order to get a potentially transcendent player is as old as the basketball draft. Up until the early 1980’s the team with the worst records in the eastern and western conferences conducted a coin flip to determine which team would get the top pick and led to celebrations (and championships) when the Milwaukee Bucks and Portland Trailblazers won their respective coin flips and drafted Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bill Walton, respectively. This system worked until the early 1980’s when the Houston Rockets were accused of losing their last few regular season games to get in the coin flip two years in a row, winning both and selecting Ralph Sampson and Hakeem Olajuwon.

  The new lottery system was designed to give each non-playoff team a one in seven chance at the top draft pick. The first lottery winner was the New York Knicks who drafted Patrick Ewing and earned the league ‘conspiracy theory’ accusations of a rigged lottery to get New York a franchise superstar. The equal chance at the #1 pick lasted only five years and was replaced with the current weighted lottery system where each non-playoff team gets a chance to get one of the top three draft picks with the best of the non-playoff teams having a minuscule chance at a top pick and the team with the worst record in the league a 25% chance at the top pick, a 65% chance at getting a top 3 pick and are assured of no worse than the fourth pick in the draft. These percentages have been in force since 2005 with minor tweaks before that.

  Practice has shown that getting the top pick in a draft with a transcendent player can alter a franchise’s destiny. Tim Duncan transformed the Spurs from a good team to a championship team while Dwight Howard and LeBron James brought their teams to the NBA Finals within five years. Practice has also shown that a poorly run franchise will not make good use of their fortune at getting a top draft pick and remain a lottery team for years. Kwame Brown was Michael Jordan’s choice as the #1 pick for the Wizards in a relatively barren 2001 draft and made no noticeable impact on the team while top picks Greg Oden, Andreas Bargnani, and Andrew Bogut (2007, 2006, and 2005 top picks) were so injury prone that only Bogut of the three was able to help his team make a token playoff appearance.

  Starting with the 2019 Draft, the three worst teams in the league will each have a 14% chance at the top pick in the draft and a 47% chance at getting a top three pick. The beneficiaries are the teams with the seventh through tenth worst records in the league and have doubled or tripled their chances of getting a top three pick. Presumably there will be less incentive to be the worst team in the league since the same draft lottery odds can be obtained by being the third worst team in the league instead.

  This reform is a reaction to the handiwork of former Philadelphia 76er general manager Sam Hinkie. Upon taking over the team in 2012 Hinkie was clear in stating that his process for rebuilding was to stockpile as many top draft picks as possible with the goal of landing enough superstar talent through the draft to have a championship team instead of the low level playoff team he inherited. Hinkie traded every player of value for future draft picks and he continually drafted players that either couldn’t play in their rookie seasons due to injuries (Nerlins Noel, Joel Embiid) or foreign players that were going to play overseas (Dario Saric) which had the effect of an awful team not getting better by virture of their draft picks because the draft picks didn't play for the team. The 76ers were woeful but never had the worst record in the league under Hinkie and never got the number one pick in the draft. They did have the 6th, 3rd, and 3rd picks from 2013 to 2015. During the 2016 season the 76ers hired consultant Jerry Colangelo (head of USA basketball and former owner of the Phoenix Suns) who installed his son Bryan as the president of the team. There is a widespread belief in NBA circles that the change in leadership was pushed on the 76ers by other owners and commissioner Adam Silver in order to improve the ‘optics’ of the 76ers being so blatantly bad for so long in order to accumulate top draft picks. Hinkie resigned shortly thereafter and as fate would have it the 76ers finally got the #1 at the end of the season. Colangelo used the pick to draft consensus top prospect Ben Simmons but in Hinkiean fashion Simmons was injured in training camp and held out for the entire year which gained the 76ers the third pick in this year’s draft which they traded along with another first round pick for the #1 pick in the draft (Markelle Fulz).

  Now the 76ers are the envy of many teams in the league because of all the young talent they have assembled and look like a playoff team for the next few years and if everything breaks right could even be a Finals contender. Other teams have noticed and are also working hard to enhance their draft position. The Phoenix Suns held out all their veteran starters over the last two months of the season and were rewarded with the second worst record in the league which translated to the fourth pick in the draft because of the 76ers and Lakers jumping them in the lottery.

  The copycatting of the 76ers success at assembling talent by being bad is the main reason for the lottery ‘reform’ but it will barely make a dent in tanking in my opinion. A bad team will always have an incentive to be worse to get a better chance to get one of the top picks. The new system removes the incentive to be the WORST team but increases the incentive to be one of the 10 worst teams and there is still a considerable incentive to be one of the three worst teams in the league. The new system sounds great and makes it look like the league is taking tanking seriously but there will be a new system as soon as a big market team like the Knicks, Bulls, or Lakers find themselves continually one of the worst teams in the league but continually lose out on their 42% chance to get a top three pick and wallow in the depths of the standings. This is what happened to the Minnesota Timberwolves in the years before drafting Kevin Garnett with the fifth pick in the 1995 draft and after trading Garnett to the Celtics in 2007. The Wolves were perpetually unlucky in the draft, never getting top draft pick and have never made the playoffs without Garnett on the roster. The Wolves were further beset by awful management. They are favored to make the playoffs this year after trading for #1 draft pick Andrew Wiggins and finally winning the lottery and getting the #1 pick Karl Anthony-Towns in the next season. The NBA had no problem letting the Timberwolves wallow at the bottom of the league but I cannot imagine letting the same fate befall a big market team and will rerig the system to once again reward the worst team with the best chance at a draft pick.

A Gamble Worth Taking

  As I set about loading the 2017-2018 NBA schedule into my basketball prediction program and resumed my never ending search for the elusive formula that would give me better results than the 54% success rate my program returned last season the biggest trade in many years was completed when the Cleveland Cavaliers traded all-star guard Kyrie Irving to the Boston Celtics for injured all-star guard Isaiah Thomas, starting forward Jae Crowder, a prospect, and the Brooklyn Nets first round pick in the 2018 draft which is almost certain to be a high lottery pick.

  Most of the sports media proclaimed this trade a big win for the Cavaliers. Irving demanded a trade this summer from a team that has been to three NBA finals with one championship. While Irving was contractually obligated to play for the Cavaliers for the next two years, a holdout or halfhearted effort would cripple Cleveland’s chances to compete for a championship in what may be superstar LeBron James’ last year with the team before his rumored departure to the West Coast to finish his career.

  When I look at basketball trades I look at two things – who got the best player and is the best player a superstar? The team that gets a superstar as the best player is almost always the winner of any trade. Almost. There are a few times where the team getting the best player lost the deal. In 2014 the Lakers obtained perennial all-star Dwight Howard from the Orlando Magic in a complicated four team trade that involved them sending their own all-star center Andrew Bynum and a lottery protected first round pick to the Philadelphia 76ers. Another notable player involved in the deal was Finals MVP Andre Iguodala. The Lakers didn’t win this deal because Howard played the same position as the Lakers other star center Pau Gasol and while Gasol could share the floor with Bynum (who played more of a defensive forward), he was rendered superfluous because he could not play with Howard. Howard left for the Houston Rockets after one season with the Lakers which meant the Lakers traded Bynum and a first round pick for one season of Dwight Howard’s services. The Lakers haven’t lost the deal to my mind until we know who the first-round pick will be (which will be given up this season) since Bynum’s career has fizzled out worse than Howard’s but they certainly didn’t win it Another deal where the team getting the best player didn’t win was the Knicks acquisition of Carmelo Anthony in the middle of the 2010-2011 season for promising rookie but often injured Danilo Gallinari and spare parts. The Knicks with Anthony have won exactly one playoff series in the intervening six years which has more to do with their poor management than anything Anthony has done but the Knicks cannot be considered winners in the Carmelo Anthony trade. The sad truth is the Knicks have only had a better record than the Nuggets once since getting Anthony.

  When I think of teams that have won trades by getting the best player in the deal, I think of the Lakers getting Kareem-Abdul-Jabbar from the Milwaukee Bucks in 1975 for a couple of prospects and spare parts or the same Lakers getting Wilt Chamberlain for Archie Clark and some other spare parts. There is no doubt the Phoenix Suns won their 1992 trade for Charles Barkley for first time all-star guard Jeff Hornacek and two other players since they got to the NBA Finals for the first time in 16 years (and haven’t been back since). The Lakers trade of Marc Gasol, two first round draft picks, and some parts to the Grizzlies for Pau Gasol can be looked at as a win for both sides but the Lakers got to three finals (with two championships) with Pau Gasol and while Marc Gasol is a perennial all-star now he wasn’t close to being that player a decade ago.

  The reason the team that gets the best player so often comes out on the long end of a basketball trade seems obvious – there are less players on a basketball team and a basketball court than any of the other team sports so getting a top player can immediately elevate a team in basketball like no other sport.

  The winner of the Irving-Thomas deal hinges on who is the better player and it is clear to me that Irving is by far the better player than Thomas. This wouldn’t have been a debate two years ago but in the meantime Thomas has made two all-star teams. Irving has made four all-star teams (including twice without LeBron James as his teammate) Thomas has never been picked for the USA basketball team, Irving was on the Olympic team last year and was the most valuable player in the FIBA World Cup in 2014. And did I mention that Irving made the game winning three pointer that won Game 7 of the NBA finals in 2016? When the Cavs and Celtics met in last year’s Eastern Conference finals the Cavaliers were leading 2-1 but in Game 4 fell behind by 15 points and James had four fouls in the first half. Irving took over the game and scored 42 points in leading the Cavaliers to a comeback win that broke the Celtics’ sprit. Thomas is a very good player and a great scorer but Irving does things that only a handful of players have ever been able to do. And don’t forget that Irving is four years younger than Thomas and Thomas is still recovering from a major hip injury.

  I believe this trade was a major win for the Celtics but there are a number of ways this trade can go wrong or even very wrong. Irving is signed for two more years. If he decides he wants to play somewhere else in two years the Celtics will have traded a top draft pick for two years of Kyrie Irving and there is also the possibility that Irving may want to force an immediate trade from Boston just like he did this summer. Irving has had a knee surgery and tendonitis in his left knee which is a cause for concern but has been healthy for the last two years. If the Nets pick turns out to be the next superstar then of course the deal will look bad although at this point there is no way of knowing where or who that pick will be.

  All in all, Kyrie Irving is one of the best players in the NBA. Top players are so hard to get that this was a gamble Boston had to take. There is one consideration that I hadn’t heard mentioned much that could have long-term impact. Isaiah Thomas was a beloved player in Boston and the 5 foot 9 inch last pick in the draft personified the underdog image the city has of itself. He played for the Celtics in the playoffs with an injured hip and through the death of his sister last year. And he was traded just like a commodity. It cannot be argued that he has been treated very poorly by the franchise and I wonder if future NBA super stars will pass on playing for Boston or insisting on no-trade clauses or other compensation that wouldn’t be expected from other teams.

  As for Cleveland, if the Nets pick turns into a superstar or is traded for a player that helps the Cavaliers win another championship then they have to be considered winners in the trade but I can’t agree until I understand how a winning team can drive away a multi time all-star. The Cavaliers got some value for Irving but should have never been in that position to begin with.

Congratulations Are In Order, I Suppose

  I have no doubt that NBA basketball is taking over as America’s number one sport. The 2016-2017 season ended over a month ago yet the NBA has been front and center of the sports pages ever since with pre-draft trades, the actual draft, and the free agency period. Twenty years ago baseball and the upcoming football season would have been at the front of the sports sections and talk radio – now it is the NBA off season. Most of the experts I listen to and read expected very few teams to pick up high salaried players because there is seemingly no possibility of competing with the Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers teams that have won their conferences the past three years.

  It didn’t quite work out that way since good teams are not easily dissuaded from trying to take the step to greatness and as good as the Warriors and Cavaliers have been they are always just one major injury from falling back to the pack. The Houston Rockets have not had a losing season since 2006 and have won 50 games in three of the past five years since acquiring all-star James Harden from the Oklahoma City Thunder, making it to the conference finals in 2015. After a promising regular season ended in a disappointing second round playoff loss to the Spurs, Rocket General Manager Daryl Morey managed to get Los Angeles Clipper All-Star Chris Paul to come to Houston as a free agent. Normally the team that currently employs a player can offer them the most money in free agency but Paul won’t have to sacrifice any money because the Clippers arranged a sign-and–trade deal with the Rockets in which the Clippers signed Paul to the contract he had agreed to with Houston and then traded him to the Rockets for starting guard Patrick Beverly, former sixth man of the year Lou Williams, and a pair of rotation players (Sam Dekker and Montrezl Harrell).

  This looks like a great fit. Morey is known for his pioneering use of basketball analytics and the Rockets were one of the first teams embrace the philosophy of taking either three points shots or close range shots like lobs and layups that would either lead to a high percentage of baskets or foul shots. Paul just had his career high in three point attempts and percentage. He also gives the Rockets a second all-star which will allow Morey to try to convince another top 20 player to head to Houston for a realistic chance to compete for a title.

  I don’t like this deal for Houston. In getting Paul, they sacrificed a lot of depth (even if the trade to Clippers wasn’t made, signing Paul would have led to the release of most of the same players to create salary cap space). Paul is 32 years old which seems pretty old to me (Harden is 27) and his performance and durability could tail off drastically at any time. And if Paul’s effectiveness doesn’t drop off he will be eligible for a max extension at the end of next season. The Rockets just gave Harden a $228 million dollar extension and if Paul gets something even close that will be their team for the foreseeable future. Another thing I don’t like about this deal is that both Paul and Harden seem to have the ball in their hands a lot on offense so either or both players will have to change their game to accommodate the other superstar which could make either or both players far less effective.

  I can’t see the Rockets being able to beat the Spurs or Warriors even with Paul. The only way I see this deal working for the Rockets is if Morey is able to obtain another superstar and make a title run. I can’t rule it out and it seems LeBron James is looking to leave Cleveland next year. If he does Houston may be a promising destination for him. I look at the Rockets acquiring Chris Paul as a home run swing that has a small chance of paying off.

  The Boston Celtics were another big player in free agency. The Celtics had the best record in the eastern conference this year and made the conference finals but were blown out by the Cavaliers in 5 games, two of which were 30+ point losses. The Celtics had the top pick in the draft by virtue of their trade with the Nets in 2014 which gave them the Nets #1 pick by swap or outright for five years. The Celtics traded the top pick to the 76ers for a future #1 pick and the #3 pick which they used to select small forward Jayson Tatum of Duke. Then the Celtics were able to sign free agent Gordon Hayward of the Utah Jazz to a $128 million dollar 4 year deal. In order to sign Hayward, the Celtics had to renounce the rights to center Kelly Olynk and trade guard Avery Bradley to the Pistons for power forward Marcus Morris for a salary cap savings of three million dollars.

  I like the Celtics getting Hayward more than the Rockets signing of Paul but not much more. Hayward is young at 27 and has been in the league six years. He made his first All-Star team this past season leaving open the question of whether his all-star status is proof of his hitting a new level or a fluke. While Paul’s best years are not ahead of him it is possible that Hayward is ready to ascend to a new level.

  Even if Hayward is an all-star and the Celtics other all-star Isiah Thomas successfully recovers from the hip injury he suffered in the playoffs last year I can’t see this team challenging the Cavaliers for the eastern conference championship. I’m not even sure if Hayward is better than Avery Bradley who was dumped in order free up the salary cap space to pay Hayward.

  Is this move going to lead the Celtics to a championship of a Finals appearance? I don’t think so but James decides to leave the Cavaliers after next season this is probably the best team in the East by a small margin over the Wizards and Raptors. The Warriors are on another level but if they should get upset it is not impossible to see this group of Celtics become champions.

  While no teams vaulted themselves into championship contention in my eyes during free agency the Thunder and Timberwolves have improved themselves the most. The Thunder picked up perennial all-star Paul George from the Indiana Pacers for an overpaid Victor Oladipo and 2016 first round pick Domantas Sabonis. It was a steal except for the small detail of George becoming a free agent next season and already telling the Pacers that he wants to play for the Lakers. Even so, this is a great gamble by the Thunder. George is an immediate upgrade and shows MVP Russell Westbrook a season before he can opt out of his contract that the team is willing to take risks to add talent. The Thunder aren’t championship contenders because of this move but are markedly better and if all the pieces fit just right could beat anyone in the playoffs.

  The other big move I like is the Timberwolves acquisition of Jimmy Butler from the Bulls for 2016 first round pick Kris Dunn, slam dunk champion Zach Lavine (coming off a knee injury), and a swap of the 7th and 16th picks in the NBA draft. Butler is under contract for two more years at $20 million and while not the high flyer that Lavine is has proved to be a durable hard-working player. Butler will either infuse the Wolves young stars Karl Anthony-Towns and Andrew Wiggins with his work ethic and defensive intensity or be ostracized and tuned out by the young talented core. I expect the Wolves to return to the playoffs for the first time since they traded Kevin Garnett.

  It seems like the entire NBA press is congratulating the Rockets, Celtics, Thunder, and Timberwolves for signing or trading for their All-Star player. I'll hold off on my congratulations until I see how these new acquisitions mesh with their teams. For now, all that has been won is the right to pay each of these players 20 million dollars of more. Everything else is the hope that future performance will outweigh the risk of under-performing players with large contracts or fractured team chemistry.

Not The Greatest Yet

  

  The NBA season wound down to its conclusion this week with the Golden State Warriors winning their second championship in three years. My basketball pick program performed admirably with a 54% success rate when my calculated line deviated from the actual betting line on Bovada.lv’s website. This should have yielded me a 2.5% profit on the 322 games my program picked except for two factors.

  One factor was my Bovada account being senselessly suspended for 18 days (as outlined here) just before the program had a hot streak. The other factor was my refusal to get out of my own way and let my basketball program do its thing. I continually tinkered with the betting amounts and sometimes added my own bets instead of trusting the program that has delivered picks over the magic break-even point of 52.4% over my four season retrograde testing. I didn’t use my program during the playoffs and managed to erase my $27 regular season deficit and was $12 ahead heading into the Finals where I decided to take the points in every game since I was expecting close games throughout. I went 1-2 in the three blowouts and lost the two close games against the spread by a total of 1 and a half points to leave me $4.06 down for the season. This was a downer but I received $130.39 in the form of a welcome bonus from Bovada and $70 from two contributors in exchange for my picks in advance of the games so I netted $196.33 for the season and if my two contributors picked the games I selected they would also have shown a profit since they received my picks during my Bovada suspension. I haven’t tried to withdraw my money yet but will report on it if and when I do. In any event, I consider my basketball program a success and will give it another go next year with a little more discipline. I can’t say it was the greatest betting season ever but for me the sting of losing $4.06 was well worth the valuable experience I received moving from the realm of fake to real betting.

  The storyline of this NBA season was were the top performers and teams rated in a historical perspective. Russell Westbrook of the Oklahoma City Thunder averaged a triple-double (10+ points, rebounds, and assists) for the entire season which last done by Oscar Robertson in 1962. There was a large debate as to whether Westbrook’s triple double season was deserving of the MVP award or whether the award belonged to James Harden. The argument for Harden is that while he had a few more assists and a few less points and rebounds his Houston Rockets were 8 games better than the Thunder which implies that Harden made his teammates and team better than Westbrook made his.

  In my view the league’s MVP is LeBron James. I’m not a big fan of King James but I recognize his greatness. James also nearly averaged a triple double (26 points and 8.5 assists and rebounds), led the league in minutes played per game, and finished in the top 10 in minutes played despite missing 8 games NONE OF WHICH THE CAVALIERS WON. I know the Cavaliers had a mediocre regular season record (for them) of 51-31 and didn’t even win their conference. Still I think this isn’t a playoff team without LeBron and a championship contender with him.

  The entire triple double thing tends to impress me as a fan based statistic. Out of the players I saw it seems clear to me that Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, and possibly Larry Bird could have had a triple double in almost game they played. Blocked shots weren’t kept as a statistic until 1973 which was well after Bill Russell retired and Wilt Chamberlain was at the very end of his career. The players of that time claim the both Russell and Chamberlain blocked at least 10 shots a game so I’d have to think that both averaged triple-doubles during some years in their careers. Both Russell and Chamberlain averaged over 20 rebounds a game for their careers. 10 blocks a game is not out of the question or a misremembrance on the part of old-time players.

  Before their loss to the Cavaliers on Friday, the Warriors won their first 15 games of the playoffs before finishing with a record 16-1 for the playoffs. The closest any team came to playoff perfection was the 1982-83 76ers who went 12-1 in that years’ three round best of seven playoff format and the 2000-2001 Laker team that went 15-1 when the first round of the four round playoffs was best of five games. The Warriors 16-1 playoff record is the best percentage-wise of all time. There have been plenty of comparisons between the Warriors and great teams of the past to determine who the greatest team is. I’ve never seen a team like the 1991-1993 Chicago Bulls and they get my nod over the Showtime Laker teams of the mid 80’s. I’ve never saw the great Celtic teams of the 50’s and 60’s. Ultimately the latest super team has to be favored in a comparison with great teams of the past. Today’s players are bigger, faster, and more skilled than ever before. The superstars of the past like Wilt Chamberlain and Michael Jordan would be great in any era but the role players of the past wouldn’t be competitive against the players of the present. Having said that an imaginary matchup between teams of the past and future would come down to which rules were used. If today’s Warriors were able to get foul calls on minimal contact they would easily win but if the physical play of 20 years ago were allowed with players able to hand check on defense and toss elbows like beanbags the old timers may be able to bully their way to victory. I would have a hard time anointing the Warriors as the greatest team of all time as long as the Celtics of the 50’s and 60’s won 8 championships in a row and the Bulls and 2000-2002 Lakers have three-peat championships. It is easy to say that the Warriors would have won three championships in a row of they hadn’t blown a 3-1 lead in last year’s Finals but they did blow that lead and the other three franchises didn’t. It is not easy to have the best record in the league three years in a row like the Warriors have but it is even harder to win three championships in a row. The Warriors stumbled while the Lakers, Bulls, and Celtics did not and to my mind teams that come close do not get the benefit of a doubt. If the Warriors win another title or two they may well be the best basketball team ever but with the injuries Stephen Curry and Keven Durant seem to suffer every year or two I don’t see their rolling over the league as a given.

  The other talking point during the Finals was whether LeBron James could establish himself as the greatest player of all time if the Cavaliers upset the Warriors. The Cavaliers lost the series but James once again proved he is the best player on the planet, averaging a triple-double in the five games while expending energy on defense guarding Finals MVP Kevin Durant. James has played 14 years and has played at least 74 games every season but two (playing 62 of the Heat’s 66 games in the strike shortened 2011-2012 seasons and taking two weeks off in the 2014-2015 season and finishing with 69 games). This durability is almost unprecedented. James is showing few signs of slowing down at the age of 32 and has been to seven consecutive NBA finals with three championships. Michael Jordan is considered the greatest player of all time with his six championships and six Finals MVPs with Bill Russell and is 11 championships also coming into consideration. If James can break the NBA career points record (he is 5 years away) and get to the NBA Finals a few more times I think he will be thought of as the best player ever due to recency bias and the wish of many to believe they are seeing the greatest ever. I can’t see James as the greatest player of all time and the recently concluded finals were a perfect example of why I think that way. James was the best player in the series and started each game with a flurry of points, rebounds, and assists. The Cavaliers were in every game at halftime. But in the fourth quarter of the first three games, James had no energy left and the Cavaliers lost. To me the hallmark of a great player is the ability to take over the game in the fourth quarter and not the first. James did come up big in the fourth quarter of the final game but fell short of leading his team to victory. Until and unless James takes over big games in the fourth quarter I fail to see how he can overtake Jordan as the greatest player ever.

Give It A Rest

  

  In 2014, the NBA (National Basketball Association) signed a 9 year television deal with Turner Sports and ABC/ESPN worth 24 BILLION DOLLARS, which represented nearly a tripling of the previous television deal. The ‘raise’ was well-deserved since the NBA is globally popular, televised sports is one of the few ways television networks can separate themselves from new internet competitors like Netflix and Amazon, and the NBA’s 82 game schedule plus playoffs provide plenty of content.

  Last season ABC introduced a Saturday night prime-time game of the week that featured the top teams in the league over the last two months of the season. The broadcast was well received and the games were generally top notch with the highlight being a Warriors-Thunder classic won on MVP Steph Curry’s buzzer beating shot in overtime. The game was the highest rated regular season NBA game not held on Christmas Day.

  This year the Saturday night prime telecasts kicked off in January with the games serving up a heavy dose of the top teams in the league (the Cleveland Cavaliers, Golden State Warriors, San Antonio Spurs who have won the last three championships). On February 11th, a highly publicized matchup between the Warriors and Spurs was on the prime time schedule. The Spurs top two players were ruled out when all-star Kawhi Leonard suffered a concussion during the week and former all-star Lamarcus Aldridge was ruled out with a heart arrhythmia. The Warriors were in the middle of a long road trip and had played an overtime game against the Minnesota Timberwolves the night before the game all in the middle of their worst stretch of basketball in three years after losing all-star Kevin Durant to a strained knee. The Warriors decided to rest their other three all-stars Stephen Curry, Draymond Green, and Klay Thompson for the Spurs game. The game was a prime time nightmare with both teams playing backups while the ABC cameras seemed to feature forlorn San Antonio children wearing Stephen Curry jerseys to a game that their hero was skipping.

  The Warriors were heavily criticized for the decision and rebutted the criticism by stating that if the NBA wanted to have their stars available for a big prime time game they should have arranged for it to not be in the middle of a long road trip and part of back to back games. That seemed to deflect much of the criticism from the team to the league.

  The very next Saturday the prime time game had the defending champion Cleveland Cavaliers on the road against the Los Angeles Clippers. The Cavaliers were scheduled to play in Los Angeles on Sunday night against the Lakers and decided to rest their top three players LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, and Kevin Love for the prime time game and play them on Sunday against the hapless Lakers. The Cavalier backups were blown out by the Clippers and squeaked by the Lakers the next night. The two spoiled prime time games were a source of embarrassment for the league and ABC.

  Five years ago, the San Antonio Spurs were fined a quarter of a million dollars for resting four of their top players for a game against then champion Miami Heat in a nationally televised Thursday night game (the Spurs came within a few shots of winning the game anyway). Five years later Spurs coach Greg Popovich is viewed as a visionary by being willing to sacrifice a game or two to rest his players and develop his reserves. Today many NBA basketball teams monitor their players for signs of stress and will give a player a night off in the belief that it will prevent injuries. But the money is much greater now – I doubt ESPN/ABC was thrilled with having two marquee Saturday Night games relegated to ‘Must NOT See TV’. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver didn’t fine the teams but instead wrote a letter to the team owners to ask that they have more of a hand in the decisions to rest star players for nationally televised games.

  The Warriors and the Cavaliers had much the same reasons for resting their players: the players were on back to back games and being injury free and rested for the playoffs in April trumps any regular season game. The Warriors know this especially well as they set a league record of 73 wins last year but had that effort expended to set the record questioned when they failed to win the championship. The NBA allows teams to put patches of their uniforms to represent their teams championships and discussions of great players seem to always turn to how many championships a player won to somehow validate their greatness. The culture the NBA has built or allowed to be built clearly values championships over regular season wins and it seems hypocritical to try to override a team’s desire to rest some players anytime they see fit, nationally televised game or not.

  There were quite a few suggestions offered on how to prevent this situation of resting players for prime-time games or on a superstar’s single visit to a city. One suggestion was to ruin resting player’s statistical averages by counting a ‘rest’ game as a game played with no points, rebounds, or assists. Other suggestions ranged from fining the team the amount of the player’s salary to suspending the resting player for a number of games. None of these solutions will ever work because if they are enacted every team will stop using the term rest and simply sit their star players for a ‘tweaked knee’ or a ’24 hour flu’.

  I was disappointed at the ruination of the two prime time games because I wanted to see the games and I wanted to bet on the games. Once the possibility of resting players was raised the games came off the board at the Bovada betting site. The problem of resting players can be eased by making sure teams playing nationally televised games have no games the day before and after the games but teams will still rest players or hold them out of big games. Kevin Durant had one of the better takes on the subject when he told ESPN "The truth about it is, it's only for a couple of players in the league...They don't care if the 13th man on the bench rest. It's only for like LeBron [James], Steph [Curry], [James] Harden, Russell [Westbrook]. It's only for like five players, so you want a rule just for those five players?" Thar's very true - the top players are being targeted because that's who the fans want to see when they tune into a nationally televised game or pay for a ticket to a game. And there are already rules made just for these players to allow them to get higher salaries and longer contracts than the 13th man on the bench. There are benefits of being a star player and one of the drawbacks is that the fans and television executives expect them to be playing.

  Based on Durant's comments I do have sort of a solution to the problem. The NBA collective bargaining agreement with the players slots certain players as ‘max contract’ players meaning these players receive the maximum allowable salary under the current rules. Almost every team has 1 max contract player and most have more than 1. The next collective bargaining agreement should stipulate that ‘max contract’ players cannot play more home games than road games in a season. The ‘max contract’ players are the ones that the fans pay to see and if such a player misses a road game they should be held out of a home game also. This wouldn’t eliminate the problem but I believe it would make teams have to plan their rest for their star players more carefully and possible rest their stars for home games knowing that a road game missed for ‘rest’ will sit the player out for an additional game in front of the home town fans as well.

Kings and Wise Guys

  The NBA trade deadline was last Thursday and the biggest trade was the Sacramento Kings trading All-Star center and 2016 Olympian DeMarcus Cousins along with journeyman Omri Casspi to the New Orleans Pelicans for rookie Buddy Hield, backup point guard Tyreke Evans, journeyman Langston Galloway, and the Pelicans first and second round draft picks in the 2017 draft (the Pelicans keep their pick if it is a top 3 lottery pick).

  Cousins was the 5th selection in the 2010 draft and is considered one of the best centers in the NBA. He made 2nd team All-NBA the past two years which would seem to indicate he is one of the 10 best players in the league although not in the top 5. He was due for a contract extension at the end of the year and the new collective bargaining agreement would have placed him as eligible for a $209 million dollar 5 year contract under the ‘Designated Player Veteran Extension’ which rewards players who are with the same team they were drafted by (or traded while under their first contract) and made All NBA first, second, or third teams in two of the previous three seasons. By being traded, Cousins will not be a designated veteran and can ‘only’ sign a 5 year extension for $179 million dollars.

  Cousins is always among the league leaders in technical fouls. He has been suspended twice by the Kings and three times by the league. After trading Cousins, the Kings made references to changing the ‘culture’ of the team. This makes Cousins sound like a bad guy. But bad guys and bad teammates aren’t usually selected to play on the U.S. Olympic team and Cousins is known for his many charitable works in the Sacramento area.

  Talent is like stones on a pyramid. There are very few stones at the top of a pyramid and very few top NBA talents. To trade a top talent like Cousins for very little return makes me think that the Kings just didn’t want to pay him the huge extension at the end of the year. The Kings moved into a brand new arena this year and this presumably will allow them to sell enough season tickets and luxury box suites to make money even with a losing team for a few more years. Of course the Kings have been a losing team for the past 10 years and almost left Sacramento to move to Seattle before being rescued by new owner Vivek Ranadivé. Ranadivé’s ownership of the Kings has been marked by constant changes in coaches, general managers, and the overall direction of the team. Trading Cousins seems to make a reboot for the franchise but just two years ago the Kings traded their first round pick in the upcoming draft in order to get the Philadelphia 76ers to take three players off their hands to get enough salary cap room to sign players that are no longer with the team.

  It is no surprise that a mismanaged team like the Kings couldn’t win with Cousins and it won’t be a surprise to me if they don’t win without him even though there is generally a short term ‘Hawthorne Effect’ after losing a top player.

  To me it makes no sense to trade a top 10 player without getting either two top 20 players or a top 20 player and a top 10 draft pick in return. Rebuilding winning teams is hard enough but building teams from scratch rarely works. The Philadelphia 76ers have lost 60 games for the last 3 years, stockpiling draft picks in the hopes of drafting a championship team. This year they have had such a marked improvement they may only lose 50 to 55 games games out of 82. After getting to the Eastern Conference Finals for six consecutive years the Detroit Pistons lost a first round playoff series in 2009 and hadn’t made the playoffs for 6 years when they slipped into the 8th spot last year.

  There are only two teams I can think of in the last 20 years that were able to rebuild teams on the fly. The Los Angeles Lakers assembled a championship team featuring Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal in the early 2000’s and when that team fell apart a new team was built around Kobe Bryant to win two more championships in 2009 and 2010. During the rebuild the Lakers missed the playoffs only one time. Two years after winning the championship in 2006 behind Dwayne Wade and Shaquille O’Neal, the Miami Heat descended to being a 15 win team but after obtaining LeBron James and Chris Bosh to pair with Wade in 2011 went to four straight NBA Finals with two championships.

  The team I have my eye on is the Boston Celtics. After Danny Ainge took over as the head of basketball operations in 2003, a promising Celtics team struggled and missed the playoffs in 2006 and 2007. With his job on the line, Ainge managed to assemble a ‘Big 3’ of Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, and Paul Pierce and surrounded his stars with talented role players as well as hitting on a great draft pick in point guard Rajon Rondo. The team won the 2008 championship and went to the finals in 2010. The team could not get past the Miami Heat in the next two playoffs and after losing in the first round to the Knicks in 2013, Ainge traded Garnett and Pierce to the Brooklyn Nets for a handful of journeymen players and the Nets first round picks in 2014, 2016, and 2018 as well as the right to swap picks with the Nets in 2017. None of the picks were protected.

  The Celtics missed the playoffs in 2014 and have drafted guards James Young and Jaylen Brown with their first two picks from the Nets. Brown has shown more promise but neither are considered All-Star level players at present. This year the Nets are by far the worst team in the league and the Celtics have a great chance of owning the top pick in the draft because of the right to swap picks. Meanwhile Ainge has slowly assembled a playoff team that has gotten better in each of the last four years. He picked up guard Isiah Thomas from the Phoenix Suns for a player and a draft pick in 2015 and Thomas has blossomed into an All-Star. Former All-Star Al Horford was obtained in free agency last summer and the Celtics currently have the 5th best record in the league.

  So while teams like the Lakers, 76ers, and Timberwolves have been accumulating top draft picks for years and are still near the bottom of the league standings and teams like the Lakers and Heat were able to rebuild their teams around a star player to win multiple championships Danny Ainge has completely rebuilt the championship Celtics teams to be back near the top of the league while missing the playoffs only once AND has the top draft pick of the worst team in the league for the next two seasons. I don’t know if Ainge is the smartest guy in the room when NBA general managers get together but he has to be on the short list. If I was the owner of one of the long suffering losing teams the first thing I would do is try to find someone like Ainge to run my team.

The Hard Way

  Just 3 days after the end of the NBA season the annual draft was held which led to player movement as some teams tried to move draft picks for players and other teams tried to move draft picks for players while still other teams tried to move up, down, and around in the draft. The most notable trades to my mind was the Brooklyn Nets trading useful veteran Thad Young to the Indiana Pacers for the 20th pick in the draft and the Orlando Magic getting center/forward Serge Ibaka from the Oklahoma City Thunder for the 11th pick and Victor Oladipo (the #2 pick in the entire draft three years ago). The Nets-Pacers trade is an example of the new Nets GM Sean Marks betting on himself to draft a better player than Young. I don’t understand what the Pacers see in Young that other teams don’t since they have a very good history of developing draft picks. The draft pick turned into Michigan guard Caris Levert and while the results of this trade won’t be known for a few years at least the Nets will save about $10 million a year for not having to pay Young. The Ibaka trade seems like a prelude to more Magic moves since they have already have a center in Nikola Vučević while the Thunder are trying to rebuild on the fly by trading Ibaka a year before he becomes a free agent and commands a huge chunk of the salary cap. Thunder GM Sam Presti has a good track record of drafting and picked center Domantas Sabonis with his pick and this will be another trade that will take years to judge.

  The New York Knicks General Manager Phil Jackson has won 11 titles as a coach but has had a rough go in his first two years running a team. His handpicked coach Derek Fischer didn’t make it through two seasons. Jackson seemingly hit a home run when he drafted Kristaps Porzingas at #4 last year. To my eyes Porzingas is talented but was hurt a lot in his rookie season. If Porzingas turns out to be injury prone he will fit right in with the Knicks new acquisitions Derrick Rose and Joakim Noah, who were both with the Bulls last year. Rose was the 2011 NBA MVP but has been plagued by knee injuries since. He played a total of 49 games in three seasons (2012-2014) although he has made it into 117 games the past two years. Noah followed his 2014 Defensive Player of the Year performance by playing in 96 games the past two years and is coming off shoulder surgery. Joining Porzingas, Rose, Noah, and max contract all-star Carmelo Anthony in the starting lineup is 30 year old Courtney Lee who is joining his 7th team proving that while he is a good enough player to be coveted by other teams he is not good enough for a team to resist letting him leave via trade or free agency. Jackson is one of my favorite coaches but as a General Manager he has proven to not be up to the task and this assemblage of all star players from 5 years ago looks like the same old quick fix that every Knicks general manager has failed with in the past 20 years.

  There are trades every year and the Knicks load up on yesteryear's all-stars every few years but it is very rare in the NBA that an MVP caliber player in his prime switches teams yet that is what happened earlier this month when superstar Kevin Durant left the Oklahoma City Thunder to join the Golden State Warriors. The only comparable movements of star players to my mind was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar forcing a trade from Milwaukee to the Lakers, Shaquille O’Neal leaving the Magic to join the Lakers as a free agent, and LeBron James leaving Cleveland for Miami and then heading back to Cleveland. I was too young for Wilt Chamberlain's moves from Philadelphia to California and back again which I assume were seismic in nature.

  It was widely expected that Durant would sign a short term deal with the Thunder and go into free agency for real next year but he chose a short term deal with the Warrior team that came within a few minutes of winning a second consecutive championship. At his press conference Durant said that he wanted to move on to a new chapter in his life by moving to California and thinks it is going to be a lot of fun to play in the Warriors winning culture with all-stars Draymond Green, Stephen Curry, and Klay Thompson.

  In order to get salary cap room to sign Durant, the Warriors had to part with five members of their championship rotation: centers Andrew Bogut and Festus Ezeli, forwards Harrison Barnes and Marresse Speights, and guard Leandro Barbosa. Of these five Bogut and Barbosa will be missed the most. Bogut provided height, defense, and off the ball offense while Barbosa was often the fastest player on the court even at the age of 33. Durant will be a direct replacement and a considerable upgrade for Barnes while Ezeli had fallen out of favor with the coaching staff.

  I find Durant’s decision very courageous. He signed a 2 year contract for $54 million when he could have gotten 5 years and over $130 from the Thunder. This is a lot of money to leave on the table. If the Warriors win at least one championship with Durant he will undoubtedly sign a long term deal but if the Warriors fail to win a championship the Durant will be pointed to (justly or not) as the reason for the failure, not being a championship caliber player, and I could see him accused of spoiling the camaraderie of the team by causing half the roster to be jettisoned in order to pay him. And don’t forget Durant is just one year removed from missing over half a season (including playoffs) with three foot operations. It appears to me that Durant is assuming large risks to his wallet and legacy in order to play on the Warriors. It would have been easy to collect the extra money and security with the Thunder but Durant took the hard way by taking a short term deal to play for a new team where he will likely get the lion’s share of the blame if the Warriors fail to win a championship and minimal credit for any of the teams future success.

  Do I think the Warriors will win the championship now that they have Durant? Probably, but they should have won the championship this past year and didn’t due to their injuries and their arrogance. Forward Draymond Green gives the Warriors a lot of their attitude but he spend the postseason punching and kicking opposing players in the groin, culminating in a suspension that cost the Warriors a chance to close out the series in 5 games. Green found himself arrested for assault in the off season. Green is starting to remind me of Dennis Rodman, a supremely talented hustle player that couldn’t stay out of trouble on or off the court. The team has no center, the bench is comprised of marginal veterans playing for minimal salaries, and there is no guarantee that Curry’s lower leg issues or Durant’s foot injury problems won’t resurface. The factor that mostly concerns me is the Warriors don’t have a quality center. When Bogut went down in Game 5 of the finals the Warriors were markedly worse defensively. Now Bogut is gone to clear the salary cap room for Durant with no replacement. This is not going to be much of a factor in the regular season but it is hard for me to see a team winning the championship without an above average center so matter how good the rest of the team is.

A Net Disaster (the down side of 'The Future Is Now' philosophy)

  George Allen was the Washington Redskins football coach in the 1970s and was known for trading his future first round draft picks for aging veterans. When asked about how he would replace the aging players in the future without draft picks, Allen said “The Future Is Now”. Allen was proven right – the Redskins had winning records all 7 years he coached them. The ‘Skins suffered only a mild drop-off when he left the team in 1978, winning half their games in the next four seasons before becoming Super Bowl champions in 1982. The secret to Allen’s success was that even though he traded his draft picks he had a keen eye for talent. The quarterback of the 1982 Redskins was Joe Theismann who Allen acquired from the Miami Dolphins in 1974 for his 1976 first round draft pick. It was a good deal for the Dolphins since Theismann was a 1971 4th round draft pick that went to the Canadian Football league and never played a down for the ‘Fins and a better deal for the Redskins who obtained a two time pro-bowler and 10 year starter for a low first round pick.

  The ‘Future is Now’ strategy is a legitimate strategy to build a championship team. The other main strategy is to build a core group of young players through the draft like the Seattle Seahawks have done. Most teams have a hybrid strategy. The Denver Broncos won the Super Bowl two weeks ago with mostly drafted personnel and the free agent signings of Peyton Manning and Demarcus Ware to fill gaping holes at the quarterback and defensive line positions. No matter which strategy is adopted the key to success is being able to get quality players and being healthy at the right time for a championship run.

  In the 1970’s the Yankees epitomized the successful execution of ‘The Future Is Now’ strategy by overbidding for every top free agent on the market and won two championship with the additions of Reggie Jackson, Catfish Hunter, and Goose Gossage to their already playoff ready roster. The strategy was less successful in the 1980’s as the team overreached for mediocre players coming off good seasons. After building a dynasty in the late 1990’s with a youthful core group the team again went astray by overbidding for marginal all-stars like Jason Giambi and Mike Mussina as well as steroid cheated Alex Rodriguez and got to the World Series one between 2002 and 2008. A final bidding spree in 2009 (Mark Teixeira, C.C. Sabathia, Johnny Damon) netted one championship but not a single World Series appearance since. Now that all major sports have a salary cap or penalties for excessive payroll (a luxury tax) the pendulum has swung towards building a core group of young players because sports teams either can’t fit more than two expensive free agents under the salary cap or eventually decide to slash salary to avoid paying the luxury tax. Since the death of Yankee owner George Steinbrenner the Yankees have been trying to cut payroll to avoid paying the luxury tax. The result has exposed their lack of player development and left them with a mediocre group of players who are either past their prime or whose prime will not be good enough to contribute to a championship team.

  In basketball, the Miami Heat turned the pendulum back to the superstar concept when they acquired superstars LeBron James, Chris Bosh, to join their own drafted superstar Dwyane Wade. This was only possible by James and Bosh taking less money than they could have gotten elsewhere in order to team up and chase a championship. The trio managed 2 championships and 4 finals appearances before James left the team to rejoin the Cleveland Cavaliers. The Cavaliers have assembled their own ‘big 3’ by teaming James with Kyrie Irving and trading for all-star forward Kevin Love. Love, James, and Irving all have big contracts and Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert has a $65 million luxury tax penalty on top of his $110 million dollar payroll. The Cavaliers surely believe the future is now and even replaced their head coach David Blatt despite having the best record in the Eastern Conference in their quest to win this year.

  In 2012 the New Jersey Nets were moving to Brooklyn's new Barclays Center Arena. The Nets were in the midst of a five year losing string which included a league worst 12-70 record in 2010 and were eager to field a competitive team in their new Brooklyn home. To that end, the Nets traded $3 million dollars, 2 first round draft picks, and promising young player Derrick Favors to the Utah Jazz for disgruntled but talented point guard Deron Williams at the end of the 2011-2012 season. In the summer of 2012 the Nets traded a batch of spare parts for Atlanta Hawks guard Joe Johnson. Even though Johnson was a 6 time all-star his $126 million dollar contract made him the league’s highest paid player at the time and the Hawks wanted to clear salary cap space to rebuild. The Net started the season 11-3 and coach Avery Johnson was named NBA coach of the month for November. Johnson didn’t keep his job through December as the Nets lost 10 of 11 games to fall to 14-14.

  The Nets corrected their record under interim coach P.J. Carlesimo, winning 35 of their final 44 games, but losing to the Chicago Bulls in the first round of the playoffs in 7 games. This wasn’t good enough for Nets owner billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov. The Nets replaced Carlesimo with newly retired Jason Kidd and traded for the Boston Celtics’ Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce, the heart of the Celtics 2008 championship team. To get the pair of superstars the Nets traded 5 journeymen players, their 2014,2016, and 2018 first round draft picks and also gave Boston the right to swap 2017 draft picks with the Nets.

  Most trades for draft picks are assigned 'protection' to protect a team from losing a chance at a generational player if they should win the draft lottery. The Los Angeles Lakers traded their 2015 draft pick to Phoenix years ago but were assured of keeping it if the pick should be in the top 5. When the Lakers won the second pick in the draft they kept their pick and assigned their 2016 draft pick to Phoenix but only if it is not in the top 3 of the draft. If it is the Lakers 2017 pick has a similar top 3 protection but in 2018 their first round pick will unconditionally belong to Phoenix. The Nets probably expected their new acquisitions to lead them to top records and low draft picks so they assigned no protections to any of the picks that were traded to the Celtics.

  The 2013-2014 Nets started with a 10-21 record before catching fire once again, winning 38 of their final 51 games to finish with the 5th best record in the Eastern Conference. The Nets won their first round playoff series against the division winning Toronto Raptors but were no match for the eventual champion Miami Heat, losing in 5 games. I doubt this was the ‘Dream Team’ result Prokhorov envisioned while paying a $90 million luxury tax bill on top of the Nets’ $100 million payroll. Coach Jason Kidd demanded more organizational power and when he didn’t get it left to join the Milwaukee Bucks as their coach and main basketball mind. Pierce left as a free agent to join the Washington Wizards and the Nets were still chasing a championship. The 2014 draft pick that went to Boston was the 17th pick which Boston used to get James Young form Kentucky who has not to this point been able to stick with the team.

  The Nets entered the 2014-2015 with new coach Lionel Hollins and a vastly trimmed payroll which only cost Prokhorov and additional $19 in luxury tax payments. The team struggled to stay in the playoff chase, Garnett was traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves, and the team eventually claimed the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference, losing in 6 games to the Atlanta Hawks. Heading into the 2015-2016 season, the Nets waived Deron Williams and bought out the final 2 years of his contract, leaving Joe Johnson and his unmovable contract and all-star caliber center Brook Lopez as the only two pieces left of what was hoped to be a championship team. The Nets payroll is still $13 million dollars over the salary cap and will pay another luxury tax this year. The team was not projected to be very good and have lived up to expectations with a 14-40 record that is the 3rd worst in the league. Coach Lionel Hollins was fired and long time General Manager Billy King was also relieved of his duties although King has been retained to help the job search for his successor.

  Three short years after trading three first round draft picks to the Celtics for the aging Garnett and Pierce and paying the largest luxury tax ever, the Nets have the third worst record in the league which would give them a chance at a top player in the draft IF they hadn’t traded their pick to the Celtics. Aside from being in the New York market the team is a very unattractive destination for top free agents since the Nets can’t offer more money than other teams and the prospects of winning are minimal. If the Nets are awful in 2017 the Celtics will trade first round picks with them and if the Nets are awful in 2018 the Celtics will get their pick in that year’s draft!

  It looks like the Nets will be awful for the next 5 years and it is likely but not inevitable. The key will be whether the next general manager can pick talent. The Nets have one playoff caliber player in Brook Lopez. There are always quality players that are drafted in the second round or not at all as well as ‘problem’ players that teams are dying to get rid of due to personality or character issues. If the Nets can pick up two or three quality players over the next couple of years they could be a marginal playoff team and start to attract free agents because after all it is still New York. It is an unenviable task but not impossible.

  Yesterday the Nets hired San Antonio Spurs assistant general Manager Sean Marks to be their new General Manager. This makes a lot of sense in that Marks has learned from an organization that has sustained success over two decades but makes little sense in giving the control of the franchise to someone only 5 years removed from being a player. I imagine the Nets were reduced to gambling on a first time GM since I doubt they could attract a top name general manager to take over a franchise with an active owner prone to adopting a ‘win now at all costs’ strategy. Prokhorov recently issued an open letter in which he recounted his mistakes in his ownership of the Nets and Marks thanked the Nets for the opportunity and said he looked forward to “the challenge of creating a unified culture and building a winning team”. I think the challenge will be to Marks patience and believe that as soon as he makes some progress in rebuilding this denuded franchise Prokhorov will renew his push to get a championship using the familiar ‘all-in’ strategy.

NBA Season to Date Observations and Predictions

  The NBA season is almost a month old with every team except the Washington Wizards playing at least a dozen games. As I write this on Sunday morning the defending champion Golden State Warriors have yet to lose and the perennial rebuilding Philadelphia 76ers yet to win.

  I thought the Warriors would get fat, happy, and selfish after winning last year’s championship. Instead they seem to be focused on proving last year was no fluke. None of the many role players have tried to break out of their roles, content to let Stephen Curry take (and make) the bulk of the shots while moving the ball, playing tough defense, and waiting for their chances to score. The Warriors have hit a tough stretch (for them) of late, finding themselves trailing the Nets and Clippers in the fourth quarter of their recent games but have managed to pull out wins. Do I think the Warriors can break the 1995-1996 Bulls record of 72-10? I believe they are sufficiently motivated and if they stay healthy this team is the one that can break the record. Having said that, it is a long season and I think that the Bulls record will withstand this challenge.

  The team that got fat and happy seems to be the Warriors 2014-15 Western Conference Finals opponents, the Houston Rockets. In the offseason Rockets superstar James Harden signed a $200 million dollar show deal with Adidas and has taken up with reality TV show icon Khloe Kardashian. Harden seemed out of shape and not at all in the mood to even pretend to play defense this season and when the Rockets started what they hoped to be a championship season with a 4-7 record including 4 20 point losses, head coach Kevin McHale was fired because in the words of Rockets GM Darrell Morey “The team was not responding to Kevin McHale”. The team responded to new coach J.B. Bickerstaff with a comeback win against the moribund Portland Trailblazers before further responding with a road loss against the Grizzlies and a home loss to the Knicks. I was high on the Rockets two years ago when they acquired center Dwight Howard but Howard can’t stay healthy (he is already taking games off this season to rest his back) and the fate of the team rests on Harden who is a superstar that is not playing like one which is an awful combination for a player that needs to handle the ball most of the time to be effective. This turn of events is a huge blow for GM Darrell Morey, making the huge proponent of basketball analytics seem clueless to the dynamic of team building for a championship run as opposed to collecting talent and draft picks.

  My pick to win the championship is the Los Angeles Clippers who rewarded my confidence by following a 4-0 start with losing seven of nine games for a 6-7 record after Sunday’s loss against the Raptors. Despite the rough patch I think the Clippers are built for the playoffs. They need to stay healthy and get superstars Chris Paul and Blake Griffin get used to playing with newcomers Paul Pierce and Josh Smith. The wild card for the Clippers to me is whether Clippers owner Steve Ballmer will push the panic button and order GM/Coach Doc Rivers to shake up the team or even fire Rivers.

  I picked the Los Angeles Lakers to win 37 games this year which would be a 16 game improvement over last year. The Lakers have started 2-11 and would have to win more than half of their remaining 69 games to get to 37 wins. My prediction doesn’t look good but I still like the chances of the Lakers’ young talent to develop significantly as the season goes along and the less Kobe Bryant plays the quicker this process will be and the closer the team will get to 37 wins. As great as Bryant was, he is an aged (not aging) former superstar who takes more shots than anyone on the team while shooting 34%. Not only is Bryant unproductive he is taking minutes away from the younger players and disrupting their ability to grow as a team. Meanwhile the big surprise in the West is the Dallas Mavericks with a 9-4 start defying the skeptics that predicted the Mavs would miss the playoffs. I don’t believe in the Mavericks and think their record is the result of their brilliant coach Rick Carlisle. As the season wears on talent will win out over schemes and the Mavs will struggle with their aging roster. In the east I predicted the Atlanta Hawks would struggle to get 50 wins after getting 60 last season. The Hawks currently are at 9-6 which is a pace for 49.2 wins so I’m spot on so far. I also predicted the surprise team to be the Orlando Magic and said they would make the playoffs. The Magic have been inconsistent so far with a 6-7 record. I’ve seen the Magic play twice and they are not just inconsistent they are maddeningly inconsistent – looking like world beaters in one quarter and a turnover machine the next. Coach Scott Skiles is already running out of patience with his young team, benching center Nik Vucevic for the second half of their win against the Timberwolves and subbing the entire starting unit earlier this month. I knew Skiles would wear out his welcome in Orlando as he has in every other stop in his coaching career but I think his act is going to wear thin faster in Orlando than his other stops. It looks to me like the Magic are running the risk of a player revolt and a lost season unless they can pull off a few upsets on their upcoming western road trip in December to get the players to see success from Skiles hardcore methods.

  The most impressive team in the east to my mind is the Chicago Bulls. First year coach Fred Hoiberg has successfully shaken up the lineup by starting Tony Snell and Doug McDermott and bringing former Defensive Player of the Year Joakim Noah off the bench. Snell and McDermott have looked more productive, Noah is more rested, and the Bulls have looked crisp while going 8-4 to start the year. The other surprise team is the Knicks who have gone 8-6 to start the year including road wins against the Thunder, Rockets, and Raptors The Knicks have coalesced behind 7-3 rookie Kristaps Porzingas who has become an instant celebrity much like Jeremy Lin three y ears ago as can only happen in new York. I am impressed with the Knicks progress under club president Phil Jackson but I’m not convinced yet, preferring to see how the Knicks react when they run into their early injury problems and Porzingas hits the rookie wall.

  My basketball prediction program may have hit the rookie wall. I split my 2 picks on Friday, leaving me with a 10-3 mark and trimming my mythical winnings to $670. My unpublished weekend picks went 3-4 to take the program’s season mark to 30-16. One of the program’s flaws has been exposed, showing a certain slowness to detect a turnaround in a teams fortunes whether due to injury or a team suddenly jelling like the New Orleans Pelicans seemed to do this weekend with wins over the Spurs and Suns.

  Tonight there are three games I’ll put up $110 to win $100 using the Betonline.ag lines as listed on the Yahoo Sports pagefor entertainment purposes only with no real money wagered. My program likes Charlotte giving 5 points to the visiting Sacramento Kings, the Pistons giving 2 points on the road at Milwaukee, and the Thunder getting 4 points from the Utah Jazz in Utah which seems to go against conventional wisdom to stay away from road teams on the second game of a back to back but I'll give my program a little leeway and take the risk.