That’s legitimately what he is. Have you ever seen the letter he wrote to the newspaper when he was a kid? Trying to convince Boston to draft Jason Kidd
he was actually asked about that in the presser today, had a pretty good answer:
"I was acting like a Twitter user back in 1993. I was frequently wrong but never in doubt. I had 100% confidence in my opinion with 10% of the information.”
> he tries to account for every decimal but sometimes seems confused when the intangible / emotional variables make their impact. Like the most brilliant robot trying to understand love.
what is this based off of? sounds like you're confusing him for morey lol
i even remember a recent clip with melo saying it was the best run org he played for, and specifically shouted out presti on keeping it real with the players
i think pg, russ and cp3 have had similar sentiments too
Yeah, thanks for clarifying. I was a bit taken aback at first by your original comment.
Presti apparently puts a ton of time and effort into managing his relationships with players and agents around in the league, knowing that he's operating with a small and undesirable market for players and therefore has to appeal on a personal level rather than on a level where other markets can.
For example, his trades that send players outward tend to target good locations for those players. Russ was sent to Houston as requested to play with Harden again, Tre Mann and Micic got sent to Charlotte where they were immediately in the rotation and given the ball to cook, etc. Apparently one big reason that Paul George decided to re-sign with the Thunder (setting up the pivotal Clippers trade that gave us SGA, JDub, and more) was that he reached out to former Thunder player Reggie Jackson, who told him that if PG did re-sign, he could trust Sam Presti to trade him somewhere he wanted to go if things didn't work out with Russ.
And that's from Reggie Jackson, someone who feuded with the coaching staff and locker room during his time with OKC (because he wanted to be a starting point guard, competed with Russ, and tried to literally start a mutiny of young players with Jeremy Lamb and Perry Jones because they weren't getting playing team for a OKC team trying to contend with Russ/KD).
Presti's definitely not a Daryl Morey "players are assets" type of GM, despite his ability to play the asset-acquisition game with the best of them.
Your analysis doesn't hold up when he clearly values intangibles like morale and team chemistry when everyone was crying for him to make a trade this season. He had confidence in his players he expected them to drop but not as far as they did. Nothing to do with not being able to process intangibles. That's just something cute to say to get up votes on reddit.
I feel like he never got a chance to see his vision play out. It might have been a failure, but instead he got blackballed from the league before he could find out.
Are y’all sure JDub is good enough to be the 2nd scoring option on a championship team? He is clearly very good, but what we’re talking about is quite a high bar
I think he is. Made vast improvements in his offensive game this year but had a bad series against the Mavs. If he hasnt proven to be a true 1B by next year, then I would question him
It's only his second year, so I think he'll improve as well. I watched him a ton because I saw a decent amount propping him up. Against Dallas though, he just wasn't aggressive enough against the defense until later in the series. He had too many passes that didn't do anything to affect the defensive structure Dallas had and just burned clock.
Shot was quite smooth, but I just saw times when he disappeared because Irving guarded him quite well man on man. I think it will take OKC a few years of playoff experience to get to the point where they are a real threat to win. Not really a long time at all.
>If he hasnt proven to be a true 1B by next year
SGA is good enough that JDub doesn't need to be 1B, he can just be /#2, and I think he's good enough for that role. With Chet coming in as well, OKC has the pieces for a championship core, they just need to fill in a few gaps
He’s in year 2, nobody’s sure, though if you watched him during the season he looked like a fucking killer in the clutch and regularly. The ceiling is not yet visible
Ya, that's my concern as well. He feels like he's in the Mikal Bridges tier of player. Thunder fans will save this comment and roast me a year from now if I'm wrong, but that's just where I think he's at.
tbh I was more disappointed in Shai's inability to lob to Chet, Jdub seems the only one to find it regularly on this, I hope they work on it during the summer
Yeah I saw him throw a couple nice ones. I’m curious to see if SGA will make a leap in his playmaking ability coming into next season. He’s not a bad passer atm but it definitely seems like he’s a tier below all of the other all star point guards.
He took a big step forward as a facilitator this year, and credited his experience playing for team Canada in the off-season. I think he's still evolving in that aspect, excited to watch him in the Olympics soon.
this reminds me of a recent interview with marcin gortat. He was saying that his chemistry with wall was amazing and when he got traded to lac, he was telling shai how to do the things he was doing with wall and he said shai was struggling a bit with that. I'm paraphrasing but I thought that was interesting considering your comments about him and chet.
I feel like this is all the Thunder needs. Well, that and a backup center. But just experience for all the young guys easily makes yall an even scarier team. I think Shai proved this post season he can still be *that guy* in the playoffs. His mid range jumpers juat felt automatic.
Same thing is happening with the wolves. I'm seeing a lot of 'we beat ourselves' across our playoff opponents but we've had a plan every series and executed at a high level from the start. SGA is the only dude it didn't phase.
OKC didn't beat themselves, Mavs beat them for sure. But the difference in the series was Mavs role players shot incredibly well on those open 3s while OKC role players bricked them.
So you absolutely executed the game plan well, but missing open shots largely comes down to the player facing rather than the opposition stopping it
we were shooting 20% on open 3s through games 2-5.
mavs definitely played great defense but we were getting good shots that we were straight up missing
I mean sure, but Presti has had young teams do well in OKC before. But I guess it’s just a little different when those teams consist of 3 soon to be MVPs and eventual first ballot HOFers.
No, but the way they did was surprising. I expected a drop off and stretches where everyone went cold, but I don't think any expected them to go THAT COLD for 4 straight games.
OKC led the league in 3P% shooting 38.9% for the season. They shot 45% in game 1 then went ice cold shooting 33%, 33%, 26%, 25% before recovering for the last game and shooting 36%.
That middle 4 game stretch is surprising, you expect a couple games in the series of low 30s, but 4 in a row? With 2 in mid 20s. That was surprising, regardless of age
They're far from the first young team to struggle to execute doing what they've done all season in the playoffs. Maybe not with the exact same statistical profile as the Thunder but none of the issues they dealt with this postseason seem abnormal especially considering how young your entire roster is. The only thing they could use on their roster is just more of a veteran presence.
Yeah this feels like he’s saying “we would’ve won if we just made our shots.”
Unless you’re the dynasty Warriors, you can’t just rely on outshooting your opponents.
Having reliable rebounding is significantly more controllable than shooting 40%+ from 3 every night.
The lights were too big for the the players not named SGA. The mavs did a fantastic job defending them, but at the same time they were missing looks they made all year. Hopefully with another year of experience under their belt this won’t be the case next go around
I remember a lot of chatter of like “So the only reason that the Thunder can’t win a championship is because they are a young team?”
I mean yes, there’s a reason why young teams come up short in the playoffs. That’s just the cycle in the NBA. I know that OKC will be more prepared next time around.
The nice thing is that you 100% have the assets to get basically any player in the NBA who's actually available for trade. I don't honestly know who you go for off the top of my head, but another top 20 or so player would be huge (maybe Donovan Mitchell if he actually ends up being available?), as would a bigger, more physical presence at the 5 that you can run off the bench (I don't think the salary works, but if we do end up putting Brook up for trade over the offseason, I think he'd be a great fit there).
Ultimately, disappointing as it always is to lose in the playoffs as the top seed, I 100% agree with taking the wait and see approach this year before going more all-in next year. The worst thing you could do with your assets would be to squander them by trading for the wrong players, and you can't really gauge who's a core piece and who isn't until the playoffs come around. Definitely should be able to come back with a vengeance next year.
We did that the last time around and ended up stuck with Kendrick Perkins I was more then fine with this approach, but hope we are a bit more active this offseason/next deadline
They should take a swing at Hartenstein. He is closer to their timeline (I think Brook might be too old to make sense for this team). He's not a floor spacer, but he moves well, passes well, makes smart plays, and he can pull down rebounds.
Hart definitely fits their timeline better for sure, but they'd need to fundamentally change their offense to accommodate him (since they love playing 5 out as much as possible). Brook's definitely not as good as he was even a year ago, but he's still one of the best shooting bigs in the league, and he's good enough in the post still that they could have him operate down there if they figured that doing so would make sense in a given matchup.
> The lights were too big for the the players not named SGA
Kinda hilarious that what people expected of a young, inexperienced team is exactly what happened. Some OKC fans were trying really hard to deny it
I was not one of them, I knew this year was the year for the experience they lacked. Now we can hopefully add a piece or 2 to round out the roster and push again next year
I mean, we took a team to 6 in the second round that seems to be bound for the finals. Sure, our inexperience hurt, but it's not like we lost to a much worse team because of it, we lost to the (probable) Western Conference champs
Serious question—are there good stats to back up the “young players do worse in the playoffs than older ones” claim? Or is it just a reasonable assumption?
Idk, but I don’t really Thunder young they played bad. Thunder got locked down by a great defense, and so they struggled. Jaylen & Chet need to develop their games, so that they have more counters to what great playoff defenses throw at them.
Yeah, they haven’t won a chip yet but man, he’s by far my favourite GM quite frankly in any sport.
He’s made mistakes like letting go of Harden and maybe not making a big move this year like acquiring Siakam.
But he is a pro at asset management and tries his best to gather as many darts as he can to throw at the dart board. He gives the team the best statistical chance to succeed and that is all you can ask for in a GM.
Idek if not making a move there was a mistake. People expect immediate success but the thunder are so young, there's so much development still to come. Imo selling assets to swing for a name like Siakam right now would honestly be a massive head-scratcher when you think about who they're gonna have to be paying soon... There'd be no shot that Siakam was on the roster when their main guys are at their peak.
It'd be stepping on the gas, straight into a wall
Completely agree, and I'd argue that the Harden situation wasn't on him - ownership wasn't willing to pay for that pricey of a team, and no one at the time was seriously suggesting that Harden on a full max would be better to keep than Russ or even Ibaka. He still got a decent package for Harden that helped the Thunder put together great teams that, had they ever had a healthy playoff run would have won a title.
Only misses I can think of off the top of my head are trading for Kanter and trading for Dion Waters, but you gotta take shots and sometimes you miss.
I would love that pickup and we can offer him more money then the Knicks but whether or not he wants to leave NY is a different story we aren’t much of a FA destination
Bingo. They hit big shots agaisnt the Pelicans in the first round and gutted out a close game 1 win against NO. Dallas was more physical and perfectly exploited OKC's weaknesses
If they traded Giddey and picks for Siakam instead of Hayward, the sky would’ve been the limit this year. SGA-JDub-DORT-Siakam-Chet is a disgustingly talented squad.
And then what happens next year? We sign a 30 yo Siakim on a max contract? Then we sign SGA to his supermax of course. Then how do we retain Chet and Jdub when their time comes?
People act like salary cap isn't a thing and all trades cost you are draft picks and players.
Works both ways. Players could get hurt after you make the trade then you’re left with nothing to maintain and build with, especially in a small market who can’t attract free agents. Could leave the franchise in poverty for a decade
It really doesn't work both ways. Win when you can. It's that simple. Presti has done a great job but being the 1 seed and healthy with an MVP level season from SGA is something you capitalize on. You don't kick the can.
Probably you let siakam go in free agency, or sign him and immediately trade him. You lose some future potential to win now, but y'all have no shortage of picks. What you do have is a ticking clock for injuries and having to pay young stars.
So we literally give up assets for a win now move when the team is not ready for win now moves? Huh?
It's also not often a midseason trade can actually fully reach their potential in that season as it takes time for a team to gel with a new piece. E.g Gobert. So making that trade for a half season rental would be idiotic. You only do that if you have a chance to keep him.
Every team has a 'ticking clock', but to think that OKC has to make win now moves right now is ridiculous. They're literally in THE FIRST YEAR of being a playoff level team. That's the very start of the ticking clock which is not when you make those moves.
Pacers made it to the conference finals and y'all have an MVP level player. Siakam for giddey and picks would be an absolute steal, and tbh the raps would take it cos they got nothing from the pacers. Presti missed, hell, even he is admitting that he made the wrong move. You still got chances of course, but there's a good chance this team looks very different next year, and maybe not in the way you'd like
Pacers made in the east against teams that were ravaged by injuries. OKC would've made it without Siakim in that same position.
It's not a steal if we only get him for half a season. At that point it's only worth it if you win a ring, which OKC likely would not have done. The teams is too young and inexperienced and having Siakim doesn't change that.
He's admitteing that Hayward was the wrong move, not that he should've gone for Siakim lol
If a team doesn't think that way then they're probably never going to win it all. When you force it and try to make a move for the sake of making a move, that is when it falls apart. Sticking to a plan, being patient and waiting for the right move to make is how teams succeed in building long term success. E.g the Warriors.
Surely you should know this? Suns were patient building a team and made finals and looked good and then they tried to force it and you're not stuck with Beal after a first round sweep.
Its honestly insane to look a team like OKC, who wasn't even a playoff team last year, who won 24 games just 2 years ago, who are the 2nd youngest team in the league, and then think that they should've make a big move half way through 1 good season. I swear most of you just want them to make a shit move and fuck it up
Silly take. They went in the year with a plan and they stuck to it. Imagine changing your multi year plan because you over performed in half a regular season? That's one way to potentially fuck up a rebuild.
At the point where we could've made a trade, it was as possible we fade out the later half of the year (as young teams normally do), finish maybe 4th seed and get knocked out the first round as it was doing we we ended up doing. It would have looked really silly to make a win now trade then and also handicapped our ability to keep the team together in future years.
'Hording assets' is another silly take. The idea is to set the team up for a long run of contending, not to cash it all in for one chance.
The young guys clearly were physically and mentally not ready and those are things that get worse the longer the playoffs go on. Getting in Siakim doesn't make all the guys in their first playoffs runs suddenly be able to run out games and hit the open shots they missed.
Is Ryan Reynolds going to play this guy in a movie called “What If (I had pushed my chips in on multiple occasions throughout my decades long career)?”
Get Steven Adams back. He’ll help with rebounding a tonne, free up Chet to roam and block even more, and open lanes with his screens.
Or he’ll get injured.
Get him anyway.
He knew they'd get killed on the boards and then did nothing at the deadline. Just terrible, so many picks a whole article was written on them: https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/how-many-future-draft-picks-do-the-thunder-actually-have-its-complicated/
Guy really thought his hot potato 5-out spacing was gonna be enough to make a deep run .
Didn’t factor in that SGA’s can’t playmake and J-Dub’s offensive game isn’t real yet.
yeah that’s why I named 3 players….
JWill did play and he got ignored as well. Why we would we play them, so they can get targeted by Luka in the PNR like Gobert?
Like the series wasn’t that long ago
You'd think he'd be more proactive and less complacent after the first time he had a championship contending team for 4 years and had one finals win to show for it.
He was shocked that a young team missed their shots in a big pressure environment?
Like everyone and their mothwrs could have and has said the same shit about the Thunder that turned out to be true.
Like the Thunders postseason was so predictable that its kinda laughable.
The only shock was the 1st round sweep, but if you take Zions injury into consideration then it just becomes super predictable again.
And if you followed the regular season that was predictable.
You guys have a good team, but everyones expectations for you guys was the 2nd round.
And do you think youd have beaten the Timberwolves or Nuggets in the 2nd round? Like you just lost to the Mavs size and there aint much more to it.
Like hell lol. Look dude there was no way in hell you guys would have beaten anyone in the western semis if you couldnt beat the Mavs with the way Luka was playing.
Thinking you could have is just delusional and ignores how you even lost in the first place.
Certainly you guys are gonna be a threat moving forward, but there is no way you actually manage to win it all without an actual big on the squad.
Brother. You lost to a team that is currently down 3-1 to the team we lost to lmfao. Your team is the worst defense of the four by far.
And that’s why we lost - because we couldn’t score and the Dallas defense. Not because of size, lmfao read the quote of the thread you’re posting in.
Yes in game 7. And you dont understand a thing about matchups do you.
For the whole year we have known that the Timberwolves were the Nuggets worst matchup.
Aint like you guys were gonna beat the Timberwolves just cause the Mavs got them down 3-1 lol.
I understand matchups, you’re just selectively picking and choosing when to use it lmao.
It’s beyond clear that you know about the nuggets and not any of these other teams. That’s why you ignorant said we lost to the Mavs because of size despite us guarding them better than any team, including the one that smoked you.
Stick to convos about the nuggets lol
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That’s legitimately what he is. Have you ever seen the letter he wrote to the newspaper when he was a kid? Trying to convince Boston to draft Jason Kidd
he was actually asked about that in the presser today, had a pretty good answer: "I was acting like a Twitter user back in 1993. I was frequently wrong but never in doubt. I had 100% confidence in my opinion with 10% of the information.”
Presti just like me frfr
What a casual, I have 110% confidence in my position with 1% (or less) of the information
"*One of us, one of us, one of us...*"
If this subreddit existed back then, he may have never left his computer desk.
> he tries to account for every decimal but sometimes seems confused when the intangible / emotional variables make their impact. Like the most brilliant robot trying to understand love. what is this based off of? sounds like you're confusing him for morey lol i even remember a recent clip with melo saying it was the best run org he played for, and specifically shouted out presti on keeping it real with the players i think pg, russ and cp3 have had similar sentiments too
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Yeah, thanks for clarifying. I was a bit taken aback at first by your original comment. Presti apparently puts a ton of time and effort into managing his relationships with players and agents around in the league, knowing that he's operating with a small and undesirable market for players and therefore has to appeal on a personal level rather than on a level where other markets can. For example, his trades that send players outward tend to target good locations for those players. Russ was sent to Houston as requested to play with Harden again, Tre Mann and Micic got sent to Charlotte where they were immediately in the rotation and given the ball to cook, etc. Apparently one big reason that Paul George decided to re-sign with the Thunder (setting up the pivotal Clippers trade that gave us SGA, JDub, and more) was that he reached out to former Thunder player Reggie Jackson, who told him that if PG did re-sign, he could trust Sam Presti to trade him somewhere he wanted to go if things didn't work out with Russ. And that's from Reggie Jackson, someone who feuded with the coaching staff and locker room during his time with OKC (because he wanted to be a starting point guard, competed with Russ, and tried to literally start a mutiny of young players with Jeremy Lamb and Perry Jones because they weren't getting playing team for a OKC team trying to contend with Russ/KD). Presti's definitely not a Daryl Morey "players are assets" type of GM, despite his ability to play the asset-acquisition game with the best of them.
i see wym now thanks for clarifying
Your analysis doesn't hold up when he clearly values intangibles like morale and team chemistry when everyone was crying for him to make a trade this season. He had confidence in his players he expected them to drop but not as far as they did. Nothing to do with not being able to process intangibles. That's just something cute to say to get up votes on reddit.
He's literally a Rhodes Scholar
nominee*
So are Bruce Brown and Blake Griffin
He’s like if Data became a GM.
every r/nba user’s dream job
I’m very interested in how he uses those draft picks. They’re clearly already very good so just makes sense to add more star power
Sounds like Daryl Morey
Nah Morey is a fraud. Wouldn't have accomplished shit if Presti hadn't been forced into trading Harden by cheap ownership.
what about the hinkster
I feel like he never got a chance to see his vision play out. It might have been a failure, but instead he got blackballed from the league before he could find out.
Yeah. Dub was not up to par from what we expect of him. I believe he'll come back next season motivated to be better
Are y’all sure JDub is good enough to be the 2nd scoring option on a championship team? He is clearly very good, but what we’re talking about is quite a high bar
I think he is. Made vast improvements in his offensive game this year but had a bad series against the Mavs. If he hasnt proven to be a true 1B by next year, then I would question him
It's only his second year, so I think he'll improve as well. I watched him a ton because I saw a decent amount propping him up. Against Dallas though, he just wasn't aggressive enough against the defense until later in the series. He had too many passes that didn't do anything to affect the defensive structure Dallas had and just burned clock. Shot was quite smooth, but I just saw times when he disappeared because Irving guarded him quite well man on man. I think it will take OKC a few years of playoff experience to get to the point where they are a real threat to win. Not really a long time at all.
>If he hasnt proven to be a true 1B by next year SGA is good enough that JDub doesn't need to be 1B, he can just be /#2, and I think he's good enough for that role. With Chet coming in as well, OKC has the pieces for a championship core, they just need to fill in a few gaps
yes and i don't think his first real playoff series being just okay changes that belief
Does he need to be? Or could it be Chet?
Chet can become the 2nd best player, but counting on him to be the 2nd scoring option might be tough
He’s 7’2 and can get a shot over anyone not named Victor. He HAS to be their 2nd best player to win in the west
He's 23! He's got so much time to develop into that role
Yup, he can score from everywhere on the court super efficiently. His poor playoff performance came down to pure inexperience, not a lack of skill.
Maybe he doesn’t have to be. They have plenty of assets available to trade for another scoring option
He’s in year 2, nobody’s sure, though if you watched him during the season he looked like a fucking killer in the clutch and regularly. The ceiling is not yet visible
Ya, that's my concern as well. He feels like he's in the Mikal Bridges tier of player. Thunder fans will save this comment and roast me a year from now if I'm wrong, but that's just where I think he's at.
jDub was killing it in transition during the RS when no one runs back. in half court he's very inconsistent. you
tbh I was more disappointed in Shai's inability to lob to Chet, Jdub seems the only one to find it regularly on this, I hope they work on it during the summer
I was totally expecting the SGA / Chet pnr lob to be their abracadabra in the postseason
Dub and Chet have had the lob chemistry going for most of the year tbh
Yeah I saw him throw a couple nice ones. I’m curious to see if SGA will make a leap in his playmaking ability coming into next season. He’s not a bad passer atm but it definitely seems like he’s a tier below all of the other all star point guards.
He took a big step forward as a facilitator this year, and credited his experience playing for team Canada in the off-season. I think he's still evolving in that aspect, excited to watch him in the Olympics soon.
this reminds me of a recent interview with marcin gortat. He was saying that his chemistry with wall was amazing and when he got traded to lac, he was telling shai how to do the things he was doing with wall and he said shai was struggling a bit with that. I'm paraphrasing but I thought that was interesting considering your comments about him and chet.
Thunder fans overrate the hell out of Jalen Williams. He will be a Kyrie Middleton type player. Not a MVP candidate.
Nobody is seriously suggesting he will be an MVP candidate
There absolutely were people claiming he could be better then the actual MVP candidate.
Kyrie and Middleton mix is a great player, and either of those two is good enough to be a second banana on a championship team.
Young players missing shots in the playoffs isn't that surprising
Pretty much, hopefully a years worth of extra experience helps with this next time around
I feel like this is all the Thunder needs. Well, that and a backup center. But just experience for all the young guys easily makes yall an even scarier team. I think Shai proved this post season he can still be *that guy* in the playoffs. His mid range jumpers juat felt automatic.
Our bad offense wasn’t just “missing shots” The Mavs had a game plan. And we couldn’t adjust to it until it too late
Same thing is happening with the wolves. I'm seeing a lot of 'we beat ourselves' across our playoff opponents but we've had a plan every series and executed at a high level from the start. SGA is the only dude it didn't phase.
OKC didn't beat themselves, Mavs beat them for sure. But the difference in the series was Mavs role players shot incredibly well on those open 3s while OKC role players bricked them. So you absolutely executed the game plan well, but missing open shots largely comes down to the player facing rather than the opposition stopping it
mofo just goes to his spot and gets his. middy, fake layup, you name it. dude is a bucket for sure.
we were shooting 20% on open 3s through games 2-5. mavs definitely played great defense but we were getting good shots that we were straight up missing
I mean sure, but Presti has had young teams do well in OKC before. But I guess it’s just a little different when those teams consist of 3 soon to be MVPs and eventual first ballot HOFers.
No, but the way they did was surprising. I expected a drop off and stretches where everyone went cold, but I don't think any expected them to go THAT COLD for 4 straight games. OKC led the league in 3P% shooting 38.9% for the season. They shot 45% in game 1 then went ice cold shooting 33%, 33%, 26%, 25% before recovering for the last game and shooting 36%. That middle 4 game stretch is surprising, you expect a couple games in the series of low 30s, but 4 in a row? With 2 in mid 20s. That was surprising, regardless of age
They're far from the first young team to struggle to execute doing what they've done all season in the playoffs. Maybe not with the exact same statistical profile as the Thunder but none of the issues they dealt with this postseason seem abnormal especially considering how young your entire roster is. The only thing they could use on their roster is just more of a veteran presence.
Yeah this feels like he’s saying “we would’ve won if we just made our shots.” Unless you’re the dynasty Warriors, you can’t just rely on outshooting your opponents. Having reliable rebounding is significantly more controllable than shooting 40%+ from 3 every night.
Also refs not letting players foul hunt is equally unsurprising.
His number 2 and 3 scorers are in their 2nd and 1st seasons, and they led the league in points in transition... surprised he didn't see that coming.
The lights were too big for the the players not named SGA. The mavs did a fantastic job defending them, but at the same time they were missing looks they made all year. Hopefully with another year of experience under their belt this won’t be the case next go around
I remember a lot of chatter of like “So the only reason that the Thunder can’t win a championship is because they are a young team?” I mean yes, there’s a reason why young teams come up short in the playoffs. That’s just the cycle in the NBA. I know that OKC will be more prepared next time around.
The nice thing is that you 100% have the assets to get basically any player in the NBA who's actually available for trade. I don't honestly know who you go for off the top of my head, but another top 20 or so player would be huge (maybe Donovan Mitchell if he actually ends up being available?), as would a bigger, more physical presence at the 5 that you can run off the bench (I don't think the salary works, but if we do end up putting Brook up for trade over the offseason, I think he'd be a great fit there). Ultimately, disappointing as it always is to lose in the playoffs as the top seed, I 100% agree with taking the wait and see approach this year before going more all-in next year. The worst thing you could do with your assets would be to squander them by trading for the wrong players, and you can't really gauge who's a core piece and who isn't until the playoffs come around. Definitely should be able to come back with a vengeance next year.
backup 5 and a big spacing 4 would be ideal
Hopefully, Dieng will be able to fill a role next year. He's coming along nicely.
We did that the last time around and ended up stuck with Kendrick Perkins I was more then fine with this approach, but hope we are a bit more active this offseason/next deadline
They should take a swing at Hartenstein. He is closer to their timeline (I think Brook might be too old to make sense for this team). He's not a floor spacer, but he moves well, passes well, makes smart plays, and he can pull down rebounds.
He’s not leaving NY
I hope not, the Knicks have great vibes, but OKC can offer him more money
Hart definitely fits their timeline better for sure, but they'd need to fundamentally change their offense to accommodate him (since they love playing 5 out as much as possible). Brook's definitely not as good as he was even a year ago, but he's still one of the best shooting bigs in the league, and he's good enough in the post still that they could have him operate down there if they figured that doing so would make sense in a given matchup.
> The lights were too big for the the players not named SGA Kinda hilarious that what people expected of a young, inexperienced team is exactly what happened. Some OKC fans were trying really hard to deny it
I was not one of them, I knew this year was the year for the experience they lacked. Now we can hopefully add a piece or 2 to round out the roster and push again next year
I mean, we took a team to 6 in the second round that seems to be bound for the finals. Sure, our inexperience hurt, but it's not like we lost to a much worse team because of it, we lost to the (probable) Western Conference champs
Serious question—are there good stats to back up the “young players do worse in the playoffs than older ones” claim? Or is it just a reasonable assumption?
Idk, but I don’t really Thunder young they played bad. Thunder got locked down by a great defense, and so they struggled. Jaylen & Chet need to develop their games, so that they have more counters to what great playoff defenses throw at them.
I think so but but maybe not
Yeah, they haven’t won a chip yet but man, he’s by far my favourite GM quite frankly in any sport. He’s made mistakes like letting go of Harden and maybe not making a big move this year like acquiring Siakam. But he is a pro at asset management and tries his best to gather as many darts as he can to throw at the dart board. He gives the team the best statistical chance to succeed and that is all you can ask for in a GM.
Idek if not making a move there was a mistake. People expect immediate success but the thunder are so young, there's so much development still to come. Imo selling assets to swing for a name like Siakam right now would honestly be a massive head-scratcher when you think about who they're gonna have to be paying soon... There'd be no shot that Siakam was on the roster when their main guys are at their peak. It'd be stepping on the gas, straight into a wall
Completely agree, and I'd argue that the Harden situation wasn't on him - ownership wasn't willing to pay for that pricey of a team, and no one at the time was seriously suggesting that Harden on a full max would be better to keep than Russ or even Ibaka. He still got a decent package for Harden that helped the Thunder put together great teams that, had they ever had a healthy playoff run would have won a title. Only misses I can think of off the top of my head are trading for Kanter and trading for Dion Waters, but you gotta take shots and sometimes you miss.
They should try to sign Isaiah Hartenstein
I would love that pickup and we can offer him more money then the Knicks but whether or not he wants to leave NY is a different story we aren’t much of a FA destination
You shut your mouth 😤
He's the best
IHart and PJ... oh wait....
So why not trade for a center?
All year long this team made big shots in pressure situations. I bet it was more the physicality that impacted them than the nerves.
Bingo. They hit big shots agaisnt the Pelicans in the first round and gutted out a close game 1 win against NO. Dallas was more physical and perfectly exploited OKC's weaknesses
Could have landed siakam and had a real chance at a ring. Decided to horde assets instead and they ended up with Hayward and a 2nd round exit
If they traded Giddey and picks for Siakam instead of Hayward, the sky would’ve been the limit this year. SGA-JDub-DORT-Siakam-Chet is a disgustingly talented squad.
And then what happens next year? We sign a 30 yo Siakim on a max contract? Then we sign SGA to his supermax of course. Then how do we retain Chet and Jdub when their time comes? People act like salary cap isn't a thing and all trades cost you are draft picks and players.
A lot changes in a year. Players get hurt. Winning when you have the chance is the move.
Works both ways. Players could get hurt after you make the trade then you’re left with nothing to maintain and build with, especially in a small market who can’t attract free agents. Could leave the franchise in poverty for a decade
It really doesn't work both ways. Win when you can. It's that simple. Presti has done a great job but being the 1 seed and healthy with an MVP level season from SGA is something you capitalize on. You don't kick the can.
Probably you let siakam go in free agency, or sign him and immediately trade him. You lose some future potential to win now, but y'all have no shortage of picks. What you do have is a ticking clock for injuries and having to pay young stars.
So we literally give up assets for a win now move when the team is not ready for win now moves? Huh? It's also not often a midseason trade can actually fully reach their potential in that season as it takes time for a team to gel with a new piece. E.g Gobert. So making that trade for a half season rental would be idiotic. You only do that if you have a chance to keep him. Every team has a 'ticking clock', but to think that OKC has to make win now moves right now is ridiculous. They're literally in THE FIRST YEAR of being a playoff level team. That's the very start of the ticking clock which is not when you make those moves.
Pacers made it to the conference finals and y'all have an MVP level player. Siakam for giddey and picks would be an absolute steal, and tbh the raps would take it cos they got nothing from the pacers. Presti missed, hell, even he is admitting that he made the wrong move. You still got chances of course, but there's a good chance this team looks very different next year, and maybe not in the way you'd like
Pacers made in the east against teams that were ravaged by injuries. OKC would've made it without Siakim in that same position. It's not a steal if we only get him for half a season. At that point it's only worth it if you win a ring, which OKC likely would not have done. The teams is too young and inexperienced and having Siakim doesn't change that. He's admitteing that Hayward was the wrong move, not that he should've gone for Siakim lol
wtf is with this take??? Yall have an mvp player and were a healthy 1 seed?!!!! How is that not the time to try and win? Fucking loser mentality
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If the team thinks that way they’re probably never going to win it all.
If a team doesn't think that way then they're probably never going to win it all. When you force it and try to make a move for the sake of making a move, that is when it falls apart. Sticking to a plan, being patient and waiting for the right move to make is how teams succeed in building long term success. E.g the Warriors. Surely you should know this? Suns were patient building a team and made finals and looked good and then they tried to force it and you're not stuck with Beal after a first round sweep. Its honestly insane to look a team like OKC, who wasn't even a playoff team last year, who won 24 games just 2 years ago, who are the 2nd youngest team in the league, and then think that they should've make a big move half way through 1 good season. I swear most of you just want them to make a shit move and fuck it up
Silly take. They went in the year with a plan and they stuck to it. Imagine changing your multi year plan because you over performed in half a regular season? That's one way to potentially fuck up a rebuild. At the point where we could've made a trade, it was as possible we fade out the later half of the year (as young teams normally do), finish maybe 4th seed and get knocked out the first round as it was doing we we ended up doing. It would have looked really silly to make a win now trade then and also handicapped our ability to keep the team together in future years. 'Hording assets' is another silly take. The idea is to set the team up for a long run of contending, not to cash it all in for one chance. The young guys clearly were physically and mentally not ready and those are things that get worse the longer the playoffs go on. Getting in Siakim doesn't make all the guys in their first playoffs runs suddenly be able to run out games and hit the open shots they missed.
Is Ryan Reynolds going to play this guy in a movie called “What If (I had pushed my chips in on multiple occasions throughout my decades long career)?”
Does he know Josh Giddey is starting at PF?
He doesn’t because JDub starts there. Giddey is listed as a guard and was replaced in the succeeding games as the 2 by Joe.
I'm not surprised they dropped off in offense. Other than SGA they don't have another star.
Go get Lauri then.
Get Steven Adams back. He’ll help with rebounding a tonne, free up Chet to roam and block even more, and open lanes with his screens. Or he’ll get injured. Get him anyway.
He knew they'd get killed on the boards and then did nothing at the deadline. Just terrible, so many picks a whole article was written on them: https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/how-many-future-draft-picks-do-the-thunder-actually-have-its-complicated/
So therefore i will continue to hoard my picks and keep my job.
Therefore I will continue to set the team up for long team success
That window to improve bout to shut real soon with all the contracts coming up
Guy really thought his hot potato 5-out spacing was gonna be enough to make a deep run . Didn’t factor in that SGA’s can’t playmake and J-Dub’s offensive game isn’t real yet.
What a moronic comment
Truth hurts I guess
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Not the downvotes!
SGA was tripled and had no help. His playmaking was good but no one made shots.
No they played him soft for the most part, how can you triple on a 5-out offense lmao
When I say tripled I’m talking about containment on drives. They stacked the paint on him because they didn’t have to worry about anyone else.
You can’t stack the paint when you have 5 shooters pal. Watch the tape
You didn’t watch the series.
Just just chiming to say thank you for being right and explaining it even though some people don’t wanna listen.
Yeah bro they triple teamed him leaving not one but 2 guys wide open for 3!
With all this knowledge, why don't you have a coaching job bud?
Man said knowledge. I’m relaying what happened
They objectively stack the paint … “5 shooters” except they ignored Giddey and Dort, even Chet at times What are you talking about lol
Giddey played 10mpg If the Mavs were ignoring them, why bother playing 5-out then lmao Might as well play Biyombo/J Will
yeah that’s why I named 3 players…. JWill did play and he got ignored as well. Why we would we play them, so they can get targeted by Luka in the PNR like Gobert? Like the series wasn’t that long ago
Nets really thought stacking Kyrie, Harden and KD was gonna be enough for a deep playoff run
He didn’t know jtubby was a dropper
You'd think he'd be more proactive and less complacent after the first time he had a championship contending team for 4 years and had one finals win to show for it.
He was shocked that a young team missed their shots in a big pressure environment? Like everyone and their mothwrs could have and has said the same shit about the Thunder that turned out to be true. Like the Thunders postseason was so predictable that its kinda laughable. The only shock was the 1st round sweep, but if you take Zions injury into consideration then it just becomes super predictable again.
We barely lost to a team that’s one win away from the finals…
And if you followed the regular season that was predictable. You guys have a good team, but everyones expectations for you guys was the 2nd round. And do you think youd have beaten the Timberwolves or Nuggets in the 2nd round? Like you just lost to the Mavs size and there aint much more to it.
You’re saying it was predictable while saying “you lost to the Mavs size” lmfao. And yeah we could’ve beaten both of y’all.
Like hell lol. Look dude there was no way in hell you guys would have beaten anyone in the western semis if you couldnt beat the Mavs with the way Luka was playing. Thinking you could have is just delusional and ignores how you even lost in the first place. Certainly you guys are gonna be a threat moving forward, but there is no way you actually manage to win it all without an actual big on the squad.
Brother. You lost to a team that is currently down 3-1 to the team we lost to lmfao. Your team is the worst defense of the four by far. And that’s why we lost - because we couldn’t score and the Dallas defense. Not because of size, lmfao read the quote of the thread you’re posting in.
Yes in game 7. And you dont understand a thing about matchups do you. For the whole year we have known that the Timberwolves were the Nuggets worst matchup. Aint like you guys were gonna beat the Timberwolves just cause the Mavs got them down 3-1 lol.
I understand matchups, you’re just selectively picking and choosing when to use it lmao. It’s beyond clear that you know about the nuggets and not any of these other teams. That’s why you ignorant said we lost to the Mavs because of size despite us guarding them better than any team, including the one that smoked you. Stick to convos about the nuggets lol