(02-18-2025, 01:07 PM)SleepingHero Wrote: I mean it depends on this mysterious calf strain. I’m starting to doubt that it’s just a calf strain at this point.

(02-18-2025, 01:34 PM)F Gump Wrote: I'm a fan of Stein's reporting, and usually see it as gold. But I'm very leery of his possible bias in putting out the news of a careful minutes management in a way that makes it sound like Luka has an ongoing impairment. 

Sure, Luka COULD be ailing and still slowed. Or even a bit out of "basketball shape" at this point. 

Certainly LA is going to be careful. Duh. He's valuable. 

But it feels like this is mostly just a common sense approach by LA, but Stein making it into "news" to perhaps serve as some much-needed justification for Mavs FO rash decision to get rid of him. 

So until LA FO or coach tells us that they are holding Luka back in an unusual way, I'm gonna figure it's regular basketball stuff going on.

(02-18-2025, 02:09 PM)HoosierDaddyKid Wrote: What the Lakers have to be careful with at this point is. whatever is going on with his calf, doesn't develop into an Achilles injury. That's what happened to KD.

(02-18-2025, 04:51 PM)Dahlsim Wrote: How "recurrable" exactly is Doncic's calf?  Word I heard was that his issue was that didn't stay out long enough to let it heal completely.  Is that being handled now properly by just avoiding back to backs?   
What about AD?  How "recurrable" is his injury?    Did both teams try and sell each other the proverbial "pig in a poke"?  

(02-18-2025, 05:31 PM)michaeltex Wrote: I have wondered this myself and have been thinking about the timeline.

As I recall, Luka had the calf injury bothering him last spring, I don't remember when it started, but he said he just had to play through it until he got the time off to let it heal naturally. So he limps through all four playoff series and doesn't get to quit until mid-June. By which time he's acquired other aches and pains (ribs, knee, shoulder(?)).

Then off to Slovenia and a few weeks later, despite being beaten up after playing a long NBA season, he's playing with the national team in the Olympic qualifier, but is eliminated after a few games on July 6th.

So, in theory, he had from early July until October 1st, the best part of 3 months, to rehab the calf and get it right for this season. But he wasn't in camp a week before it was announced there was another problem with his calf. He got "kicked" in practice, (smelled fishy at the time to me TBH), but it cost him the rest of pre-season and working with several new teammates.
 
So when he DID start playing, it was back to the same old, high usage, give Luka the ball and see if he can amaze us once again. But apparently the injury still wasn't healed and it blew up on him again.

I love watching him play and I'll try to watch him no matter where he lands, but I get why the MBT felt like it was better to cut bait before getting hung committing to $70MM/yr. If Giannis was not available, I'm not sure there is anybody else better and available than AD as a trade chip. Not happy with the return, but Christie's play helps and I'm thinking AD might be unstoppable when paired with Dlive, PJ, Kyrie, Klay and Max.

Sorry if this is a little jumbled. Kind of stream of thought typing...

(02-18-2025, 06:54 PM)HoosierDaddyKid Wrote: Bottom line, it's all about that SuperMax deal. They weren't going to commit that much money to a player that was nonchalant about his conditioning and diet. And also, it would hamper them from building out the roster around him. Boston is a good example. Tatum and Brown have max deals. They're window for winning another title is going to close within the next 2 years, and they're currently for sale because of those huge deals and their role players, White, KP, Pritchard, Holiday, etc. It's not sustainable.

(02-18-2025, 07:27 PM)mvossman Wrote: This argument would have more weight if he didn't trade Luka for 2 1/2 years of supermax on a much older player with injury history.  It will have even less weight if he trades most of the team for a 37 year old on another supermax.

(02-18-2025, 07:27 PM)mvossman Wrote: This argument would have more weight if he didn't trade Luka for 2 1/2 years of supermax on a much older player with injury history.  It will have even less weight if he trades most of the team for a 37 year old on another supermax.

(02-18-2025, 07:58 PM)F Gump Wrote: With DAL/Nico, they never said they have an issue with paying the supermax itself. They've explicitly made it clear. They just couldn't justify committing to LUKA that huge amount, and in so doing being on the hook to him for SIX seasons, in light of his questionable personal habits for an elite athlete, and his apparent unwillingness to alter them.

No other player would be putting that sort of financial noose around the Mavs neck (not just the amount in a year, but the extreme number of years too.)

(02-18-2025, 08:48 PM)mvossman Wrote: When you talk about that noose, I would argue that going all in for the short term and then going into a 4+ year window where you have no control of your first round picks is at least as big of a noose.  

(02-18-2025, 09:06 PM)KillerLeft Wrote: I think this is a valid point, too, which makes me wonder how they soured on Luka so thoroughly. 

I'm not saying Harrison is infallible - far from it - but I also don't think he's a moron. He mortgaged that 4+ year window you're referring to in an effort to build around Luka, specifically, so I don't buy for a second that he's been wanting to pull this rug for very long. I think he had an internal clock (or a literal clock, considering the impending extension eligibility) on a maturation process and finally just decided it was never going to happen. 

I think Smitty said it the best last week. We were discussing what type of event it would take for Luka to see how important proactive focus on his health and fitness was to his career, and Smitty said something like "reaching the Finals and losing badly certainly didn't do it." That, right there, is what happened, imo. I think Luka showed up for the season out of shape AGAIN, and this time worse than ever before, and any/all momentum that the team should have carried with it from last year dissipated. It might have been the wrong choice on the team's part not to fight through it again, but I bet a ton of people were super frustrated by that.

(02-18-2025, 09:06 PM)KillerLeft Wrote: I think this is a valid point, too, which makes me wonder how they soured on Luka so thoroughly. 

I'm not saying Harrison is infallible - far from it - but I also don't think he's a moron. He mortgaged that 4+ year window you're referring to in an effort to build around Luka, specifically, so I don't buy for a second that he's been wanting to pull this rug for very long. I think he had an internal clock (or a literal clock, considering the impending extension eligibility) on a maturation process and finally just decided it was never going to happen. 

I think Smitty said it the best last week. We were discussing what type of event it would take for Luka to see how important proactive focus on his health and fitness was to his career, and Smitty said something like "reaching the Finals and losing badly certainly didn't do it." That, right there, is what happened, imo. I think Luka showed up for the season out of shape AGAIN, and this time worse than ever before, and any/all momentum that the team should have carried with it from last year dissipated. It might have been the wrong choice on the team's part not to fight through it again, but I bet a ton of people were super frustrated by that.

(02-18-2025, 09:48 PM)Smitty Wrote: By the way, Killer, I think you’ve done a fantastic job of expressing your take on the thought process that was involved with this deal. You’ve been very rational and thorough when working your way through it all. The reading material has been top notch and pulled me down from the ledge at times. Appreciate your continued contribution to the board!

(02-18-2025, 09:36 PM)Smitty Wrote: It’s certainly discouraging when we all think of Luka as a psycho competitor and the one time he reaches the finals and gets embarrassed, it doesn’t make him hungry to come back and be the best version of himself.

I haven’t weighed in much on the topic because others here have said what I’ve been thinking in one way or the other. Ultimately, I’m a fan of Luka and hope he goes on to be one of the greats. It’s taken other greats time for it to click. Even a 50% Luka is damn good, so I’ll be watching.