11-30-2021, 10:04 PM
(11-30-2021, 01:15 PM)mvossman Wrote: I can see the dislike for the KP move (especially in hindsight) but on the other hand, when you have an organization that has a terrible history in free agency and a generally poor history in developing through the draft, its hard not to pull the trigger on a potential star for 2 firsts and salary dump, even with a few red flags. The real problem is that Cuban does not understand his strengths and weaknesses. Instead of hoarding cap space that he has never been able to use effectively, he should have been accumulating assets for trades, which he sometimes gets right. I'm more disappointed in the last three years of failure than the KP trade.
I think most fans were excited about the KP trade (I was) because there was still a lot of potential. I don't even want to kill the MBT for making the move (hindsight and all) but I do think a more disciplined franchise wouldn't have done that move. KP was expensive, hurt, and due for a max contract sight unseen. We also threw in DSJ to go along with the salary dumps of Lee, THJ and Burke. Hindsight can make you overlook DSJ (young, recent lottery pick) or make you forget how terrible that THJ contract was. Maybe that move is more okay if you hadn't have had to spend an additional first to move up and get Luka. It's just a typical Cuban shortcut move because he hates taking. That's admirable in some regards but will hurt the long term success of the team.
And yeah, we are bad at drafting and using our free agent money but I don't think we can handwave that away. This franchise needs to get much better at that. I don't think you can build a successful team by only being good at trades (which we really aren't anymore).