[/cell]Balls O'Hard:Attritition -
at·tri·tion
əˈtriSH(ə)n/Submit
noun
1.
the action or process of gradually reducing the strength or effectiveness of someone or something through sustained attack or pressure.
Balls O'Hard: The say nothing good ends after the reading or pasting of an internet definition. There's also pretty common though that when a team starts their own attrition, not much good happens there either. You usually see a slow sad decline in production and the eventual disassembly of a team. So here we start out season off with two bad omens.
Balls O'Hard:Two years ago we were in the finals with Gordon Hayward and Enes Kanter. Last year we were in the conference finals with Harrison Barnes. All of those guys are gone now. That's 2 all Star level players and a human embodiment of the Swiss army knife gone. We can see the attrition happening.
Balls O'Hard: When farmers have a profitable cash crop sometimes you'll see them come out and harvest their crops to the fullest. They'll they'll reap every last stalk of corn, every last grain of rice and farm out every nutrient from the ground to make sure they maximize their profit. They wont change what's working and get every last dollar out of the crop. We see this in our league too. It's called going 'all-in'. You see asset after asset sent off to bring in win-now talent. And sometimes it works and you sew a championship or years of playoff victories. You'll see after a solid 5 year run, the team's 28-31 year old star sold off for pennies on the dollar, all to start over. I'm sure the Philadelphia 76ers fans have been frustrated with me in the past for not making some of these moves. We've seen elite talents change hands for those pennies on the dollar: Paul George, our own Gordon Hayward and Enes Kanter, Kyrie Irving, etc.
Balls O'Hard: With a new year, we've lost another talent. We moved on from Harrison Barnes who really never showed his true worth until the playoffs, where he could play the 2,3,4 and defend almost anyone to a good degree. He could hit the 3, shot at near 50% and could also rebound pretty well. We lost a very quiet but very good player. Sometimes you'll see team move on from players because things aren't working right. When i first started as GM, i would make moves to increase talent and frankly just to make moves. Some GMs still employ this strategy. In recent years, ive really tried to hone in on moving with intent. There's been a lot of great offers by a lot of other great GMs here that we've had to decline because it didn't fit in the team strategy going forward or it put another team ahead of us in our division or conference for the next 3-5 years shortening our own window.
Balls O'Hard:It's funny because when i started as a GM everyone was a mortal enemy to me. Rivalries were fueled by venom and I wanted to step on any team in my way's throats. Now i'm genuinely happy for my counterparts rebuilds and wish them success, just as long as it's not against me!
