#SLOE: People's Basketball Sim League

Hey there guys and gals, and welcome to this year's presser. Nothing fancy this year as I know we all have instagram live, zoom, google hangouts, jackbox.tv, and other non in-person multi-person avenues for superficial human contact to get to today.

Ever since the 3rd ring for West/Duren/Otto/whatever front-court made sense for that season build, I've been searching for another build that made sense. We had the West/Booker/Briseno build (which made the finals), the West/Bagley/Jackson/Haynes build (which lost in the conf finals in 7 to a very good Bulls team), and it seemed like we were getting slightly worse as well as wasting the prime years of Jerry West.

Finally the answer to our prayers was dropped into our lap with the #2 pick of the contraction draft. Norris Turney would be the Jerry West, to West's Duren in this new build, and all I needed to do was find the Otto Porter and we could run shit. Jerry is still only 30 and could be an MVP of a championship team for 3 or 4 more seasons (as Duren was at the age of 34). But then I made a mistake.

I traded Turney in a moment of impatience to the Bulls in exchange for the opportunity to make a ring happen this last year. Bringing in Curtin and Sabonis for Turney and an almost-washed-up Jackson was a Gamble (oh yeah, Carlton Gamble was in there too), was certainly a swing for the fences move. But I forgot the long-term plan, and I made it. It didn't leave me long enough to figure out the new build, and we didn't make it out of a first-round matchup with the very well run Magic team. This is a move that could haunt our team for a generation, and I don't know if I'll make it back to the big dance.

However, spilled milk, etc. etc. What are we going to do about it?

Without our own pick this year, we endeavored to flip West for a potential rebuilding package and start from scratch. When no reasonable offers were ever 'officially' made, we were left with a choice: outright tanking, salary reduction, etc. OR add some more pieces, take advantage of the fact that we reset our tax status last year, and see if we can find some pieces that gel well enough to win a ton of games before eventually resetting sometime in the future. We went with option B.

We traded Bagley for Ash and Thompson, to allow West to play SG, brought Curtin back at the 3, and then brought in a bunch of role players with the hope that several will step up during the season. We expect to make the playoffs and be a very tough out, but there aren't championship aspirations this season.

We'll still consider scenarios to tear-down and reset if the right offer for Sabonis or West comes along, but we're pretty happy with the way the offseason came together in the wake of a poor move last season, and we should have a good time playing an uptempo, high scoring style of basketball.

Happy to take questions now...

Random Reporter: Despite your stated intentions to rebuild, you've done an impressive job continuing to put out highly competitive teams year after year. Are you prepared to keep doing this until the perfect offer comes along? Will you only forcibly tear it down if one of your self-sustaining builds underperforms?

Xist2Inspire wrote: Sun Apr 05, 2020 12:29 pm Random Reporter: Despite your stated intentions to rebuild, you've done an impressive job continuing to put out highly competitive teams year after year. Are you prepared to keep doing this until the perfect offer comes along? Will you only forcibly tear it down if one of your self-sustaining builds underperforms?

You know as well as anyone there’s no ‘perfect offer’. But yeah, I’m not taking 25 or 50 cents on the dollar for a perennial MVP candidate. 80 cents? Sure.

But yes, until then I’ll do my best to win as many as possible, build my bank, and take playoff shots. If a team dramatically underperforms, whelp, that’s why I haven’t traded future picks.

Sham Smith, Bulls.com: Why do you think it's been so difficult to find a deal for Jerry West?

garbageman wrote: Sun Apr 05, 2020 1:50 pm Sham Smith, Bulls.com: Why do you think it's been so difficult to find a deal for Jerry West?

Great question, and I think it’s a confluence of a few things in no particular order.
1. I’ve won a bunch. I remember during Wig’s heyday, plenty of GMs wouldn’t trade with him. There was a feeling he really had an edge and no one wanted to get fleeced.
2. A lot of ‘buyers’ made deals for similarly talented players. You could make arguments over the rankings of West, BDJ, Fox, Boban, Luka, etc. but these guys are all in the upper echelon, and all found new homes in the last season or so. I was involved in some if not all of those talks/deals/teams but didn’t get it done.
3. A couple teams with requisite returns are being stewarded and thus not interested in major trades.
4. Plenty of GMs find me unlikeable and would prefer not to trade me a young guy with potential.
5. It’s always harder to sell than buy.
6. Some GMs may have been averse to taking a leap, and buying CAN be risky. Teams like the Jazz and Lakers and even Suns to a small extent that have fostered a stable of young talent have been patient with their guys and haven’t wanted to go all in.
7. Tax implications for going all-in have been seen, and are (rightfully) strongly considered.

Tl;dr - just hasn’t happened.

TheSyndicate wrote: Sun Apr 05, 2020 2:59 pm

garbageman wrote: Sun Apr 05, 2020 1:50 pm Sham Smith, Bulls.com: Why do you think it's been so difficult to find a deal for Jerry West?

Great question, and I think it’s a confluence of a few things in no particular order.
1. I’ve won a bunch. I remember during Wig’s heyday, plenty of GMs wouldn’t trade with him. There was a feeling he really had an edge and no one wanted to get fleeced.
2. A lot of ‘buyers’ made deals for similarly talented players. You could make arguments over the rankings of West, BDJ, Fox, Boban, Luka, etc. but these guys are all in the upper echelon, and all found new homes in the last season or so. I was involved in some if not all of those talks/deals/teams but didn’t get it done.
3. A couple teams with requisite returns are being stewarded and thus not interested in major trades.
4. Plenty of GMs find me unlikeable and would prefer not to trade me a young guy with potential.
5. It’s always harder to sell than buy.
6. Some GMs may have been averse to taking a leap, and buying CAN be risky. Teams like the Jazz and Lakers and even Suns to a small extent that have fostered a stable of young talent have been patient with their guys and haven’t wanted to go all in.
7. Tax implications for going all-in have been seen, and are (rightfully) strongly considered.

Tl;dr - just hasn’t happened.

I award this most thorough presser answer ever.

TheSyndicate wrote: Sun Apr 05, 2020 2:59 pm

garbageman wrote: Sun Apr 05, 2020 1:50 pm Sham Smith, Bulls.com: Why do you think it's been so difficult to find a deal for Jerry West?

Great question, and I think it’s a confluence of a few things in no particular order.
1. I’ve won a bunch. I remember during Wig’s heyday, plenty of GMs wouldn’t trade with him. There was a feeling he really had an edge and no one wanted to get fleeced.
2. A lot of ‘buyers’ made deals for similarly talented players. You could make arguments over the rankings of West, BDJ, Fox, Boban, Luka, etc. but these guys are all in the upper echelon, and all found new homes in the last season or so. I was involved in some if not all of those talks/deals/teams but didn’t get it done.
3. A couple teams with requisite returns are being stewarded and thus not interested in major trades.
4. Plenty of GMs find me unlikeable and would prefer not to trade me a young guy with potential.
5. It’s always harder to sell than buy.
6. Some GMs may have been averse to taking a leap, and buying CAN be risky. Teams like the Jazz and Lakers and even Suns to a small extent that have fostered a stable of young talent have been patient with their guys and haven’t wanted to go all in.
7. Tax implications for going all-in have been seen, and are (rightfully) strongly considered.

Tl;dr - just hasn’t happened.

Did you leave out anything else?

Very interesting insight on the lack of a deal for West. Have you reached a point of abandoning this trade idea? What would it take to let this deal go?


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greepleairport wrote: Sun Apr 05, 2020 6:20 pm Very interesting insight on the lack of a deal for West. Have you reached a point of abandoning this trade idea? What would it take to let this deal go?


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*checks DMs*

GWR: How do you keep your motivation high?

JNR wrote: Mon Apr 06, 2020 8:27 am GWR: How do you keep your motivation high?

My motivation (like I think anyone's) ebbs and flows. But I really enjoy the intellectual strategic aspect of the game. Trying out different mini strategies. Seeing what role player is going to play well in what spots, in what systems. Sometimes I'll see I play a particular team twice in an upcoming sim and I'll gameplan specifically for that team to see if it works even if it means an extra loss in the sim overall (which it rarely does, I think).

I also always have a goal with my team, get better, sell, add depth, duck the cap. Whatever it is there's SOMETHING I'm working towards.

So in big ways or small ways, I'm always somewhat motivated to move toward SOMETHING and I think that helps.