Phx-Suns.Net

I'm not too surprised by the Bulls beating the Celtics. Wade, Rondo, and Butler know how to play. And as much as we like IT on this board, I don't think the Celtics are that great a team. I think they are right there with OKC. To me, the east is pretty flat, and any team could take any series (unless the real cavs show up).

A few observations:

The Bucks are that team NO ONE wants to play this year. This will be Freak's real coming out party I think. He's a monster and they're just in a great flow right now. Props to Kidd for coaching that team up.
The Raptors, for whatever reason, are still the Raptors and lack that legit franchise 1A guy. Love Lowry, love what DeRozan's become, but they're really just an OK team. The big questions facing the franchise are: Do they fire Casey? Can they make any trades or a trade to get that 1 guy? Do they blow it up? Do they keep trying to improve from within? Tough to say what they'd do.

The Celts are similar to the Raps IMO. They're better coached and have better role players but lack that 1 guy. It's not Horford unfortunately, or at least, they're not giving him the opportunity to be that guy. How far can IT take them? Really sucks what happened to him and I was glad to see him have a great game. Does he play Game 2? If he does, it is the letdown game? I don't think the Bulls are that good but they're tough and have the experience. They also match up well. Could be a tough 6 or 7 game series. My one hope is that the Cs do lose and lose because of their bigs, or lack thereof. They were outrebounded 53-36 yesterday so if they're looking for a bigman in the summer, I'd expect Tyson to be discussed. McD has the relationship with Ainge, he'd fit right in on that team and we'd be sending him to an EC contender.

The jury is still out on Toronto. If they can get past the Cavs in round two, they'll definitely be making investments in Ibaka and PJ. If they still can't get past the Cavs, who are kind of stumbling themselves at the moment, then you have to wonder, is it even worth their money to re-up Lowry, let alone Ibaka and PJ.

Bulls and Bucks were impressive this weekend. I want to see a few more games before I draw too many conclusions. I think the Celtics are more vulnerable than the Raptors, though. I still expect Toronto to go far this year, but we'll see.

pickle wrote:The jury is still out on Toronto. If they can get past the Cavs in round two, they'll definitely be making investments in Ibaka and PJ. If they still can't get past the Cavs, who are kind of stumbling themselves at the moment, then you have to wonder, is it even worth their money to re-up Lowry, let alone Ibaka and PJ.

They've got to get past the Bucks first.

Even if Toronto doesn't make much noise this year, I have a hard time seeing them break this team up. This is the best team in franchise history, and they have a ton of fan support. Literally, the 4 largest win totals in franchise history are the last 4 years. Bosh once won 47, and Carter once won 47. I don't think they break up a team that can win 50-60 in the east unless they get a star back who can play right now.

Toronto won't break up their team. They have a really strong roster, and they added multiple tough veterans in the middle of this season. I think no matter how far they get this year, they should keep this core intact and make another run at it next year.

They may need to move on from Lowry. He literally can not shoot in the playoffs and that is a legitimate problem at this point.

O_Gardino wrote:
They've got to get past the Bucks first.

Even if Toronto doesn't make much noise this year, I have a hard time seeing them break this team up. This is the best team in franchise history, and they have a ton of fan support. Literally, the 4 largest win totals in franchise history are the last 4 years. Bosh once won 47, and Carter once won 47. I don't think they break up a team that can win 50-60 in the east unless they get a star back who can play right now.

Mori wrote:Toronto won't break up their team. They have a really strong roster, and they added multiple tough veterans in the middle of this season. I think no matter how far they get this year, they should keep this core intact and make another run at it next year.

I don't know... It's easy for us as non-Raptors fans to sit here and admire their team, given that their success trajectory is almost exactly reverse of ours. But look at what they have right now, in terms of contracts vs. talent. DeRozan, a man who steadfastly refuses to shoot the 3, is going to be paid 27.7 mil a year until 20-21 season. Lowry is up for an extension this summer, at age 31, and I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that he'll be seeking the full max or thereabouts, 5 year for (not familiar with the cap rules, what's his max now?) at least Conley's 150 mil. They already owe 15 mil to Carroll and JV, and 8 to Joseph, with some other smaller rookie scale contracts all set to expire next year. Then they have Ibaka, Patterson, PJ, who are all free agents. If they commit to all these guys, they had better be sure they can get to at least one finals, no? Otherwise, they'll be holding the bag for Lowry for 35 mil when he's 36 years old... Even if his game ages well, that doesn't seem like an investment I'd make if I were their owner, unless, again, I know for sure I can get past the Cavs and get to the finals at least once with this team. Lowry DeRozan and Ibaka might be somewhere around 85 to 90 mil in a 103 mil cap.

And I think they'll get past the Bucks. As bad as Lowry has been, he's not gonna score 4 points every game in this series.

The Raps are living the best period of their history, have created huge hype among fans, and if I were them, I'd ride it till the end, seeing as the players have developed a family atmosphere, with Lowry being the heart and soul despite his playoffs strugglings. I'd spend on Lowry, Ibaka and Tucker, while I'd move on from Casey, use assets (to an acceptable extent) to dump Carroll and move Valanciunas to increase Nogueira's role (unless the new coach could/would actually take real advantage of Jonas). That core is still young, just entering its prime and has a chance to improve from within with another coach.

Part of their problem is that they have not done a lot with the extra assets they've had during their winning (Poetle #9, Wright #20, Caboclo #20). Also, lotto picks Ross (#8) and Valanciunas (#5) didn't really upgrade the level of the team.

I agree with part of this. I'm not saying they should blow it up, just that it will be tough to sign on the dotted line if this lineup cannot get past the second round (Cavs) yet again. I don't think this core is young. Lowry is the unquestioned engine of this little train and he's 31, seeking a 4 or 5 year contract. Once they commit to all the contracts they will need to this summer, they are not that different from Grizzlies east in having massive dollars tied up in three players with limited flexibility in the next 3 years.

If they were to move Casey and bring someone in, this someone had better make an impact right away.

I think they needed to have featured JV more after the performances he put up last year, but instead DeRozan played like crazy at the start of the year and JV regressed, in my opinion. Agree about Cabocolo; jury's still out on Poetl and last year was a brutal class anyway. Maybe they ought to have gone for Maker or Labissierre, but there wasn't a lot to work with last year, period.

pickle wrote:I agree with part of this. I'm not saying they should blow it up, just that it will be tough to sign on the dotted line if this lineup cannot get past the second round (Cavs) yet again. I don't think this core is young. Lowry is the unquestioned engine of this little train and he's 31, seeking a 4 or 5 year contract. Once they commit to all the contracts they will need to this summer, they are not that different from Grizzlies east in having massive dollars tied up in three players with limited flexibility in the next 3 years.

If they were to move Casey and bring someone in, this someone had better make an impact right away.

I think they needed to have featured JV more after the performances he put up last year, but instead DeRozan played like crazy at the start of the year and JV regressed, in my opinion. Agree about Cabocolo; jury's still out on Poetl and last year was a brutal class anyway. Maybe they ought to have gone for Maker or Labissierre, but there wasn't a lot to work with last year, period.

The Grizz are a great comparison. Like the 2011 Grizz, the raps have never won anything and don't have fans. Maybe the Raps are thinking about the Grizz leaving Vancouver. If I'm the Raps, I spend a generation building a fan base and getting the city used to seeing the team in the playoffs.

Their fan base is pretty rabid now... Basically Canada's team. But I'd rather be where we are than staring down a max contract to Lowry with DeRozan on the books for 27.8 mil a year with their track record of post season performances.

IT is playing game two and then flying to the funeral:

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/isaiah-tho ... --nba.html

Ring_Wanted wrote:The Raps are living the best period of their history, have created huge hype among fans, and if I were them, I'd ride it till the end, seeing as the players have developed a family atmosphere, with Lowry being the heart and soul despite his playoffs strugglings. I'd spend on Lowry, Ibaka and Tucker, while I'd move on from Casey, use assets (to an acceptable extent) to dump Carroll and move Valanciunas to increase Nogueira's role (unless the new coach could/would actually take real advantage of Jonas). That core is still young, just entering its prime and has a chance to improve from within with another coach.

Part of their problem is that they have not done a lot with the extra assets they've had during their winning (Poetle #9, Wright #20, Caboclo #20). Also, lotto picks Ross (#8) and Valanciunas (#5) didn't really upgrade the level of the team.

Would the Raptors trade with us some deal around JV for Bledsoe? What else would it take either side?

They avoid overpaying Lowry and get younger, while we can move on from both Eric and Len. With Lowry struggling again, it could be the ideal offseason to do it.

I think Lowry's the heart and soul of that team. They may not want to max him, but if they get rid of him they may not recover. He and DeRozan are very tight. Raps are in a tough spot, kind of like the Grizz with Conley. They have more value to their own teams than on the market.

I don't love JV but he could be a decent fit next to Chriss.

I'm not that excited about Jonas V. But I admit that I haven't done a lot of research to learn about him. I just think if he were any good, the Raps wouldn't be thinking about getting rid of him. They could desperately use a great center on that team.

Marty [Mori Chu] wrote:I'm not that excited about Jonas V. But I admit that I haven't done a lot of research to learn about him. I just think if he were any good, the Raps wouldn't be thinking about getting rid of him. They could desperately use a great center on that team.

Strange. I think they desperately need outside shooting. Derozan is a midrange guy and Lowry can't shoot in the playoffs. Ibaka developed a 3 and Tucker can hit the corner 3 but that's basically it. They moved Ross and now are very limited from the outside.

Watching Robin Lopez, it makes me want to give Len more time. I remember how much Lopez frustrated me when he was young and was happy to see him hit the road. Now, I wish the Suns had him as their center.

I'm certainly not pining for Robin freakin' Lopez. I am sad the Celtics are about to go down 0-2 to the Bulls in the playoffs. What a bummer. I don't want to say this validates what we all thought about winning with IT in the playoffs when he's dealing with a personal tragedy though. I'm not really sure what this says about anything.

carey wrote:I'm certainly not pining for Robin freakin' Lopez. I am sad the Celtics are about to go down 0-2 to the Bulls in the playoffs. What a bummer. I don't want to say this validates what we all thought about winning with IT in the playoffs when he's dealing with a personal tragedy though. I'm not really sure what this says about anything.

I'm not pining for him, but he is playing well.

FWIW, the Bulls seem to have better talent and should win, IMO. The only position that the Celtics are better at is PF.