Frank, the story IS Utah

A few things to clean up from the second part of the summer league season:

- Nice article today on Jason Smith in today's Inquirer. For those of us old enough to work for a living, I'm sure at some point someone had the same type of chat with you that Coach Cheeks had with Jason a few weeks ago. My first boss told me never to read the paper at my desk. I can see this headline in a November notes column - "Smith still recovering from ankle injury".

-Interesting note from Maurice Brooks in Vegas regarding the Knicks and their talent level.

- Louis Amundson looks like he's going to play 15 minutes a night this year.


- One of 76BigShot's league wide spies mentioned speaking with a NBA GM in Vegas; this GM said that he thought the Sixers had a tremendous draft and that Thad Young and Jason Smith are both going to be good players. Take it FWIW.

- The teams in Utah were not as good as the teams in Vegas. With all the issues that have occured over the past few days, will the summer league still be in Vegas? You bet...the players love it there!

- Herb Hill is coming on a little. There's a fierce competition going on for the final 2-3 spots on the roster; it seems from afar that Hill is getting every chance to lose that spot and he's hanging on...there is really nothing better than free agents and second round draft picks that turn out to be servicable to good players is there? Hill played four years of college ball in a big time conference so playing in front of 7000 pissed off Philly fans shouldn't be that big of an adjustment.

More Musings..

First, a big thanks to all the new readers...I really hope everyone comes here for their 76ers information and opinion. My goal is to make this your "Sixers Homepage"...to that, please take advantage of the links on the right --->...if there is a link that you use that isn't there, let me know!

76bigshot@gmail.com

Onto the real stuff...

I was looking at the Sixers Salary Cap ... we all know what it looks like, but to look at it this summer with the salaries lined up it takes on a different form than it might have recently.

There's been a lot of conjecture about what Andre Iguodala is going to cost the team against the cap when his first contract is up - after this season - after what has happened w/ Rashard Lewis and his insane contract.

If you figure the cap remains at 54 million-ish for the next few years, being conservative, the sixers will be at $35 million with AI's existing 3.8 million. That should give them plenty of room to overpay slightly but not blow their cap room up. They would still have over 10 million dollars under the cap, a midlevel exception, and Andre Millers expiring 10 million dollar contract to move.

The other good aspect, to me at least, is that most of the young talent, with the exception being Louis Williams, is locked into low salaries for the next three years. The only albatross is Dalembert, but he's 7 feet tall, blocks shots and is very very very slowly improving.

After the cap situation is flexible, the team will have a good read on all the talent (as it will have played quality minutes in 2007-8) and can make a decision about which direction to go. They will also not win more than 35 games this season, which should yield another high pick in a relatively strong draft.

What if Thad Young is better than we think? What is Louis Williams has to play big minutes because Andre Miller pulls a hamstring and is just good? They could both stink too....point being that Billy King & Co. can make those decisions with more data and their backs not up against the wall with the cap.

Now we know The Plan

So what have we learned since draft night?

• The fans "plan" and Billy King's "plan" aren't the same. I, for one, like Billy King's plan. I'm going to call it the "Chicago Bulls" plan...keep drafting good players, let them develop into assets and TADA!, you've got some flexibility to improve. They got rid of Chandler and Curry when they were at their "upside" peak in exchange for Luol Deng, Joakim Noah and got the cap space to sign a premeire free agent (although thats now a questionable signing). The fans want to do what I'll call the "WIP" plan...fire everybody, its their fault, and get someone in here who knows what they're doing, and try to get the first overall pick while worrying about every free agent out there. Both plans do not follow Larry King's "today is worth 3 tomorrow's plan", which is good for all. People...Ed Snider is running a business. Right now, the business simply isn't in good condition relative to the competition within the league and on the open market (vs. NFL / MLB teams). I'm sure after sitting down with the team, the plan was to try to move up in the draft, but if not, Thad Young was their guy. We all HATE upside...but we need it right now. Its got value to other teams. Case in point - Darko. I mean, he's marginal, and might turn into servicable...we all know this. Memphis gave him a contract based on UPSIDE, not what he's worth now. One more thing in defense of the scouting and drafting - they haven't missed too much in the last few years since Larry left.
  
• Let's not get too excited about the Summer League. Please. Sure its neat to read the stories etc...but who is guarding Lou Williams? Let's see LW play some defense and not turn the ball over consistently in the winter. I hope they don't trade Andre Miller and let Williams get his backup minutes....its really too much for a 21 year old to be put in that spot. (Tony Parker has Tim Duncan)
  
• 2007-8 is a throw away year. Every team has to have one to "purge" a former core of players and develop a new identity, both within and without. The culture change promised by Billy King is taking place before your eyes...just a hunch, but Thad Young's att-I-tude definently endeared himself to the brass. I posted earlier that the starting lineup in 2009 could be Williams, Igoudala, Young, Smith, Dalembert ... if I told you that a year ago, you almost wouldn't believe it. Getting back to my first point, until the team generates wins (Wins = TV ratings), the team will be undervalued in the marketplace. The brass decided that they were going to need to take a step back to take three steps forward. The plan is to let that young core develop, get another draft pick, maybe find a D-League type free agent, and save cap room for 2008. I wouldn't run out to get a FA unless it was a perfect fit in 2008 either (Elton Brand!)
• I'm excited to watch the young guys play...hearkens me back to 1997/98 when the team was developing a personality.
  
• This planning takes some patience from management. The executives in Boston and New York are going with the WIP plan and its going to bite them while the Sixers are young and improving. Within 24 months, the Sixers will be better than both those teams for the better part of the decade. So my kudos to Ed Snider for fixing my favorite team
• Now that we don't have Joe Smith, our rebounding is really bad. Like worst in the league bad. We stunk last year and he was one of the better rebounders on the team.
  

Welcome to Real GM readers

Thanks to all our new readers from www.realgm.com - looking forward to having all the new readers.

Interesting note in the paper today about how Thad Young is dedicated to being aggressive and he wasn't in college....he played pretty well and has gotten better every game.

Let's see what happens at training camp!

Off to a Good Start

The Summer Leaguers lost an OT decision to the Pistons. They probably had better players than we did but last nights star, Louis Admunson, sprained an ankle - he apparently was off to a good start (theme...)

So I'm not one to pay attention to silly things like summer league stats, but this one caught my eye...Maurice Brooks points out that only a few guys have put 30 up in this league...and most of them have turned out pretty good. LW is only 20...looks like a good draft pick.

Thad Young took 11 shots tonight but only went to the line once.

The Start of the 2007 Season

Sixers eked out a 2 point victory over the Spurs tonight in the Summer League.

Few quick things to note:

- Player of the Game - Louis Amundson - 16 points, 11 boards
- Lou (don't call me Louis) Williams - 8 Turnovers
- Thad Young - 2-6 and got to the line once w/ two boards and two turnovers off the bench.

The Spurs didn't have Tim Duncan and Tony Parker was getting married.

We're talkin...summer league

Ugh.

So I'm going to free-flow some thought of the past week and hopefully it will make sense.

The draft overall...Man was I and the rest of you upset with the draft. Fuming. I was sure that Julian Wright was going to play for the sixers...check the record. This is not Thad Young's fault. I'll say it again - while he wasn't the top player on the board according to Jay Bilas, it was obvious this is the guy they were going to take if they couldn't move up to get Yi.

Yi! Jeez...he still might be a Sixer, but at what cost? He was the guy they were chasing? He can rebound? Can Yi adjust to the NBA like Yao did from a mental standpoint? Yao struggles his first few seasons...which Thad Young is going to do.

On to Mr. Young...I'm not sure that you can equate a year in college at Georgia Tech comparable to Ohio State, Florida, or Texas...they actually make you study at Georgia Tech. A few more things I like about Young - the fact that he's still growing, maybe not so much from a height perspective (although he thinks he can grow another 2 inches) but from a weight perspective. He has a body like Scottie Pippen. Pippen was a QTip when he came into the league and developed about 25 lbs of muscle and was a huge physical mismatch on the wing. Young was the #3 player coming out of high school behind Oden and Durant....remember that 3 Florida players stayed in school, Jeff Green kinda came out of no where, and there was a backlog of good top end players. I'm trying to tell myself that they saw a higher end Andre Igoudala who could be a leader in 5 years.

I like Jason Smith pick, but why did they have to move up? For those of you who would have rather had Dequan Cook...he won't be productive for a few years. Maybe 5.

I understand why they traded down per se; you don't want three guaranteed contracts when you can get a player one pick down who isn't committed We at 76bigshot feel that the salary cap comes before almost anything unless it concerns a high end young superstar. I like Byers but I really don't know about Herbert Hill...I hope McRoberts doesn't turn into something. Honestly though I've never gotten a 2nd round pick right so why should I have this year.

I'm not expecting much before or during the season...maybe a swap here or there to fiddle with the roster. but unless a fight breaks out with a team and player

So what do we have? Not what I expected.

A first round pick next year and the opening of the cap...It's tough to put all your eggs in those baskets.

I'm not hiding!

I just don't know what to write yet.

I think we were ALL a little disappointed we didn't get a top 8 pick.

I think there's a chance Yi will still be coming to Philly.

I'm glad we're not the Celtics or the Knicks.

I think, reviewing all that I wrote over the past 3 months about this draft, that Thad Young is going to be better than we all think. Maybe just not in December 2007.

I'll have more.....later.

Oh, and a BIG TIME welcome to all the readers from Sixers for Guidos and Pride and Passion!

Looking forward to sharing the upcoming season with everyone!

Today's Workouts

Sixers Notes

Today the Sixers will bring in an impressive list of players - Georgia Tech freshman forward Thaddeus Young, LSU junior forward Glen "Big Baby" Davis, Colorado State junior center Jason Smith (whose stock is apparently rising), and Vanderbilt senior swingman Derrick Byars.

You have to think there's a good chance one of these guys will be picked at 21 or 30...maybe not by the Sixers though. I think today is "what are we going to be missing?" day...

Also interesting to note that the Sixers are GOING TO Washington DC to see Green...you think they'll tell him that there's no way he gets by #12?

Orlando List

Happy Summer - sure we've got The Finals coming up, but are they going to be watchable? Next year when Oden and Duncan...oops, Sixers site!

Here's a list of the 20 players invited to the "Elite Prospect" camp in Orlando...figuring even if Billy the King trades 12 or 21, one of these guys is going to be a Sixer on draft night.

Looking back to our post about the draft being broken down into a "top 2" and top 9", here are the 11 players outside of those top 9 that are going to be round 1 picks (or enough GMs want to see them to see if where they'll be drafted):

Javaris Crittenton, PG, Georgia Tech
Spencer Hawes, C, Washington
Acie Law, PG, Texas A&M
Josh McRoberts, F, Duke
Joakim Noah, F/C, Florida
Jason Smith, F, Colorado State
Rodney Stuckey, G, Eastern Washington
Al Thornton, F, Florida State
Julian Wright, F, Kansas
Nick Young, SG, USC
Thaddeus Young, SF, Georgia Tech

Chad Ford's Blog

The big question is "Is the 'top 5' player that Billy wants on this list? And if he's not (which I'm guessing he's not), how's he going to move up? What does he have to trade?

Besides the 4 draft picks this season, which are worth more than they ever will be, here are some other assets they have to move in a trade:

• Andre Miller - He's got two years left for a team that thinks it needs a PG to get to the "next" level (Lakers? Mavs? Heat? Cavs? Detroit if Billups leaves? Clippers?) I would hate to see him leave but if it meant getting a Brandon Wright or Mike Conley Jr.
• Louis Williams - If there are any believers in his skills (which there may be), he could be a throw in to move up
• Dalembert - He's not as good as his salary but he's got size, so if someone has a need at center he might be worth quite a bit in a trade (Atlanta?)

Sixers Salaries

Let me also say, being the master of the obvious, that there is no one on the Sixers that in untouchable when it comes to this draft...including Iguodala.

If it meant getting #3 and retaining some picks, I think its worth it for Conley, Brewer, or Wright.