LABron James Discussion: The Final Year?

OKC has influenced everyone into believing that depth is critical. Knicks just won with Brunson, Hart, Bridges, OG and KAT, their bench was really only Robinson and Shamet, with a guard sprinkled here or there for 10 mins.

Spurs likewise had Wemby, Castle, Vassell, Fox, Champagnie and Harper playing the bulk of the minutes with Keldon Johnson.

Both of these teams relied on 6 guys, with a 7th playing around 15-20 mins and another 1 guy at 10 mins.

We need Luka, Lebron, Reaves, Center, SF and then Smart and one more player which could be Rui if he stays to make the bulk of our minutes.

Love and Bronny as 13th and 14th men are going to have zero impact on the playoffs. Heck they’ll have a pretty small impact on the regular season too.

Love is still a decent player though, he can rebound and shoot. He is better than Kleber, I think people are just mad because he is old and they associate it with Lebron exerting influence and everyone wants Lebron gone.

 

i was saying that you can't cut or trade guys you sign as friends/favors. this is where the bronny signing has already hurt us. if bronny was a just a regular end of bench guy, he'd have been cut for goodwin and re-signed to the g-league team or a two-way or whatever. if love has the same protected status, now you have two of those. that's not good business, imo.

 

Yeah I think you're missing the biggest point.

You need depth for 2 reasons, but mainly the first one:
1. Withstand the looong regular season without overloading your stars that leads to injuries late season (ring a bell? ). Not only to have a larger 11-12 man rotation but also keep the team winning when your stars miss a game. This is huge to keep a good locker room vibe, take some pressure off of stars to return from injuries or play heavier minutes to keep a certain seed

2. Have different options in the playoffs for different matchups. We saw McCain lighting it up in a game and then Wiggins in the other one, Sochan playing in the finals, Carter taking minutes off of the 6th man of the year, etc

You win a title with a strong 6-man rotation, no doubt. All finals will be like that.
But the difference of an 8 deep or 12 deep roster is how you reach those final games.


Regarding Bronny/Love it's less about the actual impact but more the messaging, imo

Btw, another angle I'm getting from this Love thing is that Kessler may be coming. Love was in Utah and can help being a bridge for Walker as he settles in LA. I don't mind that and it actually makes sense from a roster building perspective

 

What happened with all of the development talk over the past two seasons?
This is where I have the biggest issue with KLove. I want the last three spots to go to project players, not washed buddies who are only there to waive their Pom poms.

 

Also, when you have had your top THREE players injured at the end of various seasons, you need a deep team throughout the regular season so they aren’t over worked by the time playoffs roll around.

 

explain/warn about Kardashians?