I enjoy sports on two levels. First, and most importantly, I enjoy the thrill of watching unimaginably talented people performing amazing athletic feats, especially if they're players on a team I root for. And I enjoy the tension of hoping my team or my player will win.
But I, like most of you, also enjoy thinking and debating about the decisions that go into putting a team together. If my team's success depends upon the GM making a continuous series of good decisions, I get engaged in questioning those decisions. Who to draft, who to trade, who to sign. In baseball, when to bring a prospect up from the minors.
But looking at today's NBA, I question if being a good GM even matters at all. The three best teams in the NBA right now got that way because superstars chose to play for them. No other teams had a chance to sign or trade for the players that the Lakers, Clippers, and Nets got. Their GMs didn't do anything better than other teams GMs. They just happened to be the teams that the players chose to turn into superteams.
Is this the new NBA? Does team-building matter any more? Even the Heat already had Wade before adding LeBron and Bosh. The Celtics already had PP before adding Garnett and Allen.
And, yeah, it's possible for a championship team to be built through trades and the draft, like Toronto and Golden State, but it feels like it's getting harder and harder to do so. And it makes me enjoy the fact league less.
Does anyone else feel this way? And is there a solution? Would something like compensatory draft picks work in the NBA if a team signs away a max salary player, the team he's leaving gets an extra draft pick or something? Or is this not really a problem?
But I, like most of you, also enjoy thinking and debating about the decisions that go into putting a team together. If my team's success depends upon the GM making a continuous series of good decisions, I get engaged in questioning those decisions. Who to draft, who to trade, who to sign. In baseball, when to bring a prospect up from the minors.
But looking at today's NBA, I question if being a good GM even matters at all. The three best teams in the NBA right now got that way because superstars chose to play for them. No other teams had a chance to sign or trade for the players that the Lakers, Clippers, and Nets got. Their GMs didn't do anything better than other teams GMs. They just happened to be the teams that the players chose to turn into superteams.
Is this the new NBA? Does team-building matter any more? Even the Heat already had Wade before adding LeBron and Bosh. The Celtics already had PP before adding Garnett and Allen.
And, yeah, it's possible for a championship team to be built through trades and the draft, like Toronto and Golden State, but it feels like it's getting harder and harder to do so. And it makes me enjoy the fact league less.
Does anyone else feel this way? And is there a solution? Would something like compensatory draft picks work in the NBA if a team signs away a max salary player, the team he's leaving gets an extra draft pick or something? Or is this not really a problem?