Pokey Chatman was also elevated to Assistant GM. she’s moving up in our organization it seems. her history at LSU will never sit right with me, but i’ll have to accept that she’s not going anywhere anytime soon [unless it’s to another organization perhaps as a main GM].
the Quinn extension is interesting. she must be well-liked within the locker room. i’m happy for her, and i hope we have a playoff-level roster no earlier or later than the 2025 season in which she’d get the first chance to truly prove herself since 2022.
Jewell Loyd will once again stay Stateside, opting to play competitive pickleball to stay in shape during the offseason. Loyd who competed in the USA Pickleball National Championships in March, is looking to return to the championships again this season.
now that we officially missed out on winning a Top-2 Pick this time around, we should look to continue our rebuild and avoid trying to get a playoff-level roster together next season.
and under no circumstances should we look to trade the #4 pick unless it's to trade up.
so under that line of thinking: while the PG spot is our most glaring need – only positions we really don't need are at the 2 & 3 – i still believe we need to select the BPA, position aside.
my options for the #4 – assuming these players end the season uninjured and that at least Clark and Brink will be off the board:
hell yes: Bueckers (if she happens to drop) sure: RJackson, Cardoso (albeit Brazilian), Edwards (albeit Canadian) maybe if all goes right for them: Paopao (does she have enough PG skills to be one?), Prince (can she keep up that production?) no, or at least not in the Lottery: Sheldon, Van Lith, Reese, Lee, Holmes, Kitley, TJackson
a big question for us going into this draft will probably be, how do we view Ezi Magbegor & her positional future? is she better off [for us] as a 4 or a 5? our free agency moves might give us our answer before Draft Night. we'll see.
My guess is that Clark is now 75-25 to come out because Indiana is close to home. OTOH, maybe she wants to move on from the Midwest and live in a big coastal city. Who knows?
If Brink looks to be LA-bound, I'm guessing she comes out. I don't know about Indiana.
Bueckers? Cardoso? Hard to say.
Rickea Jackson seems like a reasonable fallback, but she seems like another Jordan Horston. Nice player, not a star.
by the time we find out who's actually turning pro at all this year let alone getting to selecting the #4, i'm not necessarily expecting any obvious stars to be there.
that said, i will continue to believe that the trio of Clark, Brink, and Cardoso will conclude their respective college careers in the coming spring. RJackson will be out of eligibility unless whatever her injury is this season is so bad that it causes her to redshirt. and even if none of those four are available for us to pick for one reason or another, i'd like to think someone worth taking will be there for us; i still see this shaping up to be a pretty good draft with regards to its overall talent pool.
so let’s say Clark, Brink, and Cardoso declare, and that Bueckers doesn’t. Clark at #1 to Indiana, and then i think Brink is the obvious #2 for LA regardless of who they bring in/bring back. with Griner seemingly guaranteeing herself to re-sign with Phoenix, that would eliminate their need for a center. so i think they avoid taking Cardoso – i could see them taking Edwards if she were to declare or RJackson – in which Cardoso would fall to us at #4.
am i wrong? is this wishful thinking? as delusional as i know i can get (lol), the above scenario seems very realistic.
Last Edit: Jan 13, 2024 16:42:50 GMT -5 by Deleted
to me, Griner despite being 33 is on track to have five or so more starting-level years within her. physically she has been pretty durable throughout her whole career, putting up standard numbers in 27 MPG this past season after not being able to pick up a ball for most of 2022. the question is if Phoenix thinks they could have Griner & someone like Cardoso together on the floor at the same time. otherwise, is 13-15 MPG of Cardoso off the bench for the next, say, few years enough to justify taking her with a [rare] lottery pick? otherwise an Edwards or RJackson would get to get good minutes & develop alongside Griner.
and Griner has said she’s not leaving the Merc. never say never of course, but i tend to think that’ll stay true.
First, take the best player available, who would be Cardoso.
Second, if Griner retires or decides she wants to chase a title, you have Cardoso.
Third, if Griner stays and shines, Cardoso is serious trade bait as a strong player on a rookie deal.
Now maybe I'm overestimating Cardoso, but I think she's a legit starting post in the W for a decade or so -- and you just can't pass her up if she's available.
Cardoso’s highest trade value then would likely be before she can even take the court for the first time for Phoenix, if they were to pick her. her trade value may drop if she’s limited to bench minutes and therefore bench production. that seems like it should be a draft-day trade more than anything else.
as for the Storm, it would be a mistake taking Sheldon period, let alone trying to make her become a starting-caliber PG. we need best available, but in the form of a post or actual PG. i don’t think we realistically have much on the roster worth trading the #4 pick up for either, no one that would make sense for us to trade away but still be valuable to another team. from my view, we just don’t have much value beyond two or three players.
so if the consensus top three are picked already, then who should we go with?
Phoenix had a terrible bench in 2023. Gustafson was nearing 6th woman territory and probably gets overpaid in 2024. Phoenix would be best to stockpile young players.
Cardoso’s highest trade value then would likely be before she can even take the court for the first time for Phoenix, if they were to pick her. her trade value may drop if she’s limited to bench minutes and therefore bench production. that seems like it should be a draft-day trade more than anything else.
as for the Storm, it would be a mistake taking Sheldon period, let alone trying to make her become a starting-caliber PG. we need best available, but in the form of a post or actual PG. i don’t think we realistically have much on the roster worth trading the #4 pick up for either, no one that would make sense for us to trade away but still be valuable to another team. from my view, we just don’t have much value beyond two or three players.
so if the consensus top three are picked already, then who should we go with?
As is the case in the NBA draft, the dropoff is always steep, and immediate, from the sure things to the we're-hoping. You just have to get lucky, really, as there's no way to predict which players will continue to improve, and which are as good as they'll get.
so if the consensus top three are picked already, then who should we go with?
As is the case in the NBA draft, the dropoff is always steep, and immediate, from the sure things to the we're-hoping. You just have to get lucky, really, as there's no way to predict which players will continue to improve, and which are as good as they'll get.
that being a non-answer aside, it does only make me more nervous since we historically don’t tend to nail the non-obvious draft moves, last year notwithstanding. for my own good, maybe i just shouldn’t ask these questions out loud haha.
we'll know a little bit more about everything as we get closer... time & place to ask the big questions.
Last Edit: Jan 17, 2024 15:16:45 GMT -5 by Deleted
if we want Nneka, my question is does that definitively mean we want Ezi to develop more at center? maybe, maybe not. i just hope we view Ezi to be talented enough to succeed at either post position – and at this point in Ezi’s career, i think she is. really, i don’t want to be out of the running for Cardoso just in case.
i just hope we’re shopping Russell throughout all of this, even if we don’t end up actually moving her. Russell is having a pretty good overseas season in Australia, but actually pulling the trigger on moving her will depend on who we’d be able to add to replace her. can’t just be Dulcy Fankam Mendjiadeu like it imo sort of was last year…
The question for Seattle, or any team signing Nneka, is what value a 34-year-old post player will add to the team's present and future success.
Nneka has played extremely well these in her 30s, and has been very durable, but the time will come when she starts to wear down. She has played more than 10,000 minutes in the WNBA, and she is known for her work ethic and playing hard.
For me, she is a player I would want if I were challenging for a title in the next two years. If I'm not realistically going to get to the finals without a huge helping of luck and/or unexpected development, then Nneka is not a good fit. (And I think Nneka may feel the same way.)
Ezi Magbegor is 25, and a foundational piece for a Storm team for the next five years. She seems to me to be much more comfortable at power forward than at center, though often the two spots are interchangeable. Still, I would not want to affect Magbegor's role by bringing in Nneka unless I thought the Storm could challenge Las Vegas in 2025 or 2026.
For me, she is a player I would want if I were challenging for a title in the next two years. If I'm not realistically going to get to the finals without a huge helping of luck and/or unexpected development, then Nneka is not a good fit. (And I think Nneka may feel the same way.)
and it seems like free agents are being advised not to sign anything that’d go beyond 2025, as everyone anticipates the current CBA being opted out of shortly after the 2025 season. so it’d theoretically match up well anyway for a team wanting to sign Nneka.
that said, i’ve always wanted us to keep tanking in 2024 such that we surround our young talent (which would include this year’s lotto pick and a theoretical 2025 lotto pick) with veteran talent in 2025 to then open up a window of contention. that timeline may not jibe if at least the high-end talent ain’t willing to sign beyond 2025, even if we could sign some interesting pieces either this year or next. that probably plays into our overall decision to go for good talent and make the ascent this year, even at the cost of a really good 2025 rookie.
even if we signed both a Nneka and a Diggins-Smith, i unfortunately still don’t think it would be enough to contend with the likes of Vegas & New York. we’d have to do more, like signing additional vets along with getting rid of our current salary-eating scrubs (namely Nurse but perhaps also Russell).
Ezi Magbegor is 25, and a foundational piece for a Storm team for the next five years. She seems to me to be much more comfortable at power forward than at center, though often the two spots are interchangeable. Still, I would not want to affect Magbegor's role by bringing in Nneka unless I thought the Storm could challenge Las Vegas in 2025 or 2026.
Magbegor and Russell were unable to develop post chemistry, which could be more of a Russell thing considering how she didn’t exactly come out of her headache syndrome with guns a-blazing last year. maybe Magbegor needs more of a stretch-5 alongside her. however, it’s also possible that Magbegor may not have been comfortable as a PF, even as 2023 was clearly her best season yet. again, i heard before the 2023 season happened in some interview that our coaching staff viewed her future at the 4, whereas she viewed her own future at the 5 – for what that may be worth now, if it even was true back then.
long story short, i don’t think Magbegor would complain about adding Nneka or 'swapping' Russell out for Nneka, per se.