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Those Memphis teams were Pau Gasol and not much else... KD is already better than Pau was and Russell Westbrook/Jeff Green are better than anybody on any of those Memphis playoff teams... Hell, the team Memphis rolled out there this year is probably more talented than their teams in the middle of the decade were...Originally Posted by bhzmafia14
Judging by what some people said before, those previous teams were better than the current team. The type of depth, vet leadership and coaching Memphis had during those years shouldn't be overlooked so easily.Originally Posted by Nowitness41Dirk
Memphis was never as talented as this Oklahoma City team is... This team is closer than those Memphis teams were, and they've got more assets at their disposal...
Another thing Memphis has and always has had going against them is an ownership group with a piss poor reputation... Heisley sucks and everybody knows it... Guys are smart enough to avoid bad/unstable ownership situations... Even when Jerry West was running the show, Memphis couldn't ever get anybody to play there because it was still a bad situation that wasn't going anywhere fast... I don't think we know enough about OKC's ownership group yet to make that judgment, but Sam Presti has certainly done a damn good job and has made a name for himself as a guy that knows what he's doing...
At least they had Pau Gasol who many think he's a top 10 talent since being traded away.
Nobody thinks Pau Gasol is a Top 10 guy... And most people never have...
During that time, Memphis had about 10-11 guys deep on their roster whom they could package up to bring in another star player. They just had a hard time doing it mainly because of guys not wanting to play here.
Go back and look at the roster for that 50 win team... What assets do you honestly think they had that could have brought another star player to Memphis? Shane Battier and Mike Miller...? That doesn't get you a star. Posey wasn't exactly young and nobody wanted to deal with Bonzi... The rest of the roster was nothing but spares...
I don't know if it had more to do with that 10-man rotation Hubie Brown implemented, meaning star players wouldn't get theirs or if it was location
It was them never having enough to really pull anything off for a star. Nothing more, nothing less.
Back thing, Memphis had better coaching than OKC currently has and they did have an all-star who just needed another guy to help push that team to another level.
That's debatable... And like I said, KD is better than Pau was at that point and Green/Russ are far better than anything else Memphis had on roster.
I just don't see why a guy like Bosh would go to OKC. He could possibly win in other places as well, not just OKC. He could easily go to Chicago and have a better chance at reaching the Finals in the East than in the West with OKC. He could go to Miami do the same. Hell, maybe even NY if they put the right pieces around him.
I agree it's probably a stretch for a guy like Bosh in OKC... I just threw it out as a talking point... But Chicago is not closer to contending than Oklahoma City, especially if LeBron stays in Cleveland. Miami, I agree completely. They'll have first dibs at whoever they want. But they'll only get one of Bosh/Amare/Boozer. And New York is not close, even if they get two legitimate FA stars... The only thing they have going for them is the city. The roster sucks. They can't add anything through the draft this year. Meh...
As good as OKC is, there's a reason why only 5 teams have won the last 10 NBA championships.
And there's a reason only two teams from the West have done so in the last decade... But none of that has anything to do with the current landscape... The Lakers are really good right now. But everyone else in the West is very easily up for debate next year if OKC can land another legitimate star...
The West is just too tough and Bosh would be smart to stay out East
I refuse to believe any legitimate NBA superstar has this type of mindset...