I dapped this due to you giving well thought-out interesting post.
I understand the tanking strategy. I do. That doesn't mean I don't understand the hardest process which is going from bad to below average then to decent. That's the hardest part. Orlando has been in below average land for years. They can barely even become average like a team like Utah for example who is literally league average. Look at Utah. Three franchise players they say. A center who @Malta loves like a son. Another in Exum with franchise potential and they are stuck in average zone. In this league, you gotta have veterans who can play. No other way you can win. The game is a 48 minute game. Attention to detail is extremely important. Most young players lack it but without define roles, you end up with teams who never seem to get it on a nightly basis like Utah.
The reason I bring them up is because that's what is the usual best case scenario of tanking. The rarities is OKC. That's the once in a lifetime LeBron type of impact. Hell, Orlando with Shaq went 41 and 41. Shaq instantly made them average as he was an elite prospect and coming in as an upperclassmen, he was an exceptional prospect and once in a lifetime. They won the lottery from the lowest odds with a team with vets and got a supreme talent in Hardaway and they moved from average to good, skipped very good to elite due to their talent. That's an exception to the rule. Now the norm is the Washington Wizards, the Minnesota Timberwolves with Kevin Love, the Sacramento Kings. This is the norm. These are teams that have players who didn't play to their capabilities. They have trouble developing their players to be impact and all of them had to trade for vets to make a leap from bad to below average and only one, Washington moved up to average. This is the norm of tanking. The best case of the norm was Atlanta. They couldn't develop a single player till Joe Johnson signed a max 70 million dollar deal. Then they got Horford and traded wasted players for Bibby and have been winning since. Even then, they wasted time.
This is the NBA, these teams are not easy to build. You bring up Boston. They are a team of a lot of role players who all fit very well. They don't have an obvious weakness and their well coached. Look at most of their players. They have 4 years of college and they have a lot of young NBA veterans. Thomas has been in the league for 6 years. Turner for 5 years. Crowder for 4 years. Jonas J. Bradley for 5 years. So you add their college experience with their NBA experience. They have a mindset to play system Basketball and their more mature.
I think systems can add guys like to become natural talent. Who though Leonard in college. He was a tweener with a nice shooting stroke who played PF and had impressive tools. Ben McLemore who was an amazing talent and Bill Self stated, the most talented player he's coached is just a below average SG and hasn't seem to improve when by all accounts, he's a very hard worker. How does that happen?
That's why I don't buy into this treadmill shyt. Too many things can happen.
