Still catching up on all the news, but I get the impression that there were no godfather offers out there and Ainge will not accept less that that. So I guess we're somewhat in the same holding pattern that we've always been in. There is a price for everyone, for Lauri it is high, that offer doesn't exist for him at this moment. Extremely freezing take, I know, but this is evident by Lauri not being traded yet.
I remember having a similar conversation when were talking Don trades. Some argued to death that we should be willing to take a worse deal to tank more immediately. Seems as though these conversations always turns circular because there are too many permutations based on low probability outcomes. You're going to need an incredible string of luck and great decision making no what path you take and the more big picture you take things the more murky things get. You can't actually all the possibilities and permutations, whatever you're biased towards you will see the light and vice versa. There is no model.
What I do think gets discounted in these discussions is that while drafting higher is undeniably better than drafting lower, the goal of a rebuild isn't necessarily to have the best chance of drafting a star. The goal of a rebuild is to have as most talent as possible and what I would not discount is the 100% chance at having Lauri Markannen. So while it's undeniable that Lauri hurts our tank chances, how do you weigh that versus the chances of getting another Lauri in addition to another star. This is the same question to ask for Sexton and Kessler as well. You're always making that calculation on whether or not this player is worth whatever lottery odds they might take away from you. I think it's an interesting discussion on both, but that will need another thread.
The other side of this is there's theoretically always a chance you can trade for a player of Lauri's caliber again. As much as I love Lauri, I really don't think he's the kind of generational talent that you must build around. While you can't ever hope that a Luka/Giannis type will be available in trade and willing to go to Utah, you can with reasonable confidence think that someone of Lauri's caliber could be acquire through trade at some point down the line. This obviously goes for players like Sexton and Kessler as well.
Even though my standards of what a "godfather" offer appear to be different, I don't think it's worth it to trade him for a subpar offer. I learned that he can be traded on deadline day this season, so you can keep your options open. From a personal enjoyment perspective, I think it's incredibly lame that we're entering another season where we're not competing for a top lotto spot or a playoff spot....but at least I can say with this roster there aren't any players where I'm thinking "what's the point of him being here". Lauri, Sexton, and Kessler....you could argue that they are all worth their weight even though they will make you lose lotto balls. The young guys are the young guys. The JC's are their own category where it's a completely different decision and that decision is to dump them or not with their negative value contracts + open up playing time or wait for them to expire + pray they rehab value. What we don't have are a bunch of pointless veterans that have positive value but don't figure to play into a long term future.
If there's a chance for a godfather offer, it's probably not going to happen until deadline when Lauri is on an extended deal. I'm willing to take half a season of worse tanking than a worse offer right now.
