I think the current championship-level franchise players are: Wemby, Jokic, Shai, Luka, Giannis (maybe), Ant, Cade, Tatum, Hali, Flagg, Brunson (maybe). To Stone's credit - he did literally everything possible to get one of them. We had the joint highest lottery odds for Wemby and Cade. We had a shot at Flagg through the pick that Stone traded for. We would've been able to win the bidding war for Luka, except Nico only talked to the Lakers. Jokic, Shai, Ant, Tatum, Hali were never even possibly available. We could get Giannis this summer if we want (I don't want, personally). If the bar is "have a championship-level franchise player", what more could the guy have done? The replacement-level GM would not have given us as much equity in finding one as we have had. It's a stochastic process. You can't just "get us a franchise guy under the age of 28". You buy lottery tickets. We've been good at getting them. The Nuggets, Bucks, Knicks for example were bad at getting lottery tickets... but they got lucky with way fewer. That doesn't make their FO's better at the task; they were worse. I do believe that Stone/Witus understand the "find a franchise player" assignment and also are sharp at transactions / contracts / veteran pro personnel scouting. Tbh I care more about that part of the job than I do the "putting a roster together that has ideal basketball fit"; especially when the franchise player hasn't been found yet, so fit is not even what they are optimizing for. Would I prefer a FO that combines strengths in all those domains? Sure. But in reality there will always be trade-offs. I'll take ours.
you make some good points as always. I am okay saying Stone has been unlucky finding a franchise player in the draft, and i agree that fit is the last thing u focus on, but you can’t have it both ways. Either we are still focused on finding that franchise player or you are dealing for KD and trying to contend with a team that fits. What are we doing trying to contend with a team that doesn’t fit? We must think we are ready because we just traded for a 37 yr old, so why did we just waste a year with a team that doesn’t fit? You can’t sit out back to back drafts, especially this generational one, and claim you understand the franchise player assignment. The draft is an annual chance for that to happen. That’s my biggest gripe with Stone. You keep betting on the draft and/or you identify players on the come that have a chance to be franchise players, and try to trade for them like the Blazers did with Deni. Of course he’s not in the tier of the guys u mentioned but he’s a top 20 player. It’s how Indy got Halliburton. It’s how we got Harden. We haven’t employed that strategy at all. So I’d like to see a clear vision from the GM, and I’d like him to pick a direction rather than trying to have it both ways. And I’d like him to pursue both of the strategies I mentioned for the franchise assignment, which includes not ignoring the draft in back to back years.
Are Stone/Witus trying to contend? I don't think we are. I think we're just trying to have a competitive team in this interregnum between franchise players, in years we don't own our own pick because of the Westbrook trade. There is a minimum amount of "trying to win" that is probably required in the job of NBA GM in real-life, and pretty much I think they are just about skirting that line. Look at the uproar at Stone not trading assets for a placeholder PG at the deadline. I'm not a KD fan, and wouldn't have personally made the trade because it isn't fun to be a fan of a team with an aging superstar. But the only future franchise player equity we gave up in the KD trade was the #10 pick, which after the draft lottery isn't much equity at all. There's also only so many prospects you can develop at once - and I think it's not unreasonable to think we were at a limit last offseason. I agree with you of course, that getting new franchise player lottery tickets in the door is a priority this offseason and next; I've been saying that on this board for a while. But I don't think getting into the top of the '26 draft will be particularly easy, and also can't really critique the FO too much for '26 before the offseason has even happened.
