LAC: Outgoing (Kawhi, Bogi, Beal, Lopez, Kobe Brown); Incoming (Sabonis, Monk, D-Lo), + 2026 Round 1 from Sac + 2027 Round 2 from Sac

DAL: Outgoing (AD, Klay, Caleb Martin, D-Lo, Brandon Russell); Incoming (Kawhi, DeRozan, Schroeder, Brown)

Sac: Outgoing (Sabonis, Monk, DeRozan, Schroeder, 2026 Rnd 1 Pick); Incoming (AD, Klay, Bogi, Lopez, Beal).

Salary/Roster impact

LAC: Lopez/Beal are all eligible to be traded. LAC saves 12M. LAC gets 2 picks.

LAC gets Monk who is more of a true Norm replacement and a dynamic scorer. LAC takes on the Sabonis contract and gets D-Lo as backup.

They have a starting rotation of Harden-Monk-Collins-Sabonis-Zu. D-Lo is backup point. LAC can start Sabonis/Zu for 5-7 mins each half and then stagger so they have 48 mins covered at the center spot.

DAL: gets Kawhi/DeRozan,Schroeder, Kobe Brown. There’s a nominal 500k increase, but they get 2 very skilled players with 2026-27 expiring contracts in Kawhi and Demar, a vet point guard to pick up for Kyrie in Schoeder and a filler in Kobe.

Sac: Gets AD, Klay, Bogi, Lopez, Beal. AD’s is 3 years. Others expire at the end of next season. Save 15M and get off of Sabonis/DeRozan contracts.

There are various combos one can do here but the main point is that the Kings get to move 3 of their 4 longer term deals; Dallas saves on Davis/Klay and get a quality scoring duo for fewer years at a position where they’re not that skilled (forward).

I had LAC get picks because that’s what we’d need in a such a deal and LAC is taking on a big contract in Sabonis.

Each team gets something to work with and a runway to move forward to rebuild and retool.

He’s not going to get a face up shot before he makes free throws.

No, telegraphed passes are not risky. You either throw it out of the defender’s reach, or you throw it poorly. Risky passes are passes you intentionally throw within the defenders reach thinking they won’t get it.

–Zu’s FTs—I’ve watched him plenty and don’t see him ever improving.

–By definition, telegraphed passes are risky. To tell you the truth, I’d probably take iHart over Zu.

Zu started out the Hawks game on fire. Easy pickings. But then Quin Snyder seemed to tighten it up a bit and Zu kinda folded.

https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/1ou2uzz/if_the_clippers_became_sellers_today_which/

Weirdly, Denver presents a better opportunity for us to gain our footing than these younger less-star-studded snipers like the Heat, Suns, Jazz and Hawks because they aren’t able to play at a lightening pace and exploit our age and slowness. Especially coming off a b2b. Sure Braun and Watson can bring it. But Joker isn’t going to be flying up the court in either direction which should allow us to “breathe” a bit more. If Kawhi were able to go I’d give us a shot in this one. But of course he won’t, and they will slowly pick us apart and we’ll likely end up getting blown out late.

We can probably improve, and I’m happy to ride whatever ups and downs we have through a mediocre season. But the bigger concern is that assets we might be able to move could get injured along the way. I would clean house and try to get as many Cam Christies as I could in return for all said assets, develop those role players for a few years, and wait until we’re in the lottery again. But I’ve been in blow it up mode for a few seasons now so take that with a grain of sand.

What could easily have been a 7-3 start, is now a 3-7 start with 5 defeats in a row.

We probably could have won the last two of these but this start will hurt us later when we chase our final play off spot.

I firmly believe we will get better because it’s hard to get worse than this.

My take on an actionable plan is:

• Beal needs to stay out until he is 100% physically, no matter how long this takes. Same thing goes for Bogi.
• Kawhi needs to get back asap if the injury is just an ankle injury. If it is something worse, same thing as Beal applies.
• No matter who starts, there needs to be a good balance between offense and defense. 2-3 or 3-2 offense-first or defense-first players. Same thing goes for any bench units.

The way I see it:

• Offense-first players are: Harden, Beal, Bogi, Lopez (the 3pt slow footed version)
• Defense-first players are: Dunn, DJJ, Zu, Batum, Brown, Niederhauser, Miller, Telfort, Sanders (the youngsters mostly because of their youth and energy, with the drawback that they lack experience and TL won’t use most of them).
• Potentially two-way players are: Kawhi, Collins, Christie
• CP3 seems washed so he should be used sparingly when things improve.

Harden-Dunn-Kawhi-Collins-Zu
Harden-Christie-Kawhi-Collins-Zu
Harden-Dunn-DJJ-Kawhi-Zu

or the Kawhi-less:

Harden-Christie-DJJ-Collins-Zu
Harden-Dunn-DJJ-Collins-Zu

These should all work to some extent.

Bench-wise we need to inject the appropriate youth so we don’t have issues defensively.
I am fine to allocate time based on effort and current condition. Christie could benefit from this situtation but we may need more. We are currently short of a second capable ball handler/creator type so we should fill this role by committee (Christie/Miller/Sanders plus Bogi/Beal when ready).

None of the above will work with TL. He is not daring enough and his 10-game sample sizes will kill us. We need a head coach with the balls to get the most of the whole roster and adapt/improvise on a per game/opponent basis. Look at what Miami is doing with someone capable at the helm.