Plekanec/Riberio is probably the optimal center situation Montreal could have reasonably had right now, ahead of Plekaenc/Grabrovski, Plekanec/Gomez and Plekanec/Koivu.
It's funny how things evolve, isn't it? It recently occured to me that it might be amusing look back at all those "Ribeiro-and-a-2nd" trade proposals that were universally panned as "good player vs. collection-of-garbage" and figure out which ones the other team should've taken in hindsight.
Ok, here's my take: I went through the HabsWatch list and took everything from the start of the Gainey era. Removing the "who cares" trades and those that are too soon to call (including the Halak trade, I'm not ready to rule on that one yet) I am left with 21 trades.
Losses (8):
Huet to WSH for a 2nd - derailed our playoff hopes. Would have been a "who cares" if the rumored deal for Hossa and Hedberg was true and actually happened.
Zednik to WSH for a 3rd (Fortier) - He still had gas in the tank.
*Grabovski to TOR - Fleeced, although I like Pateryn
Latendresse to MIN for Pouliot
Ribeiro to DAL for Niinimaa and 5th (Conboy) - Ouch
*Lapierre to ANA for Mara (pretty much)
*Begin to DAL for Janik
*Kostitsyn for rights to Ellis and Justin Boyd
* denotes published reports that the Habs player asked for a trade.
Push (3):
Theodore to COL for Aebischer - Unloaded the contract as Theo hit his decline, but Aebischer sucked... Not really sure what to do with this one.
2nd to FLA for Moore - Got what we paid for. 2nd is a fair price for a key cog in a playoff run.
1st and 2nd to CAL for Tanguay and 5th - Have a hard time grading this one. Got what we paid for, then decided we didn't really want it...
Wins (9):
2nd and 5th to NYI for Wiz - Compared to what other defencemen fetched at the deadline (hello, Kaberle) I think it was a steal for what Wiz provided.
2nd and 3rd to ATL for Schneider and 3rd - Same as above. Given the price for d-men and how he turned the pp and season around, I call this a win.
Rivet and 5th to SJ for Gorges and 2nd (Pac) - I smile every time I see this one
4th to PHO for Mike Johnson - Low proce for useful player
2nd and 3rd to NYR for 2nd (Latendresse) - No question Guy is the best player in the deal today.
3rd and 4th to PHI for 3rd (Ryan White) - White is the best player in the deal today.
Garon and a 3rd to LA for Bonk and Huet - Steal
Balej and 2nd to NYR for Kovalev - coulda, shoulda, woulda taken Plekanec
4th to MIN for Jim Dowd - low price for a guy who played his role well.
Unrated (1):
The big one - the Gomez trade.
To NYR - Higgins (bust - for NYR), McDonagh (lots of promise, not much yet), Valentenko (same).
To MTL - Gomez (everyone has their opinion), Pyatt (exceeded expectations), Busto (who cares).
Today, I call this a push, although I fully expect by mid year this season to call it a clear win for the Rangers based on the play of McDonagh and Valentenko - but they haven't done it yet.
So in total: 9 wins, 8 losses, 3 ties, and a tie that we expect will become a loss. Pretty much a .500 record, which is what you would expect. You win some you lose some.
However, one fundamental disagreement we have, is the value of cap space. Clearing Theodore's contract, for example, made some space similar to the amount it took to re-sign Koivu. Clearing Gomez allowed the Rangers to sign Gaborik.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Knuckles30
Theodore to COL for Aebischer - Unloaded the contract as Theo hit his decline, but Aebischer sucked... Not really sure what to do with this one.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Knuckles30
The big one - the Gomez trade.
To NYR - Higgins (bust - for NYR), McDonagh (lots of promise, not much yet), Valentenko (same).
To MTL - Gomez (everyone has their opinion), Pyatt (exceeded expectations), Busto (who cares).
Today, I call this a push, although I fully expect by mid year this season to call it a clear win for the Rangers based on the play of McDonagh and Valentenko - but they haven't done it yet.
However, one fundamental disagreement we have, is the value of cap space. Clearing Theodore's contract, for example, made some space similar to the amount it took to re-sign Koivu. Clearing Gomez allowed the Rangers to sign Gaborik.
It's hard to pick up a centerman of Gomez's quality. He had a good second half last year and has been good in the playoffs. He'll bounce back now that we have depth in the top 6. As of now, we've still won this trade, barring some kind of breakout season from McDonagh. But our guys evaluated him and decided he was expendable and his offensive upside does not seem to be there from what I've seen of him.
Also, some of the losses I've seen on here are basically washes. They are unimportant trades, even if we might have lost a bit of value. Nobody was gonna give us anything for any of that, even if we bundled it up.
Last edited by tinyzombies: 09-07-2011 at 05:16 PM.
Although Riberio's no slouch in that department either. His ability to play tough minutes was the big reason that Brad Richards got such a plumb assignment in the past few seasons.
Plekanec/Riberio is probably the optimal center situation Montreal could have reasonably had right now, ahead of Plekaenc/Grabrovski, Plekanec/Gomez and Plekanec/Koivu.
Sure, if he comes along with Morrow. Otherwise, I'll take Gomez. Gomez would have a lot more room with Morrow next to him just like Ribs and I'd rather have Gomer come playoff time.
It isn't a trade but letting mark streit go was the biggest mistake they did. They wasted a 1st and two 2nds to get tanguay and replace streit with schnieder. After that we got bergeron and spacek. If we would have kept streit we would have been much better and we could have traded streit afterwards and get a lot more out of him. Biggest blunder in habs hiostory imo.
Sure, if he comes along with Morrow. Otherwise, I'll take Gomez. Gomez would have a lot more room with Morrow next to him just like Ribs and I'd rather have Gomer come playoff time.
By the same token, in Montreal Gomez has only been effective with Gionta on his wing and Gionta is an excellent two-way winger.
Even though I've defended Gomez a lot, I'd say he's the weakest link on a line of Pacioretty-Gomez-Gionta. Last season with Gionta Gomez was merely unlucky but without him he was on some truly putrid units like Cammaleri-Gomez-Kostitsyn or Eller-Gomez-Kostitsyn while both Gionta and Pacioretty played very good hockey away from the 2nd line.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ubercron9000
It isn't a trade but letting mark streit go was the biggest mistake they did. They wasted a 1st and two 2nds to get tanguay and replace streit with schnieder. After that we got bergeron and spacek. If we would have kept streit we would have been much better and we could have traded streit afterwards and get a lot more out of him. Biggest blunder in habs hiostory imo.
There were a bunch of bad roster moves that can largely be traced to Carbonneau's incompetance as a head coach. Both Streit deserved to be the third LD behind Markov and Hamrlik and should have been kept there, if nothing else because he was a fantastic powerplay player. Grabrovski probably could have been kept reasonably happy if they'd used him regularly in the lineup. Tanguay's disgruntlement seemed to have originated from playing too few minutes at ES when he was Montreal's best forwards.
I also suspect some of Martin's issues with younger players in Montreal are an indirect result of going from a team whose coach basically let the players play to one that demands physical conditioning and adherence to the team's tactical plan.
Last edited by Mike8: 09-07-2011 at 06:25 PM.
Reason: merge
However, one fundamental disagreement we have, is the value of cap space. Clearing Theodore's contract, for example, made some space similar to the amount it took to re-sign Koivu. Clearing Gomez allowed the Rangers to sign Gaborik.
I don't disagree at all, only I was looking at the trades on the basis of what the Canadiens gave up vs what they got. In the Theodore example, they got cap space. In the Gomez example, while they lost cap space, it hasn't really affected the team (despite Pierre McGuire's warnings).
From the Rangers perspective, the Gomez deal is a clear win. Because the trades don't happen in isolation (cap space, roster spots, chemistry, etc.) it's not really a zero sum game.
By the same token, in Montreal Gomez has only been effective with Gionta on his wing and Gionta is an excellent two-way winger.
Even though I've defended Gomez a lot, I'd say he's the weakest link on a line of Pacioretty-Gomez-Gionta. Last season with Gionta Gomez was merely unlucky but without him he was on some truly putrid units like Cammaleri-Gomez-Kostitsyn or Eller-Gomez-Kostitsyn while both Gionta and Pacioretty played very good hockey away from the 2nd line.team's tactical plan.
Gomez had a terrible start last year. I read somewhere on here that he finished almost a point a game in his last 40 though and he was pretty good in the playoffs.
We needed more balance on the second line. Now we have someone to dig out pucks on both top lines (assuming Patches gets some muscle in those legs and starts winning board battles and/or learns some tricks from Cole).
AND we have guys who can carry the #1 role on our top two D pairings, so Gomez will have some help on the backline as well.
[EDIT: He had 29 of his 38 pts after Dec. 15, which is decent enough for a second line center who had no help on the wings (I certainly do not count AK as help).]
The original question was - did we win the trade. I still think we did win that trade.
Does it mean would should have spent that money elsewhere? That's another question. But the trade did apparently allow us to sign Cammalleri and build a new core to tide us over until the kids develop.
Last edited by tinyzombies: 09-07-2011 at 07:10 PM.
Gomez had a terrible start last year. I read somewhere on here that he finished almost a point a game in his last 40 though and he was pretty good in the playoffs.
We needed more balance on the second line. Now we have someone to dig out pucks on both top lines.
AND we have guys who can carry the #1 role on our top two D pairings, so Gomez will have some help on the backline as well.
That was the season before. Though it was actually Gomez got to a good start playing with Gionta and Cammaleri, went through a valley during the height of the injury period in November and December then pick up again for the final 40 playing with Gionta and Pouliot. Last year he was only really productive for the 20-30 games or so when he played with Pacioretty where he produced 55% of his even strength offense in 28% of his his minutes.
The trend is fairly obvious, Gomez needs Gionta and an offensively competent LW to produce. The LW has been at times Cammaleri, Pouliot and Pacioretty. He also clearly does not play well with Eller or Kostitsyn as those lines have been failures.
Ok, here's my take: I went through the HabsWatch list and took everything from the start of the Gainey era. Removing the "who cares" trades and those that are too soon to call (including the Halak trade, I'm not ready to rule on that one yet) I am left with 21 trades.
Losses (8):
Huet to WSH for a 2nd - derailed our playoff hopes. Would have been a "who cares" if the rumored deal for Hossa and Hedberg was true and actually happened.
Zednik to WSH for a 3rd (Fortier) - He still had gas in the tank.
*Grabovski to TOR - Fleeced, although I like Pateryn
Latendresse to MIN for Pouliot
Ribeiro to DAL for Niinimaa and 5th (Conboy) - Ouch
*Lapierre to ANA for Mara (pretty much)
*Begin to DAL for Janik
*Kostitsyn for rights to Ellis and Justin Boyd
* denotes published reports that the Habs player asked for a trade.
Push (3):
Theodore to COL for Aebischer - Unloaded the contract as Theo hit his decline, but Aebischer sucked... Not really sure what to do with this one.
2nd to FLA for Moore - Got what we paid for. 2nd is a fair price for a key cog in a playoff run.
1st and 2nd to CAL for Tanguay and 5th - Have a hard time grading this one. Got what we paid for, then decided we didn't really want it...
Wins (9):
2nd and 5th to NYI for Wiz - Compared to what other defencemen fetched at the deadline (hello, Kaberle) I think it was a steal for what Wiz provided.
2nd and 3rd to ATL for Schneider and 3rd - Same as above. Given the price for d-men and how he turned the pp and season around, I call this a win.
Rivet and 5th to SJ for Gorges and 2nd (Pac) - I smile every time I see this one
4th to PHO for Mike Johnson - Low proce for useful player
2nd and 3rd to NYR for 2nd (Latendresse) - No question Guy is the best player in the deal today.
3rd and 4th to PHI for 3rd (Ryan White) - White is the best player in the deal today.
Garon and a 3rd to LA for Bonk and Huet - Steal
Balej and 2nd to NYR for Kovalev - coulda, shoulda, woulda taken Plekanec
4th to MIN for Jim Dowd - low price for a guy who played his role well.
Unrated (1):
The big one - the Gomez trade.
To NYR - Higgins (bust - for NYR), McDonagh (lots of promise, not much yet), Valentenko (same).
To MTL - Gomez (everyone has their opinion), Pyatt (exceeded expectations), Busto (who cares).
Today, I call this a push, although I fully expect by mid year this season to call it a clear win for the Rangers based on the play of McDonagh and Valentenko - but they haven't done it yet.
So in total: 9 wins, 8 losses, 3 ties, and a tie that we expect will become a loss. Pretty much a .500 record, which is what you would expect. You win some you lose some.
This not even close to an objective thought process . The great majority of your so-called wins are debatable depending on whether you're focused on the short or long term , and most involved trades that had a success life measured in months.
Two of the 3 pushes are clear losses.
Considering the con trades involved young players that have made year after
contributions to other teams and it's an overwhelming hashtag fail for Gainey. It's not even close.
Even your asterisks tell the story about where you were headed with this before you hit the keyboard.
Strangely enough, most of the trades people say we won include a pick we sent to the other team. Yet, one trade that we DEFINATELY won is mostly because of a pick we got in it (Pacioretty)....Why is it that we're able to tell we won a trade because of a pick...but don't want to analyse hwo getting rid of a pick might not have been a great move in the process?
Is it possible with that thought process, that the Rivet for Gorges and 1st that we think we CLEARLY won...San Jose would think the same as well? I mean if Schneider, Johnson, Moore are seen as winner trades, with the limited time they played here and their contribution (not saying they suck, on the contrary...), Rivet should has been viewed as a solid contributor for the 2 years he was there....traded for 7th-8th d-man...and for a pick who could have turned out to be great or average depending of the player who is available. Personnally, I think we won the Rivet trade 'cause the end result is that it gave only 2 years of Rivet in San Jose for a good d-man that will be here for more than that and a potential gamebreaker due to a fairly strong 2007 draft. But for that reason, I am really hesitant to name us clear winners of guys that played half of a season....and for high picks on top of it.
One already scored 20 goals in a season in the NHL while the other didn't even start a season in the NHL.
I'm not saying Palushaj won't be ok, but for all we know, he may never make it!
I'm stunned to read how some posters use their projection to create bold truth!
I agree. I am always shocked that people view a player that has yet to show he can play in the NHL ahead of a player that has scored 20 goals and showed some promise while he played here. If you look at the numbers, D'Agostini almost had equal numbers in the NHL to Palushaj in the AHL.
This not even close to an objective thought process . The great majority of your so-called wins are debatable depending on whether you're focused on the short or long term , and most involved trades that had a success life measured in months.
Two of the 3 pushes are clear losses.
Considering the con trades involved young players that have made year after
contributions to other teams and it's an overwhelming hashtag fail for Gainey. It's not even close.
Even your asterisks tell the story about where you were headed with this before you hit the keyboard.
Funny how my post beginning with "Here's my take" isn't even close to objective yet your assertion of "an overwhelming hashtag fail for Gainey" is?
You are absolutely right in that it depends on whether you focus on short term or long term, and not all trades are made for the same reason.
Let's look at another Bob Gainey trade, and it will show how people view trade value: Iginla for Nieuwendyk. I personally view this trade as win-win (as I said in another post, I don't view trades as zero sum). Yes, Iginla went on to a terrific career with Calgary long after Nieuwendyk was a top player, but Dallas got a player that led them to the Cup, winning the Conn Smythe in the process.
Funny how my post beginning with "Here's my take" isn't even close to objective yet your assertion of "an overwhelming hashtag fail for Gainey" is?
You are absolutely right in that it depends on whether you focus on short term or long term, and not all trades are made for the same reason.
Let's look at another Bob Gainey trade, and it will show how people view trade value: Iginla for Nieuwendyk. I personally view this trade as win-win (as I said in another post, I don't view trades as zero sum). Yes, Iginla went on to a terrific career with Calgary long after Nieuwendyk was a top player, but Dallas got a player that led them to the Cup, winning the Conn Smythe in the process.
Sorry, didn't meant to get in your grill but I don't like the way your scorecard equates the various trade situations. In your system a giveaway of Grabovski is equal to a 2nd and 3rd to ATL for Schneider and 3rd . One has a high downstream impact, one does not. It also seems to favour all trades involving draft picks and puts in a positive light all trades that served a purpose for a year or less. Giving away Grabovski, Ribeiro, and Kostitstyn which has an impact to the team for 5-10 years is not equal to acquiring a player for 2 months to help shoehorn the team into the playoffs.
Sorry, didn't meant to get in your grill but I don't like the way your scorecard equates the various trade situations. In your system a giveaway of Grabovski is equal to a 2nd and 3rd to ATL for Schneider and 3rd . One has a high downstream impact, one does not. It also seems to favour all trades involving draft picks and puts in a positive light all trades that served a purpose for a year or less. Giving away Grabovski, Ribeiro, and Kostitstyn which has an impact to the team for 5-10 years is not equal to acquiring a player for 2 months to help shoehorn the team into the playoffs.
You are absolutely right. I looked at each trade individually, as I'm nowhere near smart enough to try to balance long term trade impact vs short term trade impact. Maybe someone with a lot more spare time than me could tabulate career WAR for each player involved in a trade (from date of trade forward) and see how a GM has affected his team? I know I definitely couldn't do it.
Regarding the two trades you highlighted, I find them very hard to compare (which is why I didn't). For Grabovski, he essentially quit on the team. Could Gainey have been more patient? Maybe. But then, I don't know what goes on in the room. I don't know how the rest of the team felt about him. Regardless, I still consider it a bad trade (in the sense that the Habs did not appear to get fair value in return).
For Schneider, I was really comparing the price paid vs what other d-men seem to cost on the market. My admittedly non-expert opinion is that it was a fairly low price to pay for a player who turned the powerplay around, filling a large hole on the team.
Again, all of this is my opinion, and I don't pretend to know any more than the average fan (and yes, I'm a fan - so I'm biased).
Its a good trade for St-Louis too, they were looking for a no.1 goaltender for a while, but its like the Habs got a pretty good player for free since Price is certainly not a downgrade to Halak..
I dont get the ones saying we are small anymore.. MaxPac Cole A.Kost Eller are all big skilled players, I rather think we have a great mix of everything..
You not only need to be big u also gottta have some stones,Max Pac lol.
It's hard to pick up a centerman of Gomez's quality. He had a good second half last year and has been good in the playoffs. He'll bounce back now that we have depth in the top 6. As of now, we've still won this trade, barring some kind of breakout season from McDonagh. But our guys evaluated him and decided he was expendable and his offensive upside does not seem to be there from what I've seen of him.
Also, some of the losses I've seen on here are basically washes. They are unimportant trades, even if we might have lost a bit of value. Nobody was gonna give us anything for any of that, even if we bundled it up.
Not when you already have a player who is superior to him and he's your captain, we didn't have pickup to anyone. He traded assets for someone who was a downgrade to replace a cheaper, more affordable center, oh yeah, did I mention the lesser replacement makes twice as much.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Agnostic
This not even close to an objective thought process . The great majority of your so-called wins are debatable depending on whether you're focused on the short or long term , and most involved trades that had a success life measured in months.
Two of the 3 pushes are clear losses.
Considering the con trades involved young players that have made year after
contributions to other teams and it's an overwhelming hashtag fail for Gainey. It's not even close.
Even your asterisks tell the story about where you were headed with this before you hit the keyboard.
Gotta say, I agree, cap space counts when you unload it, but when you bring it in, it doesn't count. The jury is still out on the Gomez deal, rofl. The worst trade post lockout and one of the worst trades in Habs history.
Last edited by habsjunkie2*: 09-11-2011 at 01:27 PM.
Reason: merge
Gomez is hands down the worst of them,replacing Kiovu who is clearly a better player and single handedly crippled the Cap space for years .Major bust .
Ok, here's my take: I went through the HabsWatch list and took everything from the start of the Gainey era. Removing the "who cares" trades and those that are too soon to call (including the Halak trade, I'm not ready to rule on that one yet) I am left with 21 trades.
Losses (8):
Huet to WSH for a 2nd - derailed our playoff hopes. Would have been a "who cares" if the rumored deal for Hossa and Hedberg was true and actually happened.
Zednik to WSH for a 3rd (Fortier) - He still had gas in the tank.
*Grabovski to TOR - Fleeced, although I like Pateryn
Latendresse to MIN for Pouliot
Ribeiro to DAL for Niinimaa and 5th (Conboy) - Ouch
*Lapierre to ANA for Mara (pretty much)
*Begin to DAL for Janik
*Kostitsyn for rights to Ellis and Justin Boyd
* denotes published reports that the Habs player asked for a trade.
Push (3):
Theodore to COL for Aebischer - Unloaded the contract as Theo hit his decline, but Aebischer sucked... Not really sure what to do with this one.
2nd to FLA for Moore - Got what we paid for. 2nd is a fair price for a key cog in a playoff run.
1st and 2nd to CAL for Tanguay and 5th - Have a hard time grading this one. Got what we paid for, then decided we didn't really want it...
Wins (9):
2nd and 5th to NYI for Wiz - Compared to what other defencemen fetched at the deadline (hello, Kaberle) I think it was a steal for what Wiz provided.
2nd and 3rd to ATL for Schneider and 3rd - Same as above. Given the price for d-men and how he turned the pp and season around, I call this a win.
Rivet and 5th to SJ for Gorges and 2nd (Pac) - I smile every time I see this one
4th to PHO for Mike Johnson - Low proce for useful player
2nd and 3rd to NYR for 2nd (Latendresse) - No question Guy is the best player in the deal today.
3rd and 4th to PHI for 3rd (Ryan White) - White is the best player in the deal today.
Garon and a 3rd to LA for Bonk and Huet - Steal
Balej and 2nd to NYR for Kovalev - coulda, shoulda, woulda taken Plekanec
4th to MIN for Jim Dowd - low price for a guy who played his role well.
Unrated (1):
The big one - the Gomez trade.
To NYR - Higgins (bust - for NYR), McDonagh (lots of promise, not much yet), Valentenko (same).
To MTL - Gomez (everyone has their opinion), Pyatt (exceeded expectations), Busto (who cares).
Today, I call this a push, although I fully expect by mid year this season to call it a clear win for the Rangers based on the play of McDonagh and Valentenko - but they haven't done it yet.
So in total: 9 wins, 8 losses, 3 ties, and a tie that we expect will become a loss. Pretty much a .500 record, which is what you would expect. You win some you lose some.
If you analyze most of the trades IMO, they players we get back rarely have an impact on our team. Free Agency and player development seems to be the best way to build your club.
Proof: look at our core players
Price, Subban,Patches, DD, Markov all came through our system which is definitely doing a better job in recent years.
Cammy, Gionta, Gomez, via free agency
Georges,Eller via trade
Ya you can say Patches was through a trade via a draft pick, but my point is that most Habs trade trade IMO would work better if we got back draft pics instead of marginal players, especially when we have a decent pipeline now and don't have rush our young players.
At the trade deadline (and of course you would have to see the situation on the team and we are in the race but....I'd rather to Kostityn to western playoff team for a first round pick rather than a player back...in the majority of the cases)
Gomez is hands down the worst of them,replacing Kiovu who is clearly a better player and single handedly crippled the Cap space for years .Major bust .
Koivu might be the better player but I take Gomez over Koivu. What Gomez adds to this team chemistry and leadership wise is what we needed over Koivu. There is no doubt that Koivu is the better player at this point, that he tried harder but what he lacked in off ice leadership hurt the team. Gomez was central to building a winning attitude in the locker room. Along with Gill, he was crucial in developing the right attitude and work ethic among our young players such as PK, Price and Patches and DD.
When the Hawks won the cup, all the memes on HF became about Toews intangibles, well compared to Koivu, Gomez has all those intangibles. Those young players respected him last year because he had won the cup and he hadn't sucked yet, so they listened and learnt from him.
You don't get that with a quiet leader like Koivu. We needed that type of leadership BADLY on this team for a long time. With Koivu as our Captain, it prevented anyone else from taking that role.
Did you read the story about Gill and Gomez having a debate during their first year about what type of a system the team should play and how Gill eventually won out and everyone bought into it? If Koivu was here, do you think Gill would have overstepped his bounds and challenged a 13 year captain like Koivu like that? I don't.
Do you remember in their final year how the media made a HUGE deal out of Koivu & Kovalev finallying playing together. I remember at the start of the game, they asked Kovalev if there was a rift between them because that was the angle that the media was playing, why they were never tried before and Kovalev denied it and merely said more less that they don't have a problem but don't really speak. What kind of captain doesn't speak to his most talented player? I'm probably remembering slightly wrong but the jist of it is right.
the trade history over the past 10 years mirrors our results... mediocre.
a few wins, a few losses, a bunch of average deals.
no move was as "big" as the Gomez blunder, but the emergence of Halak then Price has gone a long way to mitigating the negative impact of that one.
more concerning is the overall waste of assets that took place over the past decade. When you factor in UFA signings and players let go, the overall asset management track record of the organization over the past decade has been abysmal.
luckily, we've been among the league's best drafting over that same span, so wasting so many assets hasn't hurt us nearly as much as it could have.
on the trade front, since the last trade we clearly "won" came all the way back in 2007, it's probably long-overdue for us to make a deal that clearly benefits us (i suppose the Wiz trade could count, but with a first round exit and the player being long gone, how much of a "win" was it really?)
