Wednesday Bolts – 11.2.16
Erik Horne spoke with 76ers beat writer Keith Pompey about Jerami Grant: “He’s of the new wave basketball players. He doesn’t really have a position, but he’s 6-8, athletic and can run the floor. The Sixers had been trying to convert him to the small forward position, but it seems like with all the injuries he’s always had to play the power forward spot. He has a basketball IQ, but he’s kinda like a glue guy more so than anything. He’s a good defender. He’s athletic enough to guard small forwards.”
A look at the trade from Philly’s point of view: “The team has been lacking in outside shooting, and Ilyasova give them a big man option from the outside. With the early struggles of Dario Saric becoming apparent, Ilyasova can serve as a mentor to the rookie. Ilyasova’s ability to get open shots will hopefully transfer to Saric, who’s been taking contested mid-rangers to start his career. The future first-round pick is what makes the deal a win for the Philadelphia 76ers. The Oklahoma City Thunder owe their 2018 pick to the Utah Jazz, so the first will not come this season. There’s no clarification on what the protection is yet, but no matter if lottery protected or top-5 protected, the Sixers got a clear asset gain.”
Royce’s take on the Jerami Grant trade.
Be careful with your tweets from 5 years ago. They may become relevant again.
Kevin Durant just can’t shut up about Westbrook. But this time, its what he should have been saying all along: “We were brothers. We are brothers. When you do a story for Rolling Stone, we talk and then he writes the story how he wants to write it. He came up with that term on his own. That got kind of miscommunicated through the entire thing. Me and Russell grew up together. I was in the phase of finding out who I was outside of basketball. He already knew who he was. He already had a stable life. He had stable parents, a girlfriend through college. I didn’t have none of that stuff. I’m trying to find out who I am, which I didn’t know, which is not a bad thing. He knew who he was. So obviously we’re going to grow toward this way (splits arms). It’s not a bad thing. It’s not at all. We still hung out. We’re boys. My interest went this way, his went that way. He got married, I didn’t. He hung with his wife. What you want me to do? I love Russ. I don’t care what nobody say. I don’t care what he say or what the fans say.”
This is the most Steven Adams thing ever: “While negotiations were underway between the Thunder and his agent, Adams was off the grid because he dropped his cell phone in an ice bath. So, after signing his big contract, the 23-year-old big man told reporters on Tuesday that he went out and bought a new phone. “It was yesterday, it was a phone,” Adams said when asked what his first big purchase would be. “Because I dropped my phone in the cold tub and it didn’t work for, like, the past three days, and stuff was going on. My agent was trying to contact me and stuff, and I was like, ‘I’m sorry,’ I just don’t have a phone.'”
Jon Hamm on the Thunder being buyers at the trade deadline: “The new formula would have slapped more than $8 million in additional cap holds onto the Thunder’s salary calculations, nixing the space needed to make a major free-agency push. With that strategy effectively destroyed, general manager Sam Presti instead pivoted to locking up his players while the opportunity was there. It wasn’t a radical course correction, but rather a return to the status quo. “I think obviously in today’s NBA with so many uncertainties and so many things that are outside your control, having young, developing or emerging players that you can have the opportunity to extend or match given their contracts, I think that’s always important,” Presti explained in his season-opening news conference.”
