Extreme Philly Sports Forum

You scout well, get a bunch of high picks and draft a well rounded team with cap space to sign free agents in 2-3 years when you are ready for the push.

What you don't do draft 3 players that play the same position and be surprised when no one offers you squat in trade for any of them.

Honestly, none of this matters. The team is trash for at least 3 years.  Not a single player here today will be here then.
The biggest mistake of the season isn't trading McClain, but not trading Maxey.

VJ getting playoff experience means nothing. Both him and Maxey will be off this team before they compete again.  The next 3 years means literally nothing.

You overdraft a position and you get bad offers.  Just like when the sixers had all those centers.
Smart GMs trade before they decide to draft a position without need.

Second round picks are crap shoots.  Upside matters more than getting a good 10 man on the bench that will be out of the league in 5 years.

Herniated discs don't heal ever. They have no blood flow and have no means to repair themselves once they stop growing. When they talk of "healing" all they mean is manage the pain and stretching until loose bits dehydrate and shrink a bit and unpunch a nerve.

Once ruptured, you can take out the loose bits, but the core is exposed and it will not retain fluid.
It deflates a bit, then starts wearing down like a brake pad. And the core is not fully hollow, it's full of loose tissue and can keep ejecting loose bits for years after.   
-The fluid that leaks greatly inflames the area causing tissue swelling and that pinches nerves.
-The bits that eject will repinch the nerve too.

I had 3 microdiscectomies to remove bits in 5 years.
All while popping Motrin like candy to control the swelling to the point it started impacting my kidneys.   I would get a surgery, feel good, start working out, getting confidence back, and then, just leaning over in a hardware store to pick up a plumbing fitting, lose all ability to raise up again and my lower right leg paralyzed because the disc decided to eject more bits.  Then the process starts again.

The ONLY option to fix this long term is ADR. And in the US, most lumbar ADR treatments are not allowed because of patent infringement.

Note: forgive my spelling, I was thumb typing in-between meetings at work.

Joel can't jump over paper anymore. 

Stop talking about building around Maxey.
You can't build squat because they don't have any salary cap space.  If you keep Maxey for 3 years, this is what happens
1) he slows down as he naturally loses his step just like AI did, and worth much less in trade, and you have to resign him again.
2) VJ and McCain get huge renewal contracts eating up the cap again.

Nothing, absolutely nothing, makes this team a competitor in the next 2 years unless Joel and PG's contracts come off the books. If that doesn't happen, the only move is to trade ALL assets to pile picks in the next few drafts.

If you love Maxey so much, trade him and resign him back later as a free agent.