一位自由球员没有一吨attention but whom I love is Thaddeus Young. Young is a plus defender and is versatile enough to guard multiple positions. He was actually ranked 31st in the league last year in VORP for stat nerds like myself which put him right between Mike Conley and Marc Gasol (good company). He isn't necessarily a playmaker or guy who will score a ton but he averages 13 a game over his career. He shot 35% from 3 last year and 52% overall from the field while grabbing 6 boards and 1.5 steals. I see Young as a clear upgrade over Aminu at PF and a nice fit for our roster. From my understanding (and correct me if I am wrong please cap gurus) but if we renounce Aminu and Layman we can get to the non-taxpayer exception of 9.2 million.

I wonder if Young would accept a 3 year/27.6 million dollar deal? Does anyone have any insight into what the market is looking like for him? I know Indiana probably has his bird rights and can pay more, but I love him on this team. Thoughts?

We could then look to complete a deal like this, which I mentioned in the comments of another post:

Milwaukee sends Snell (12 million) and Ilyasova (7 million) to Portland

Portland sends Evan Turner (18 million) and 25th pick in the draft to the Chicago Bulls

Chicago sends Christian Felicio (8 million) to Milwaukee and a 2nd round pick (38th overall) to Portland

Why the bucks do it: Primarily to clear about 11 million for retaining their own free agents and they add a young big for depth purposes

Why Portland does it: Snell and Ilyasova improve a bench that is going to lose some pieces, the idea of addition by subtraction with Turner maybe, and moving back from 25 to 38 gives us a cheaper non-guaranteed pick where we could snag Admiral Schofield or a Louis King type

Why Chicago does it: They move up from 38 to 25 to try and find another young player for their rebuild, Take on about 10 million more in cap this year but it doesn’t sound like they are players in free agency anyways and it comes off the books next season instead of Felicio’s 8 million which is on the books through 2020-2021. The go young next year and embrace the rebuild with cap room next season. It also allows them to package the 7 and 25 in an attempt to move up if there is someone they want.

I would then look to sign a couple vet minimum guys like Tim Frazier (Dame's best buddy) and Kosta Koufus (CJs HS teammate) for vet depth.

This would leave us with (when Nurk is healthy)

Dame, CJ, Mo, Thad, Nurk

Anf, Snell, Ilyasova, Meyers, Collins

Schofield, Skal, Frazier, Koufus

This would eliminate the hope of cap space in 2020 and still leaves us hoping Moe takes the next step at SF but I do think it makes us competitive in the west next year. Maybe we package Moe + Ilyasova + Anf + and a pick for a Stud SF at the deadline?