If Duncan had sustained that injury during that play-offs rather than Webber, I think it completely changes the NBA landscape. You could probably say the same regarding McGrady and Kobe, if you swapped their injuries, again the landscape changes.
Pietre put together the pieces to win a championship, but once Webber went down, our window closed.
Hindsight being 20/20 and all, the smartest thing we could have done would have been to trade all our pieces right then. Peja was in the discussion for MVP during the first half of the year prior to Webber returning, so trading him then, along with Bibby and Miller, all while their value was exceptionally high would have been better for this franchise.
Of course something like that would never happen, as no team would ever do something like that. But at the end of the day, the only thing that matters is a championship, so looking back, it would have been the smartest move on our part.
With all that said, I'm extremely excited about this upcoming year. I don't think we're going to be winning a lot of games, but we should be watching a young team learn how to play with each other, learn a system on both sides of the ball, and hustle every night. It will be great to have a real coach as well. We need some sort of stability there.
The most frustrating thing about watching the games the last two years has been the coaches refusal to let the young guys get the minutes befitting a bad team. This year, there are no excuses. The young guys will get their minutes, and we'll be able to look at each one to see whether they have what it takes to be an important piece on a championship team. Right now the only concern I have is with Donte/Casspi, and would love to see a trade which would free up the logjam there so we can assess both of these guys.
There's a lot I agree with here...
First, I totally agree about the devastating effect Webber's collapse in Dallas had on the franchise, even though we - the fans - and the team tried valiantly to discount it and get past it.
Webber WAS the Kings back then, with as well-matched a supporting team as one could ever hope for. Once he was removed from the picture, and even worse when someone looking like him but with diminishing capacities returned to the team, there was just no way to get back to where we were before.
It has been a painful period for all of us, from the lowliest fan to the top people on the MSE organizational chart, to live through - to try and get back to where we're even going in the right direction, let alone getting close to the end of the journey.
Yes, mistakes have been made. But at this point, I too see this year as the first time we can actually look to the future instead of attempting once again to relive the past.
I'm excited about Coach Westphal, I'm very happy with Tyreke, Omri, Jon and Sergio, and I'm hoping Sean May can show some of the skills and talents that he had in college.
The only area where I disagree is in the idea that we need to "free up the logjam" to be able to properly assess Greene/Casspi. I'd rather see this year be the assessment year, the season when they try all the various combinations during games and see which ones work best under which circumstances.
This year, there are no excuses. The young guys will get their minutes, and we'll be able to look at each one to see whether they have what it takes to be an important piece on a championship team.
The only modification I would make to your comment is one word - I think at this point "contending" is the first step. Once we get back to the land of elite teams, then we can assess whether or not the pieces are "championship" caliber. And you only learn that, IMHO, but competing at the highest level against the best in the league, not as underdogs but as legitimate rivals for the one shiny bauble.