NBA TRADE TALK: TDL over

[TXBamanut]

So I have to ask the board...is Simmons fixable or is he FUBAR for the rest of his career?

Can you send him to some Zen retreat in Arizona and get his head adjusted? 

As he stands right now, DAL has no business trying to trade for him. But is there even a glimmer that he can find a path to improve his mental game? Physically, he's all you could ask for.

Personally, I think Simmons has shown that he is broken mentally since he came into the league.   From the refusal to even attempt one, to the pushback and refusal to work on it, and to brashly say "I'll just do what I'm good at." (in this limited context -- sometimes that's not a bad thing to say - re: Wes Matthews tank commander/playmaker - "Just shoot and D, man") -- that was the LARGEST red flag on his career ever for me.  It wrote a book, and that was my opinion long before he was ever considered a Mavs prospect.  I would have only taken him if we were desperate, but honestly, right now, we aren't desperate in that way.  We are desperate in one way, or we should be ---  to get the right people around Luka and not screw around with that.  The LAST thing we need in here is the "wrong" person whatever that is.

Re:  Simmons -- Anyone who literally can't muster up the courage to shoot a FT or a 3 pointer, with the gifts he has physically, with what is before him -- and he is an amazing athlete -- is a GIANT red flag.  His shooting has simply gotten worse in a lot of ways, even though statistically, he has improved slightly, which boggles my mind to even say, but it has.  It's sad...it's like if Wilt was agoraphobic or blind.  Awesopme talent, debilitating limitation...obviously that is an extreme hyperbole to accentuate the point, it's not that bad, but it is bad.

To get slightly statistically better and yet more afraid to take a shot and that improvement be worthwhile...and that is mental.

You can bind up a knee, surgically repair it and stay off of it a while and it heal.
You can go on a vacation, have some counseling and then come back stronger.

Sometimes, the knee never gets right...and neither does the mind, at least to the level that you can push them in competition against the harshest tests of comparisons, and dominate as you should be, like in professional sports.