Nico’s 7 or 8

[The Jom]

To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure it matters. I don’t think Harrison necessarily meant to speak precisely, or intended “7-8” to imply there was a cutoff line, above which people were safe and below which he’d hope to improve.

I think he was basically saying that he thought the playoff rotation was the core of a good team, and he wasn’t going into the summer looking to reinvent it.

Honestly, if he did mean anything specific by choosing that language, the implication is probably just that the cutoff point excluded Hardaway.

Maybe so. I can’t help but think good GMs are very careful choosing their words—at least when they know their players will hear what they’ve said about them. So I would expect the opposite of what you’ve said here. I would expect that Nico had exit interviews with every player and told 7 of em they were absolutely coming back and an 8th that it would take an unexpected deal for an all star to trade him, while also letting the rest know precisely where they stand.