Here’s the tweet:
Jeff Weltman will remain w Bucks until after draft, then join Raptors as 2d in command under Masai Ujiri, it has been learned/confirmed
— Peter Vecsey (@PeterVecsey1) June 9, 2013
The shocking part of this story is that Peter Vescey still writes about basketball. Here’s a little about Jeff Weltman taken from the forum thread:
So if the Suns hired Weltman, what would they be getting?
First and formost, it appears Weltman is leaps and bounds ahead of his predecessor in dealing with the media. As Michael Schwartz and I discussed last week, one of Blanks’ biggest downfalls was his dealings with people, especially the media. Weltman, in contrast, is plenty fine with sitting down with a blog such as this one. He did a two-part series with SB Nation’s BrewHoop.com, which gave a striking clarity to his philosophies.
In the second part of the series, Weltman discusses the value of analytics, but he hardly treads negatively on coaches who don’t use them on a day-to-day basis — a good sign considering the Suns have dealt with enough cross-job-description meddling of late. And if you were wondering what he was doing in the span between his 2006 departure from the Nuggets and his return to the league with the Pistons, check out his archive writing Scouts Inc. pieces for ESPN Insider.
The downsides of bringing on Weltman first begin with his experience. He’s never held a true decision-making position, but at the same time it’s hard to argue he’d be entering that in Phoenix. He’s also never been in a position to truly comb the NBA market for outright stars in the small market of Milwaukee. Monta Ellis might have been the biggest coup, and Weltman’s ability to think big could be a question mark coming into a decent market for NBA stars — or so we’re told.
Yet, the talent evaluation strengths can’t be overstated. The Clippers had some nice pieces, as Hill noted, and the Bucks had decent later lottery picks such as Brandon Jennings, Larry Sanders and John Henson. The Tobias Harris selection two years ago is looking like quite the gem as well — then again, it’s important to ask why the Bucks traded him only to tick off free-agent-to-be J.J. Redick.
It’s all quite complex, again considering any Weltman work required Hammond’s signature. In short, Weltman is a more finely-tuned personality than Blanks, has the resume where he won’t likely come in immediately looking for more power and has the characteristic Babby is looking for.
