This is a team on the rebuild. That rebuild is not complete, and it isn't going very well. I thought from the start that they would be unlikely to make the playoffs this year, and that even if they did, it'd be one and done yet again. I thought they might win eight games, but that seven was more likely. Even that, it now seems, may have been a little pollyannaish. So everything about this year is about implications for next year and beyond. That takes a little of the sting out of non-career-ending injuries. Given then that ultimately the record this year doesn't really matter (except perhaps to the extent it affects our draft position), the fact that both of these really good players will almost certainly be back next year is the key thing. The same sort of principle applies to Mac. The task this year is to ascertain whether he is worthy of the big contract going forward. This is complicated, of course, by the fact that Bill chose to make of last year a complete waste of time.
There are other players on IR or otherwise unavailable, some quite promising, who will also be back for next year. Our record, it seems, might be lousy enough that next year's 1st -round draftee is likely to be a genuine contributor.
My point is that if you set aside any expectations for "success" this year (certainly if you unrealistically define "success" as a record which get you into the playoffs) things aren't that bad. We have a few quite good players on the team right now, a few more even more promsing ones who will return by next year, and likely a decent draft position.
The decision re Mac must be made, but particularly given that last year was rendered useless vis-a-vis evaluating him, to make that decision now would be premature. The other decision - the important one - is what to do re Bill. My own view of course is that BIll the GM must be fired and that if that costs us the still-valuable services of Bill the Coach, so be it. Bill the Coach is still valuable - no doubt - but I'm not at all sure that losing him would be the devastating loss at this point that it might once have been.
P.S. "Pollyannaish" is actually a word, as wrong as it looks.
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