Will Detroit sell Amir + pick for cash?

I agree Matt about not wanting to hear anymore about FPBG. I’ll take Rip over him all day and vomit at the thought of both together. Here’s to Lakers ripping Orlando in 4, and Turkoglu becoming available.

Well, one thing about this article doesn’t make sense. Oklahoma City’s interested in BJ Mullins? Why, in God’s name?

That clear fallacy casts aspersions on the rest of the article.

Perhaps I just don’t understand the right way to rebuild.

Should we really wait to save our cap-space for next year?

There is always going to be a reason to not sign someone; unless that person is Dwayne Wade, Lebron James, Chris Bosh, or Joe Johnson. You can forget Wade, or James coming here. Are we really going to risk waiting on Bosh and Johnson, when we are not even guaranteed to sign them? Not to mention, Bosh is over-rated as it is. If you are looking for a tough-nosed defense, you can count Chris Bosh out. He isn’t Kevin Garnett. Joe Johnson I would love to have, but as I said, we are not guaranteed to get him. So why wait?

Ben Gordon, and Paul Milsap are both young talented players. Chances are we would be looking to move Hamilton, and fill other much-needed positions/roles. If this isn’t the right way to rebuild, than I don’t know what is. Should we waste a season and play out the draft for one player that can turn out to be a bust? Doesn’t make sense to me.

I wouldn’t trade Amir and our 15th pick, but I would certainly try to get extra cap-space to go after both Gordon and Milsap.

@Mark:
I would certainly try to get extra cap-space to go after both Gordon and Milsap.

In response to that, you were right when you said this:
Perhaps I just don’t understand the right way to rebuild.

I think selling off Amir and the first round pick is a good idea. I really don’t think there are any players with star potential that Detroit can get at 15 except for maybe Jeff Teague.

Amir and the first round pick frees up another 5mil. 3mil could be spent on a backup SF like Matt Barnes or something. The rest of it can be added to the 17mil in cap space Detroit already has to get two starters.

@Quick,

Maybe OKC thinks Mullens is the real deal? And if he turns out to be, that’s one heck of a young, up and coming team with Westbrook, Durant, and Green. If they’re smart they will take Evans at #3.

Smart move for the Thunder, I’m not liking it for Detroit. They need some talented rookie blood in here.

ugh and once again, Keith Langlois has spelled out in exquisite detail the absolute worst case scenario for the Pistons off-season:

http://www.nba.com/pistons/news/truebluepistons.html

To sum up: We dump Amir and our 1st round pick, we sign Boozer or Millsap, we sign Ben Gordon, we trade Tay (because Rip’s contract can’t be moved), we shift Rip to SF. The end.

Leaves us with: Stuck/Gordon/Rip/MillsapOrBoozer/Kwame and whatever we can get for Tay. But if you accept Rip as a viable SF (I don’t), the problem with trading Tay is then the only hole in that rotation is at C, and what team is going to trade a decent center for Tayshaun Prince? Or maybe he gets traded for another SF, but then we have the same problem as last year with overcrowding at SG. The one possibility is maybe we could do a Tay for Kaman deal, but that would leave us absolutely locked into the core of Stuck/Gordon/Rip/MillsapOrBoozer/Kaman for at least 3 years with no flexibility whatsoever. If that group clicks, then everything is fine, if they don’t… then we have The Teal Years Part II

Also, I’m not crazy about selling off Amir because if he’s able to produce a little more next season, he’ll be decent trade bait because of his expiring contract. With that said, if Joe thinks he really needs the extra cap room right now, I won’t complain too much. But dumping the 15th pick because you don’t want the $1.5m cap hold? That’s craziness. I would have thought teams had learned their lesson after the Suns, using the same logic, got burned by selling off Rajon Rondo (pick 21) and Rudy Fernandez (pick 24). Obviously not every mid-1st rounder is going to be that good, but at least you’re giving yourself the chance to acquire a productive and highly under-paid player. The draft is a crapshoot, but it’s still the best way to add cheap talent to your team.

@ Gabe: I’m with you. I don’t see how BG/Boozer (or Millsap) gets us to the ECF. According to the article, we’re slated ~20M under now and with Amir/15th pick = ~5M would have ~25M. That means Joe values 2 of the 3 above = ~12.5M / yr each? That’s insane.

I’d rather throw 17M at Bosh and use 4-6M for Ariza and trade Prince to Clips (Tay is from LA area) for Kaman. That would put us with Stuck/Rip/Ariza/Kaman/Bosh with AA/MFWB/Sharpe/Kwame. See if we can’t pluck us the Birdman for ~2-4M off the bench also. (I admit these numbers/scenario needs a bit of rework, just thinking out loud and throwing shit against the wall). Depending upon matchups, Rip can fill in at the 3, Sharpe could move to the 4 and Stuck to the 2, MFWB at 1 and Birdman at the 5 and we become a very fast team or some combo like that as a change of pace. In reality, we lost 2/3 and ~14 feet of our starting front court (Sheed/Dyess) and Joe D. is thinking about signing a 6’2" SG when he already has a 20pt/game SG at 11M/yr now? WTF?

If things don’t work out next year in terms of growing, I’m sure Rip’s contract at ~11M/yr for a 20pt scorer in this league can be traded for another piece. OKC’s advantage here is they can afford to work with Mullens for a couple of years, Amir is either trade bait in Feb or they let it expire. They aren’t going to the WCF next year or probably the year after but would have a great core to work with for a few years to see if it clicked. And I think S. Brooks can get them there.

I also think this selling of the 15th pick is 100% predicated on how the draft falls. I don’t see Joe D. making a deal until Stern walks up to the podium. There are just too many scenarios regarding who falls where. And if the top two picks blow up, what’s to say the Pistons trade Amir/15th pick/+ couple of 2nds to move to #3? OKC still has the 15th pick and Mullens should be available and they still have the 25th pick to trade for cash since alot of teams want to buy into the first round with two of our 2nd rounders (don’t know if they still hold their own).

I don’t think they want to bring in Rubio at #3. He’s at least a couple of years away, minimum, to playing at an NBA level, if for no other reason than he’s only 18 and they got a nice thing going with Westbrook at the 1. Even though Rubio is playing in the top Spanish league, how many 18 years olds out of HS could come into the NBA and play point? Rose being an exception. I don’t know where the scale is at for the #3 pick, but if #15 is ~1.5M, I would assume #3 is at least double that and probably close to 3×. But then who do we draft? The #3 and Prince for Griffin? The Clips draft Rubio and trade B-Diddy back to GS.

We can probably get Millsap for 8M/yr since Utah will be maxed out if Boozer doesn’t opt, but I think he will. Get Utah to tie up some cash towards Millsap after we give Millsap an offer sheet and then make an offer to Okur? Trade Rip/Tay to Tor for Bosh. Sign Gordon for 10M and pick up Gortat for 6M. If we are ~25M under (assuming OKC deal) and Rip/Tay = ~20M, that’s 45M dollars in essence to play with. The pisser is, by all accounts Bosh will stay in Tor if they resign Marion which looks likely. But I still don’t see how that team matches up with any of the big front lines in the NBA. Bargiani/Bosh/Marion might be very long and athletic but they’ll get pushed around.

Again, the numbers/players need work above I admit, but the CB and proposed Amir/15 trade gives us 25M freakin’ dollars. Toss in a Tay or Rip contract and that’s ~35M. Certainly we can pick up 3 quality starters for average ~12M each in this league. Nobody is going to Memphis/Sac/OKC as a first choice. Particularly now that the MaLoof’s are hurting for cash.

@Mike Payne

Perhaps you could explain the right way to rebuild. If we could get rid of Amir for extra cap-space, without selling off our 15 overall pick, why wouldn’t you? At what point is Amir supposed to get better again? Hell, right now we can’t even argue at his skill-set yet because he can never stay in the game long enough to reveal it.

I’m sure you are someone who would love to wait till 2010 and hang around making offers to all the big name free agents that have no real interest in coming here. There are going to be too many teams with money to try and land the same free agents we’re going after. Bosh and Joe Johnson are the only real possibilities, but you can bet teams like New York have interest in them as well. Especially the Knicks if Lebron decides on the Nets or Cleveland. Too risky, and potentially no reward.

I believe our cap-space is more like 17 Million right now.

Trevor Ariza is on everyone’s wishlist, but if the Lakers win a championship, you can bet he is going to be re-signed.

The Clippers are not going to give up that 1st overall pick for anyone, unless the name is Lebron James, Dwayne Wade, Dwight Howard, or Chris Paul.

SELL AMIR NOW

No thanks to Joe Johnson, by the way. His numbers are inflated by the ridiculous amount of minutes he plays. He’s good, but not as good as he thinks he is.

I second with Birdman. Joe Johnson = overrated as fuck. See Round two against the Cavs. Your “franchise guy” barely shows up once? That’s not a franchise guy. He’s the definition of a second banana.

What happened to the Ron-Ron talk? The guy’s unrestricted and is clearly best or second-best free-agent out there. There is no player available that will single-handedly change the culture of your team except Artest. Craziness be damned.

@ Mark: I agree. The Clips aren’t trading the #1. Just throwing stuff against the wall. The cap did come down some but with Amir/15 scenario, we would have ~22M. The cap came down for everyone as well as us, so it’s a push in terms of bidding against anyone.

Also, there is the possibility, however small, of a sign-n-trade for Dyess and Sheed. These guys will only go to contenders and no contender is giving up good pieces (what would be the point). But it still exists.

I just don’t see Thorton as a long term solution for the Clips. Granted, he’s in his second year, but still has too many t/o’s and lapses in shooting (taking good shots).

The Lakers will choose Ariza over Odom in a heart beat, sign Powell & Mbenga as cheap as possible for front court depth, but even without Odom and trying to sign Ariza the Lakers are going to be bumping up against some money problems:

Kobe 20M
Bynum 11M
Gasol ?? 9M (too lazy to look it up)
Fish 5 M (don’t know how UT did the buyout/release from GS contract he signed)
Walton 5M
Morrison 4M
Sasha 4M

is roughly 58M already. They’ve got another 5 guys to sign for the NBA min 12 players. And the only way Kobe opts out and takes less is if they win the chip this month and wants to keep the team together. Nobody is going to trade a “piece” to the Lakers with what they already have now. Throw in another million for their 1st round pick this year because they supposedly are looking at PGs and I can see where they may have a problem. Of course, if they win the chip, Jack Nicholson starts paying more because Buss will be able to raise the prices.

At the end of the day, if it becomes a bidding war, we should win. It just depends on who that war is focused on and if we should do it.

Pao Gasol = ~$14Mil this season, more next season (contract was heavy on the back end)

Unfortunate that the 15th pick couldn’t get the Thunder to take Kwame’s contract instead of Amir’s.

Also: Ben Gordon’s awesome.

Hat-tip to DBB readers…Mike for the tip.

Best part of the article for me.

Trade Amir now! For nothing but some Benjamins!

And FWIW, I’m happy the conversations seemed to have steered away from bitching and moaning about the AI… interesting how it seems to have coincided with Denver getting bounced in the Conference Finals.

About rebuilding, some random thoughts:

Start the rebuilding in the front court. If we can take care of interior defense, rebounding, and shot blocking, I would feel much better about Stuck and MFWB as our PG’s moving forward.

These seem to be the names getting tossed around:

Kaman, Milsap, Birdman, Bosh, Boozer, and Gortat.

Of that group, I really like Birdman, Milsap, and Kaman — but maybe because I’m waxing nostalgic more than anything. Those guys just seem to fit with Detroit basketball. (I like Gortat quite a bit, too, but I have a feeling he might become more expensive than he is worth.)

It is possible that we could get all three of those guys, isn’t it? Obviously, Milsap’s acquisition depends on what Utah does, and Kaman’s acquisition depends on the Clips — what they’re wiling to give up and what they would ask in return.

If we did get those first three guys, it seems like we’d have a helluva front court, especially when you throw Max into that mix — but I’m not sure we have the scoring punch we need to be a contender.

To get Kaman, seems like we’d have to give up Tay, which leaves us with a gaping hole at 3.

I don’t know if anyone is willing to take on Rip’s contract right now, and frankly, I don’t think there’s a better option than Rip at the 2 atm, anyway.

Tay’s contract is more reasonable; seems like he’s the most likely to get traded as a result, but I have no idea how we’re going to fill his slot. I like Ariza, but so does LA — and he’s not much more of a scorer than Tay, if at all. He’s just a bit younger and more athletic.

But, I still think it’s going to take at least 2 years to rebuild, and it seems like our options with big men this summer/season are better than our options at 1-2-3. So I’d rather see Joe make a hard run at some of these quality bigs this year and wait for the guards and Sf’s — because there’s bound to be a fire sale to cash in on.

Also: Ben Gordon’s awesome.

Also: Ben Gordon is incredibly overrated.

He takes awful shots, his shooting percentage isn’t that great, he’s a ball-stopper, and most importantly, he turns the ball over far too often.

He is not the savior for any team, as he’s demonstrated in Chicago year after year, and he’s certainly not going to be for Detroit either.

A backcourt of Stuckey, MFWB, Rip, and Gordon? That’s one hell of an identity crisis. Stuck, MFWB, and Gordon all need the ball to score, for one, and if we stick with Rip, it’s hard to see how there’s enough shots to go around.

That would be disaster.

What’s everyones take on Gerald Wallace. Could someone give me an idea of what kind of player he is. I don’t know enough about him to really draw up a conclusion. If we got Gordon, would it be worth trading Hamilton for him?

Off-Pistons Topic, but a big trade rumor I read today:

Celts deal Ray Allen and Rajon Rondo for Amare Stoudemire, Leandro Barbosa, and the 14th overall pick. Source: sports.ktar.com

Supposedly Boston initiated the trade.

It appears that the Thunder are interested in signing Anderson. However, at this point Presti is still not comfortable with Anderson’s drug related history. Though Johnson was penalized for falsyfying his records in high school that is not is not as bad as Anderson’s previous drug problems.

Like Sheed said about Johnson “He needs to read a book”

The Thunder’s running game on offense fits Johnson’s style a lot more than Curry’s guard orientated offense

However, you slice it though the Thunder need help on defense in the middle. Anderson is better than Johnson at this point on defense in the restricted area but overall Johnson is a better team defender.

Trade Amir now

I don’t think Chris Andersen is the right move for the Pistons. Yes, he’s athletic, but he’s also 30. His play is going to start dropping off soon. When it does, it will be precipitous. He has nothing else to offer besides athleticism.

@brgulker

Say we have to give up Tay in order to get Kaman— how about grabbing up Ron-Ron for around $9mil/yr? We basically bolster our frontcourt and get a much meaner, nastier SF and really only spend whatever it costs to get Artest because Tay and Kaman’s salaries pretty much cancel eachother out. Afterward, we still have something like $8mil to sign another guy/guys.

Stuck/MFWB
Rip/AA
Artest/Sleepy
Max/Amir
Kaman/Kwame

That lineup by itself is definitely a playoff team in the East. Hell, if we can sell the #15 and Amir for cash, we might even be able to get Boozer too. This is a hell of a lineup:

Stuck/MFWB
Rip/AA
Artest/Sleepy
Boozer/Max
Kaman/Kwame

Don’t tell me that doesn’t make us at least a top 3 seed. We can defend all 5 positions, we can score down low, we’ve got slashers, etc. We’d definitely be a “grind-it-out” team because of the lack of true shooters, but you’ve got to think that Stuck, Will, and AA will all be working on that part of their game all off-season, so it might not be as big a weakness as it seems.

That Boston/Phoenix rumor is just terrible.

Boston wouldn’t have a starting point guard.

Phoenix would have two.

Phoenix wouldn’t have a PF.

Boston would have KG, Amare, and Perkins.

Just a dumb, dumb, rumor.

@ Joel: Thanks. And shit, Mitch K hase a problem.

@ brgulker: Agree with your reasoning. As for the clips, they’ve got Camby, Zach and Kaman right now in the front court. Add in Griffin and its really only a problem this year as Camby’s contract expires. I can see them going with a trade to SA for scrape pieces. Zach’s contract is a nightmare and unless you’ve got the room, so is Kaman’s. So is B-diddy’s, so they’re stuck with Zach, Kaman & B-diddy. They ain’t trading Eric Gordon so if they want some flexibility, they’ll have to do something. Dunleavy is adamant that this is a good team except for injuries last year and rumor has it B-diddy is at the facility so far this summer. The problem is, Mike D is both the GM & coach with 2 years at 5M/per, so he isn’t firing himself.

I also agree that we need to focus on the frontcourt. Gortat may become too expensive. Much over the MLE and I say no. You could possibly do a sign-n-trade with Utah for Rip/boozer and then spend some money on BG, but I don’t like that option at all. With our space and all the teams looking to get under the cap, I think Joe D. can afford to wait. Anybody that is a big name out there (bosh/Amare/etc.) who might be being moved I think Joe D. definitely gets a call just for WTF sake, what’s Det’s position on a possible swap of players. I think if you’re an opposing GM, you gotta make that call.

As guys get traded and money availability of other teams gets used up, some folks are going to start to panic. It’s pretty obvious that Orl won’t be able to afford both Gortat and Hedo. Clev has issues. The bucks can’t afford both Sessions and Charlie V. Likewise for Utah Korver/Okur/Millsap/Boozer (depending on who stays/opts out). The Lakers and Hornets have money issues. Tor has holes/money/Bosh-Marion issues. Throw in Dallas/SA/Miami as teams who don’t have a lot of flexibility financial wise and there are a boatload of opportunities. We’ve got 3 quality starters and at least a serviceable #5 in Kwame. I’d rather see a deal late than early.

I don’t think Chris Andersen is the right move for the Pistons. Yes, he’s athletic, but he’s also 30. His play is going to start dropping off soon. When it does, it will be precipitous. He has nothing else to offer besides athleticism.>>

====
The Thunder are rumored to be interested in signing Anderson. I haven’t heard anything about the Pistons having an interest in him.

I was just saying that the Thunder are rumored to be looking at both Anderson and Johnson. I think Johnson would be the better choice for them, especially if they can move up in the draft in deal.

If Ben Gordon ever wears a Pistons jersey, I’m going to blow up PG4L style.

It is a dumb rumor, because the Celts like Ray and Love Rajon. Present and Future, and they probably think with the core healthy, they can get banner #18.

I thought it was interesting because the Suns might like Rondo back now that they’ve seen his NBA game.

@ Mike: The thunder are already at #3. This is just another pick for them. But I actually think they’ve got a deal at #3 and want a pick in round 1, depending how the first two picks pan out.

Didn’t realize Birdman was that old, but he hasn’t had much wear-n-tear for the last two years and doesn’t have alot of overall mileage. I guess the trick is to keep him interested so he doesn’t start to wander off.

The trade Phx/Bos is horrible. But if you’re looking at not signing Nash next summer and trying to save him for the playoffs, Rondo’s the guy. Somehow swing a deal involving Chi/Cle involving TT/Shaq/Andy V/B. Wallace and pieces, you can probably fill in some holes. And the best part is: You know Starbury is smiling at that rumor and I’m sure J. Tinsley can be had on the cheap.

Lots of good posts and ideas in this thread. Thanks, guys, for interesting reading.

To throw out one thing – having read the recent NYT profile on Chris Andersen, I have a hard time believing that he will leave Denver, mostly for reasons beyond money. Here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/sports/basketball/29nuggets.html

The article talks about how Andersen’s friend Mark Bryant took him into his home in Denver and set him on the path to recovery when he was at his lowest, and how Andersen then met his now-fiancee in Denver, and how he moved to a quiet town outside the city where he found he could once again manage his life.

When you’re a recovering drug addict and you’ve found a situation that is safe and secure and works well, where you’re surrounded by people you love and trust who understand and support you, it’s not always a great idea to throw it all out and try something completely different with a totally new set of people. Denver has been the ideal aviary for the Birdman. If I were him, I would be eager to stay put.

In addition to all the non-monetary reasons for staying, Denver fans love Andersen the way Oprah loves Obama, and management there seems very set on keeping him. I bet he’ll get paid there too.

@ Mike: The thunder are already at #3. This is just another pick for them. But I actually think they’ve got a deal at #3 and want a pick in round 1, depending how the first two picks pan out.>>
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There is no stong concensus on who they will pick with that choice.

I have heard 3 possibilities

1. Thabeet – Who is way overrated. He Will be 23 this coming season though one rumor has it that he is actually 26. He has no offense and plays soft. Blair punked his arse big time in one game

2. Rubio – This would involve moving Westbrook to the #2. Westbrook is a combo like Stuckey but is a far better #1 than a #2. Rubio has also said that he has very little interest in being stuck in the great state of Oklahoma much like Yi didn’t want to go to Milwaukee. I still have heard if Rubio has negotiated a buyout.

3. Harden – Though better players would be available at the 3rd pick, Harden is probably the best all around #2 in the draft if you look at Curry was a PG.

The Thunder need help in 2 areas in their starting lineup. Center and Shooting Guard. By drafting Harden with their #3 pick they fill the Shooting Gurad position. By moving up to #15 taking Mullens and getting Johnson, whose body is still bulking up, they could fill their their need at the Center position, though Johnson would need about another 15 – 20 lbs up to around 250 to be able to defend against most centers in the league. Last season he was pretty effective guarding guys up to 240-245 range. After that it got iffy. So by adding 15 – 20 more pounds of muscle he should be able to guard most of the centers in the league. Whether his body can handle that extra weight is the question.

In addition to all the non-monetary reasons for staying, Denver fans love Andersen the way Oprah loves Obama, and management there seems very set on keeping him. I bet he’ll get paid there too.>>

Don’t forget Chris Matthews and Kieth Olberman also loves The Messiah maybe even more so than Oprah. I haven’t heard if Perez Hiton is carrying a man love for the Messiah.

Well Portland’s General Manager has stated they are willing to do a lopsided trade. A lopsided trade by definition, means they would be willing to take on extra salary.

Tayshaun Prince
15# Overall

for

Travis Outlaw
Nicolas Batum

Batum is better than any pick at 15, not to mention he is very similar to Prince with his length and defense. We also get even more cap-room and a back-up SF, whether it is Outlaw who can score, or Batum who is young and can defend. A good way to start rebuilding if you ask me.

Outlaw has a 1 year, 4 million expiring contract. He is young, and will be looking to improve this season. He also can hit clutch shots.

Batum is just over 1 million on his contract, followed by two team options, and a 3 million qualifying offer. He is also only twenty years old and started for Portland in the 08/09 season.

Oklahoma City needs a PF too. Jeff Green is not a PF and gets destroyed on the boards. Don’t know why they don’t just move him to SF and Durant to SG.

By the way, that fanhouse article on Terence Williams is really funny.

Apparently, the odds are 5.5 to 1 that Detroit gets Lebron. Cavs, Knicks and Nets have better odds.

http://blog.mlive.com/fullcourtpress/2009/06/oddsmakers_place_551_odds_on_l.html#more

Mark, I think portland wouldn’t be interested in taking on tay’s contract with all the young talent they need to sign in the next couple of years. I also think they value outlaw quite a bit. Mike, I know how much you like Amir, but really? Still bulking up? Covered guys who weigh 240-245 effectively? Amir’s an expiring contract now, plain and simple. People around denver were styling their hair “birdman” style and flapping their arms after he made plays. I think he stays a nugget. I think Joe keeps 15 or moves it with other picks to go higher in the draft. With how many holes we’re looking at right now in the front court, i doubt he gets rid of amir (expiring and front court player) and 1st rounder just for cash. I think he’d need an asset in return.

It’ll be interesting to see what Presti does. Yeah, they need help with their frontcourt, but there’s really not much for help in the draft. DJ White played great down the stretch, and maybe they’re able to grab one of the FAs. My guess is they go with Tyreke Evans at #3.

Mark: <em>Mike Payne- Perhaps you could explain the right way to rebuild.

Brgulker, Joel, MB and others all did a better job than I could above. In fact, all I really can say is to repeat what (I believe it was MBinSoCal?) MBinSoCal said the other day— championship teams have one primary thing in common, a powerhouse big capable of 20-10 on any night, if not averaging it per season.

In recent history, those powerhouse, post-dominant bigs have looked like this:
Garnett
Duncan
Shaq
Duncan
Sheed (with an assist to Ben)
Duncan
Shaq
Shaq
Shaq
Duncan

So if we want to contend, rebuilding starts with a powerhouse big who can dominate in the post. IMO, Bosh and Stoudamire will be cripplingly overpriced. Millsap and Lee are too limited offensively to provide spacing for our driving backcourt. Again, IMO, Boozer at $10-$13M is our best shot.

Compared to the above, Boozer doesn’t have the defense or the heart of any of those players. He gets you the scoring/rebounding numbers, but little else. So as a bunch of other DBBers have said, myself including, job number 2 is getting a big fuckin’ body at the 5 spot. A defensive, mean motherfucker who can rebound, block shots, and intimidate the opposing guards. I’m not talking an energy player like Birdman, but a genuine 7-footer with plenty of weight. If we can’t find him this year, I’m quite content giving Kwame another year of burn as a starter until we can make an improvement next season.

Third issue is fixing the fact that our 3rd/4th option SF, while a special player, can’t score a goddamn basket when his hands are full on defense. We wont’ win anything until that’s addressed, and we haven’t won anything since it has been an issue.

So in my opinion, rebuilding should work like this:
1) Get a powerhouse, post-dominant 4.
2) Sign/trade for a tough, defensive minded body at the 5
3) Upgrade the 3.

IMO, our backcourt is FINE. Rip’s game will age well, as many here have said. Stuck deserves another season or two to prove his worth, as does Bynum. Afflalo is find backing up Rip. If any player is trade bait, it’s Tay.

Also note, re the list of champ bigs— Shaq is a freak of nature, Duncan is a once-in-a-generation talent, Garnett and Sheed couldnt’ have done it without a big body next to them. Boozer has weaknesses, but they have as much to do with his frontcourt pair than anything else. Okur is a terrible match for him, he needs a Przybilla, a Gortat, a (hurts to say this) Perkins, etc. Oh, and anybody suggests Chandler I’ll shit in a box and mail it to you. First class.

@MP
We should try to get this guy:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandler_Bing

@Birdman:
What’s your address, buddy? I kid!

Whoa, I just wrote a post that took about 10 minutes to write… and it disappeared into the abyss.

It was so brilliant that I don’t think I can replicate it.

@brgulker

I was being somewhat facetious by calling Gordon ‘awesome’. But I do think (and your comment shows it) that he’s in that group of called-overrated-so-much-he’s-underrated. No he’s not a savior. But worrying about how Will Bynum would fit in? Gordon’s overall shooting % isn’t great, but he is literally one of the best 3-point shooters (volume and efficiency) in the history of the league. As a career-arc, closer to Ray Allen than Will Bynum.

And if JoeD still believes in the lunchbucket toughguy Detroit thing, Gordon certainly fits that. I agree that having him AND Stuckey AND Hamilton is an issue. But he’s only 26, this contract is basically buying his prime.

Quick Darshan
Jun 3rd, 2009 at 1:07 pm

Oklahoma City needs a PF too. Jeff Green is not a PF and gets destroyed on the boards. Don’t know why they don’t just move him to SF and Durant to SG.
-—————-
That is true about his rebounding. Johnson is a better rebounder and can play PF. It is always possible that if the Thunder can acquire Johsnon that he would start at PF with Green going to SF and KD back to SG.

Then they would want to draft a center. So they would probably take Thabeet.

The other option would be to take Hill at #3 and move Green to SF and KD to SG. They would still need a center.

As much as I am not a fan of Thabeet I think that the first option of getting Johnson and drafting Thabeet along with moving Green to PF and KD to shooting guard might be their best choice

Should have said moving Green to SF

As much as I am not a fan of Thabeet I think that the first option of getting Johnson and drafting Thabeet along with moving Green to SF and KD to shooting guard might be their best choice

@BullsBlogger:
We’re naturally a bit sour on undersized, volume shooting 2 guards who can’t defend. Even if we weren’t, we’ve got a better SG in Rip Hamilton— who still has four solid years in the tank (see Allen, Ray and Miller, Princess Reggie). Rip may not be as capable with the tramp ball, nor can he slash as well as Gordon, but he does everything else better than Gordon (defense, jump shooting, distribution, rebounding, moving off the ball, getting in his opponent’s head).

I agree with the brgulker post that got lost in the abyss and never appeared here. Just on principle.

Mike Payne, I have said exactly what you said countless times, and I still believe that to be the best option. The only problem is getting that defensive minded center, which could end up being a huge problem.

However, I’m still interested in seeing what Milsap is capable of. We never had a 20/10 guy. Rasheed at most averaged 15 points, and that was in the 05/06 season. Milsap averaged 13 points and 8 rebounds this season, and is only 24, compared to Boozer. I wouldn’t mind pairing him up next to Gordon because Ben can be the 3pt threat that Rasheed was last year. Our problem was our big-man was staying away from the basket, and jacking up three’s. Milsap is capable of doing work in the post and can develop a mid-range jumper.

It all depends on what we would be able to surround Boozer with.

I think Memphis is a better fit for Amir. He can play the 4 in their up-tempo system. And he’d be paired up with Gasol who’s a big body at the 5.

Anyway, my main point was to say this:

1) It’s harder to find high-quality, productive big men in the NBA. Fewer fish in the proverbial pond.

But, this off-season, we have a chance to do just that — so let’s make that the priority.

2) The options at SG this season are not very good — it’s essentially Ben Gordon, who’s overrated. He takes bad shots. He’s a ball-stopper. He turns the ball over at a high clip per possession.

Plus, we already have a championship-caliber SG and two promising young PG’s; we’re fine at the Guard spots.

So once again, let’s make bigs our priority.

3) There are going to be fire sales this season as teams scramble to get under the cap. For details, see here and look at the articles “2009 Cap Concerns”: http://nbaroundtable.wordpress.com/?s=cap+concerns

4) We are one of the very few teams that is positioned financially to take advantage of the fire sales that are bound to happen. We can take on multiple players and multiple contracts. Almost no one else can do that. We can afford to wait — unless we buy into the idea that we have to contend for a ’chip next year and accept all the pressure that comes along with that; we need to be patient and not rush. The only way to get back to the top is to be that kind of patient.

I also posed two questions:

1) If Milwaukee doesn’t resign Villanueva, shouldn’t we go after him?
2) Have we talked about trading Kwame at all? I mean, he’s an asset, and he’s expiring. Someone’s gotta want him, right?

Rip isn’t a better rebounder than Gordon. Gordon has slightly better rebounding stats. Rip is the better “mid-range” jumper-shooter, but Gordon is the better “3pt-Shooter”. He has better FG%, and 3pt% than Rip, he is younger, and can create his own shot. Rip is the better defender but Gordon isn’t as bad you make him out to be.

I was being somewhat facetious by calling Gordon ‘awesome’. But I do think (and your comment shows it) that he’s in that group of called-overrated-so-much-he’s-underrated. No he’s not a savior. But worrying about how Will Bynum would fit in? Gordon’s overall shooting % isn’t great, but he is literally one of the best 3-point shooters (volume and efficiency) in the history of the league. As a career-arc, closer to Ray Allen than Will Bynum.

I see your point, and yes, he’s a good 3-point shooter.

But the Bynum comparison is kind of strange to me because Bynum cost less than one million last season.

And we need a big man more than we need another guard. That’s painfully obvious, I think.

I actually wouldn’t mind a backcourt of Stuckey and Gordon. I think they compliment each other well. But, I don’t like the idea of Stuckey, Rip and Gordon. I can’t see that working out. I’d be cool with Gordon if Dumars found a taker for Rip.

Damn that extension!

*complement

Do it.

As far as the Phoenix comparisons go, weren’t those draft night deals? The Suns actually selected those players and then traded them.

brgulker: Can it be summed up with, “TRADE AMIR NOW”?

Rip isn’t a better rebounder than Gordon. Gordon has slightly better rebounding stats. Rip is the better "mid-range" jumper-shooter, but Gordon is the better "3pt-Shooter". He has better FG%, and 3pt% than Rip, he is younger, and can create his own shot. Rip is the better defender but Gordon isn’t as bad you make him out to be.

Turnovers, turnovers, turnovers.

And 0verall shooting percentage.

Rip is better with respect to both. Why would we sign another shooting guard for right around the same amount of money who’s at best comparable to the SG we already have — especially when our most pressing need is the 4-5 slot? And backup SF slot?

It just doesn’t make sense.

@Garrett: see my first post on this page :)

@ Mike P: I think Boozer benefits from Okur. Okur is able to bring the opposing 5 out from the key area opening pick-n-rolls/pops and the low block game Boozer has.

brgulker: I think keeping Kwame until the deadline could be the plan. If we get some players this year and have a possibility next, then Kwame can go to a team who suffered a big man injury or needs a big. Sign-n-trade to Orl for Gortat and then they’ll be able to sign Hedo possibily?? It’s worth a try. If they win the chip, there will be incredible pressure on them to keep Hedo. As a trade-off, they can point to that as their priority and still have a serviceable guy behind Dwight.

Plus, none of us question your brilliance. Lost post or not.

I think Rip stays here. He’s a ~20 nite scorer, plays more than adequate defense and because of his game can at least require the opposing 2 to play D as opposed to 2’s who have to “wait until the PG penetrates and kicks” game. Maybe we do sign Gordon and trade MFWB? Throw in Tay so you would have two starters for 1 big in return. I think AA could also play some 3.

And it would be interesting if Sharpe could come alive at the 3. He’s got a good outside game and from what I remember a decent post up game against smaller 3’s. Joe D traded up to get him last year as were several other teams trying. He’s either a gem in the rough or we cut bait. I don’t think there was any question that he remained with the Pistons rather than D-League assigned so we could monitor his progress. And with all the travel, exactly how much practice time does he get (assuming he went on some trips).

I don’t think Charlie V is our answer at the 4. Perhaps moving Tay for a big and getting Charlie V for the 3 for a short 2 year contract while Sharpe develops a bit more. I’m not sure how long you can “hold” a Un-RFA before you have to renounce their rights.

Read an article where one writer thinks if Bron had won this year or wins next year, he’d feel more comfortable bolting after bringing Clev their first chip in anything over the last 3 generations. Clev talking about signing Kidd certainly doesn’t make Bron want to sign a long term deal. Kidd has at max a two year contract offer with maybe a team option in yr 3. The only PG playing at 40 and being adequate was Stockton (or close to 40 and he was more than adequate).

But I think it’s important that alot of the teams competing this year for chip all have salary issues, wherea we haven’t really had any during this run. And a number of teams looking to compete a couple of years down the road will also have salary issues. I’d rather be on a slow moving train than one that says we gotta hurry up and do something.

I don’t think Charlie V is our answer at the 4. Perhaps moving Tay for a big and getting Charlie V for the 3 for a short 2 year contract while Sharpe develops a bit more. I’m not sure how long you can "hold" a Un-RFA before you have to renounce their rights.

I guess I see @CV31 (his twitter account) as more of a 3/4 and playing the kind of role that Corliss played, albeit with a different type of game.

I’m not sure he’s a pure 3 or a pure 4, but he can score in bunches, and he rebounds well.

Anyway, if the Bucks can’t resign him, I do think he’s worth a look.

Gordon has a career 2.44 Turnover rate
Hamilton has a career 2.21 Turnover rate

Damn that extra .23! Really makes a difference.

Gordon improved his FG% to 46% this season. Rip shot 45%.

Now career wise Rip has the edge. But he has also been in the league longer. Comparing Rips first five seasons to Gordon’s; they are about the exact same.

3 Point land, Gordon career 41%, Rip career 35%.

FT% Gordon career 86%, Rip career 85%.

Don’t forget Gordon is only 26 years old. Plenty time to get even better.

I wouldn’t have both on the same team, as you said, it wouldn’t make sense.

I would be interested to see who might be interested in Rip. Charlotte, Houston, Denver, Indiana, Chicago (if we land Gordon), and Philly are all possible trade partners.

@MB:
I think Boozer benefits from Okur. Okur is able to bring the opposing 5 out from the key area opening pick-n-rolls/pops and the low block game Boozer has.

Boozer’s most commonly perceived weakness is his defense. I’m suggesting that Okur’s skill set complicates this weakness instead of neutralizing it. You’re right that he may help Boozer offensively, but that’s not where he needs help from his 5.

I think I’m the only one that still likes Amir. And I still want Marvin Williams over Ben Gordon. Hes the youngest and has shown great development since hes been in the league.

@ Mark: Assuming that’s a per 48 rate regarding T/Os. If not, I think Rip has played a ton more minutes.

@ Mike P: I agree. But if we’ve got some lumbering 5 clogging the middle on both D and O, Boozer’s O will suffer, making his inadequate D even more of a weakness (i.e., tradeoff). But I think we are speaking the same thing.

@Mark:
Gordon improved his FG% to 46% this season. Rip shot 45%.

Now career wise Rip has the edge. But he has also been in the league longer. Comparing Rips first five seasons to Gordon’s; they are about the exact same.

3 Point land, Gordon career 41%, Rip career 35%.

FT% Gordon career 86%, Rip career 85%.

Don’t forget Gordon is only 26 years old. Plenty time to get even better.

======

I wouldn’t say Gordon will get much better. But I think Hamilton will get worse as he’s on the wrong side of 30, and the legs won’t let him run around screens as they used to.

The thing about comparing their shooting s is that not only does Gordon hit over 40 3-pointers, he shoots a ton of them, so his eFG for last season was 52.1% and Hamilton’s was 48%.

Though I think we’re all pretty much in agreement that a Stucky/Gordon/Hamilton rotation will be an odd fit. I don’t think he ever liked being a 6th man, but he never complained about it, and it’s not like sitting behind Hamilton is like sitting behind Chris Duhon.

Mark, valid points. I noticed that too when I looked up the stats recently.

Take a peek at Rip’s turnovers over the past few seasons, however, and compare that with the past few for Gordon. It’s also worth noting that thus far, Gordon hasn’t shown much improvement with respect to taking care of the ball.

Personally, I think the amount of turnovers a player does or does not commit is grossly overlooked by most.

Every time you turn the ball over, you are doing two things:

1) Taking points away from your team and 2) Giving points to the other team.

With respect to turnovers, Rip has shown improvement throughout his career, and Gordon has not. With respect to shooting percentage, Rip had one of his worst seasons last year, BG had one of his best. And as many have said, Rip’s game will age well, just as Reggie Miller’s did.

So I put the question back to you: why should we sign Ben Gordon when we already have a very comparable player locked up and our most pressing needs are elsewhere?

And we must consider that trading Rip will be no easy task; his contract isn’t bad, per se, but it’s not exactly appealing to a lot of teams either.

Oh and if we get Turkoglu, it will be one horrible decision. Hes old and I think hes a product of his environment. Especially since he had generally bad years until Van Gundy came over

@MarkButter in SoCal

Turnover rate (i.e., per possession used) 08-09:

Gordon: 11.9
Hamilton: 10.3

Bigger number is worse :).

So it’s not that far off, but Hamilton is better at keeping TOs down. I am very surprised that their rebound rates are so similar considering Rip’s height advantage. If anything that means that you could not have Gordon-Hamilton as a 2-3 unless you have monster rebounders in the frontcourt.

Elton Brand please.

Re: Ben Gordon – He has great numbers, yes. So did Iverson. He didn’t fit. Trying to fit a square peg into a round hole doesn’t work, no matter how enticing the numbers are. It’s a subjective argument – some are going to fall in love with his numbers. Sign me up for the side that doesn’t.

@Matt Gibson – I still like Amir and still believe that we don’t know exactly what we have in him. It still blows my mind how he’s handled.

Gordon has shown just as much improvement as Rip did his first five seasons. In just his third season, he averaged 21 PPG on 45% shooting. Not bad.

I’m still interested in learning a bit more about Gerald Wallace. I don’t know much about him, but I’m sure we could work out a deal with the Bobcats.

Another possibility; I know people are probably sick of hearing this is; cap-space. Ewwwwwwwwww! Right?

We could potentially land a deal with Chicago involving Brad Miller and his expiring contract. He would fit the need at Center, and Rip would fit the need at SG.

Once again, just ideas and I would be interested in hearing some more.

Shinons, it’s not just about the numbers. Ben Gordon isn’t impossible to play with, and isn’t an undersized SG. He also doesn’t have that it’s all about me attitude. The comparison doesn’t work.

your friendly BullsBlogger, why are you selling us on Ben Gordon. Are you trying to get revenge for Ben Wallace?

But, seriously, I think Gordon’s range complements Stuckey’s power game. Both can handle the ball and you can never have too many ball handlers. With Stuckey, Gordon, Tay (and Odom!) you could have ball handlers at the 1-4 positions. Throw in a big man that can get rebounds, throw outlet passes and run the floor (Gortat, can you throw outlet passes?) and you have yourselves an up tempo team that’s at least average defensively.

I think the ben gordan love is also coming from our need for a better 3 point shooting game. Last 4 teams in the playoffs all had the 3 as a big component of their attack (and not coming from their 4/5).

First of, yes, a stubby 6-3 shooting guard is undersized. In fact, I’m having trouble thinking of very many teams in the league that starts a smaller shooting guard. Delonte West and Jason Terry are the only ones I can even think of…

But the point isn’t about “Oh, Ben Gordon is the exact same as Allen Iverson!!!” The point is that Iverson’s game didn’t fit. I don’t think Gordon’s game would fit. I also think Artest’s game wouldn’t fit. Same with David Lee. Plenty of guys out there, so no, I’m not comparing Gordon and Iverson. As I said before, observations on chemistry and “fit” are subjective. There’s really no way to prove or disprove them, so rather than starting a useless argument and will just say that I don’t think Ben Gordon fits with this team.

Once again, just ideas and I would be interested in hearing some more.

Brad Miller is over-the-hill and washed up. Why we would give anything up to get him, especially to a division rival, makes even less sense than signing another guard to a roster that is in desperate need of quality if not dominant big men (which Miller is not).

Below, Bill Simmons rips into Joe Dumars in his new column. Dude doesn’t often show a lot of insight into teams that aren’t from Boston, but he is on the money here.

Q: Wait a second, if you thought Billups had disappeared during the L.A. series, does that mean I’m off the hook for dumping his salary for Iverson?
— J. Dumars, Detroit

SG: Absolutely not. Billups had/has real basketball value as a veteran point guard and leader, plus an extremely fair contract: $36.3 million through 2011, then partially guaranteed in 2012. If Ray Allen was worth Delonte West and the No. 5 pick two years ago, how could anyone say Billups was worth a fading Iverson’s expiring deal and that’s it? You’re telling me Portland, Houston, Atlanta, Cleveland or Miami couldn’t have topped that offer? Don’t play the “Chauncey wanted to go home to Denver” card; that’s insulting to your fans. And don’t play the “We needed to give Rodney Stuckey the car keys” card, because Rodney Stuckey ain’t that good. Bad trade. There were smarter ways to clear money for the summers of 2009 and 2010. And if you’re so desperate to clear cap space, why extend Rip Hamilton’s deal? So confusing. I remain confused.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/090603&sportCat=nba

The stat lines for last season of Rip and BG:

Rip: http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/stats?playerId=294
BG: http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/stats?playerId=2381

There are a few things that jump out.

BG has the advantage with respect to three-point shooting.

BG scores slightly more points on slightly more shots taken in slightly more minutes played (per game).

Rip for his career shoots a higher overall percentage and turns the ball over less, particularly over the past 4 seasons.

Rip also gets one more assist per game (in slightly fewer minutes).

BG is a few years younger, but I’m still convinced that Rip will age like a fine wine.

So again, why would we sign a guy (and create a log jam at SG) when we already have a player who’s a proven winner, team-player, and who is also loyal to our franchise?

Especially when we have much more pressing needs — the 4/5 slots and starting and/or backup 3 slots?

Furthermore, Rip’s contract is going to be very tough to move, especially with the cap space where it’s projected to be.

It just doesn’t click with me, fellas.

There were smarter ways to clear money for the summers of 2009 and 2010. And if you’re so desperate to clear cap space, why extend Rip Hamilton’s deal? So confusing. I remain confused.

First, what are the other options?

Second, we extended Rip because he’s a championship-caliber shooting guard.

Pretty simple, I think. But given the source, not entirely surprising that he’s confused, I guess.

@ brgulker: agreed. what were they. Miami aint’ giving up Beasely and who on that team would that have traded for? Marion? they were already light in the front court.

Atlanta: Acie Law ( I think) and had Bibby.

Houston? Aren’t taking that salary on when they traded alston to get Brooks more playing time. Artest?

Portland: ?? the aforementioned Batum/Outlaw don’t match.

Clev: Wally? They turned down a trade for Shaq because Suns wanted Wally’s expiring deal.

What a fucking moron.

We’ve been over and over the arguments – they could have traded Sheed, or really anyone other than their most talented and important player, whose contract was still a relative bargain given his crucial importance. Dumars made the move due to two gross miscalculations: (1) he thought that Iverson was much better than he was, and (2) he thought that Stuckey was much better than he is. Miscalculation (2) is still alive and well. Oh well; the trade happened; it was a mistake; now we have to live with it. Hence this thread and all this speculation, which is fun to read.

I’m totally with you, brgulker, on extending Rip. That was a great move. Though the greatness of the move will evaporate instantaneously if Gordon is signed, because what the hell are you doing by extending Rip and then signing Gordon?

For instance, if Boozer was our target all along, could we not have traded Sheed for Boozer straight-up last year? Utah would have had an expiring deal and the cap space to sign the guy they prefer, Millsap. Detroit could have had the low-post scorer and defensive vacuum that Dumars seems to want. Then we’d have turned Ra into Boozer instead of turning Chauncey and Ra into Boozer, which seems to be what’s about to happen.

@Bill:

That’s why I don’t think we’re signing Gordon… unless there’s a sign and trade in the works or a trade for Rip that we don’t know anything about.

I agree with the first two miscalculations. CB was undervalued; AI was overvalued; Stuck was overvalued (or at least valued too highly prematurely).

But who else would we have traded? Sheed’s expiring deal for whom? What contract could we have absorbed? Who would have been willing to give us an asset for Sheed?

I have to think Joe D shopped his options.

And at the risk of re-treading covered ground: we would have only had an outside shot at being contenders if the trade had not been made. Sheed is old, and he played like it. Max and Amir under-produced all season. And on and on.

Having CB here would’nt have changed any of that; we still would have been bounced out of the playoffs by Cleveland or a healthy Boston, and arguably even Atlanta or a red-hot Dwayne Wade led heat team.

We had to trade somebody. So we traded our best player. Yeah, it’s counter-intuitive, but AFAIK, there weren’t a whole lot of other trades to be made. And we had to trade somebody — at least if we ever wanted to be a contender again.

The streak’s over. That sucks. The gang is dismantled. That sucks. But in 2-3 years, I think we’ll be rejoicing in a new gang of successful players and watching Detroit basketball in May and possibly June.

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@MB What a fucking moron.

I don’t think you’re talking about me… just making sure. I think you’re talking about the author of the article.

For instance, if Boozer was our target all along, could we not have traded Sheed for Boozer straight-up last year? Utah would have had an expiring deal and the cap space to sign the guy they prefer, Millsap. Detroit could have had the low-post scorer and defensive vacuum that Dumars seems to want. Then we’d have turned Ra into Boozer instead of turning Chauncey and Ra into Boozer, which seems to be what’s about to happen.

Either I missed something, or you’re privy to something I don’t know about.

When was there any legit indication that we could have traded Boozer straight-up for Sheed? And when has Utah said they prefer Milsap?

A fading Iverson? Did he average 26 points in the 07/08 season?

I loved Chauncey, but he is over-rated as a player. He has never shot a high percentage, never averaged many assists, slowly turning into an over-rated defender. The list can just keep going. He was a smart player, helped lead this team to a Championship, and just had the personality we all loved. That doesn’t excuse his lousy performances in the playoffs for us. It doesn’t change the fact that Boobie Gibson lit him up in the playoffs, or let Rondo drive right past him.

I’m not trying to bash Chauncey, but we all know the trade had to be made. He really stepped his game up after the trade, and people finally started to notice him again.

brgulker, I really, truly hope you’re right – and I appreciate your optimism, because I badly need a dose of that. I just still am not feeling at all confident in the person steering the ship right now. All the talk in the media is pointing toward the worst-case scenario, a Boozer-Gordon trainwreck where Rip or Tay is given away for cents on the dollar. I want to see evidence that there is an actual strategy, or, failing that, a set of sharp instincts that will be able to respond effectively to opportunities that appear.

Again, though, thanks for the optimism – really.

MarkButter in SoCal

Are you talking about the

Tayshaun Prince
15 Overall

for

Outlaw
Batum

That trade would work. Salaries wouldn’t match, but it would work.

Blazers are roughly 7-10 million under the cap. Outlaw (4 million dollar contract), and Batum (slightly over one million) would give us an extra five million in cap-space. There General Manager has stated they might be willing to do a lopsided trade (salary-wise).

It would be a good start to rebuilding. Batum is a young version of Prince. Portland gets an experienced SF.

We don’t know exactly what talks Joe D had with other teams this past summer, but we do know he tried to trade CB and Prince for Melo and Denver declined. Trading any one of our other core guys (Sheed, Rip, Tay) for another player of relatively equal value would not have made us a championship caliber team and we’d have no cap space this summer (or the next year 2 years). IMO, once Joe D realized he couldn’t get a young stud like Melo he thought the AI trade was the best option to reload.

The only other way we could have created the cap space we have this summer is if we traded some combination of players for Marbury. In hindsight a trade of Rip/Dyess/Samb for Marbury would put us in better position now, but could you imagine the reaction from Pistons fans if that trade happened at the beginning of the year? At least in theory there was hope that AI could bring a different dimension to this team and potentially make us better. Obviously it didn’t work, but there was a decent percentage of people here (I’m guilty) who thought it could make us a better playoff team at the time.

I don’t think theres any chance Utah would have traded Boozer for Sheed. The trade couldn’t have taken place before the season started b/c Utah was coming off a conference finals appearance and thought they had a legit shot to compete in the West. Also, I can’t see Sloan signing off on a trade for Sheed, especially when it makes them a worse team on the floor.

Utah’s president told the media last week that he is committed to keeping Millsap (he said he would pay whatever it took, even going into luxury-tax territory, which he probably meant only as a bluff to scare off other teams from signing Millsap to offer sheets, but still) and that, while he also would like to retain Boozer, he has questions about his defense and ability to lead a team. That kind of public bad-mouthing of a player who’s still on the roster is extremely rare, and to me indicates that the Jazz want Boozer to get the hell out of Utah.

It’s true that Millsap didn’t truly emerge as a viable replacement for Boozer until this past season when Boozer suffered his annual injury and Millsap posted impressive performances in Boozer’s absence. So maybe Utah wasn’t totally set on getting rid of Boozer at the beginning of this past season; maybe that attitude only took hold later. But Utah CERTAINLY was looking for ways out of Boozer’s deal by the trade deadline, by which point Jazz management had committed to keeping Millsap and knew that Millsap’s market value had risen to the point where they would probably need to clear cap space to keep him.

Dumars knew when he made the Chauncey-Iverson trade who the big free agents would be this offseason. He had to have one or two of them in mind as targets. Target #1 appears to have been Boozer. Why, then, didn’t Dumars wait on making a trade for the first couple of months of the season, giving the existing roster a chance to demonstrate whether it had one more run in it (and giving Chauncey, the real team leader and Curry’s closest friend on the Pistons, a chance to help the overmatched coach learn how to do his job), then play his hand later in the season, when, as it turns out, he could have had Boozer for less than he effectively paid for him?

If Dumars had been more patient he could have had his man without sacrificing the most indispensable cog in the team. It just seems like he didn’t think all that much about this trade versus the alternatives… Maybe he was genuinely scared into it by the threat that the Nuggets would go for Tinsley instead. If so, he got played.

I meant, “…for less than he effectively WILL pay for him.” I.e., he could have had Boozer for Rasheed alone rather than for Rasheed and Chauncey both – and he could have kept McDyess locked up in a contract for next year too, since (IIRC) before the trade Dyess was not set to expire at the end of this year. Sorry about that.

Can’t wait for Stuckey to make Simmons eat his words? Who is this clown anyway? Has he even played basketball before? Even on a playground?

@Mark:
That trade would work.

As I said above:
1) Get a powerhouse, post-dominant 4.
2) Sign/trade for a tough, defensive minded body at the 5
3) Upgrade the 3.

Why would you start at option three? Makes no sense to start by moving Tay just for an equivalent at best SF when we’ve got bigger fish to fry. Makes as much sense as it does talking about trying to get Gordon. We need a scoring big, we need a scoring big, we need a scoring big.

@QD:
Can’t wait for Stuckey to make Simmons eat his words?

Cosign cosign cosign. I would have loved to have heard Simmons’ thoughts on Billups after 1.5 seasons.

@ Mark: No the proposal by sports guy for Billups to Port.

FYI: Boozer was hurt at the deadline and didn’t know when he was coming back.

Utah wants Boozer out, hence the comment.

Mike Payne:

I think I got a offseason you might like.

Tayshaun Prince
15# Overall
for

Outlaw
Batum

Saves us additional 5 million. Salary Cap goes from 17 to 22.

Trade #2
Kwame Brown
for
Tyson Chandler

Saves the Hornets around 6 million this offseason, and ten after next season (Kwame is a expiring contract)

We are now at 16 Million. Only 1 million less than our original 17 million.

Sign Carlos Boozer. 11-14 Million (One reason, I’m iffy about signing him).

Sign a back-up center, and perhaps a back-up point guard. Or draft one with our leftover draft picks.

09/10 Lineup:

Rodney Stuckey/Will Bynum/Free Agent
Richard Hamilton/Arron Afflalo
Nicolas Batum/Travis Outlaw
Carlos Boozer/Jason Maxiell/Amir Johnson
Tyson Chandler/Free Agent

Outlaw provides scoring off the bench, we get a big-man in the low-post, and a defensive big that can rebound. I believe Outlaw and Batum are capable of hitting the three.

Simmons hates Detroit sports teams. Always has. That’s my one major beef with him. Otherwise, he’s generally smart, witty, and very funny in his writing. But he absolutely SHITS on Detroit sports. That and the fact that Larry Legend’s dick is perpetually in his mouth. I still like the guy and his writing though. His podcast, the BS Report, is consistently fantastic.

. Mike, I know how much you like Amir, but really? Still bulking up? Covered guys who weigh 240-245 >>

I know what I saw watching the Pistons games this last season and the year before 82games.com confirms my observations

Johnson’s stats show him in a favorable light. For example the last two years he has averaged about 850 minutes a season. If you look at his on court/off court production the last 2 years you will see. In 2007-08 the net was a +4.8 which was 3rd best on the Pistons. In 2008-09 the net was +5.4 which was the best among all Pistons players.

If you look at his floor time stats in 2007-08 his win percentage was 60.0% and in 2008-09 his win percentage was 54.2%. Finally in 2008-09 his defensive stats show that when he was on the court opponents averaged 98.4 points per 100 possessions as opposed to 105.2 points per 100 possessions when he was not on the court. Opponents FG percentage was 42.3% when he was on court vs 48.1% when he was off court

In 2008-09 he also shot 60% from the field and 45% from outside of the protected area. The 60% was best on the team and the 45% was second only to Dyess 47%

http://82games.com/

Of course as Langlois would say. Curry doesn’t like Johnson and stats don’t mean squat. Those numbers are just a coincidence

Trade Johnson now

Why, then, didn’t Dumars wait on making a trade for the first couple of months of the season, giving the existing roster a chance to demonstrate whether it had one more run in it<<

Because Billups was complaining in the media how he hating Curry’s new offensive scheme and off course the Pistons scoring per game for 2008-09 proved Billups correct.

Curry is a control freak. He knew that he would have a tough time running the offense from the sidelines with Billups on the team. Gettting Iverson was just a cap space trade, but Dumars was hoping that the rest of the core along with the non-Answer would still be good enough without Billups to contend. Duamrs was wrong.

Mike, I’ve heard the exact opposite. I’ve read that Chauncey was Curry’s biggest supporter in the locker room, and that much of Curry’s authority, such as it was, was an extension of the respect that the other players had for Chauncey. Where have you heard otherwise?

@Mark:
I think I got a offseason you might like.

As I mentioned above— “Oh, and anybody suggests Chandler I’ll shit in a box and mail it to you. First class.”

What’s your address, guy? :)

@Mike:
70.

Lots of new interesting comments here, so here’s my new plan of action:

1) Trade Tay + Bynum + Amir + 15th pick + Future first rounder to Portland for Travis Outlaw and LaMarcus Aldridge.

2) Draft 3 second round PGs, let them battle for 1 spot

3) Sign Gortat

4) Sign Milsap

6) Sign Ariza

7) Sign Shannon Brown

Depth Chart looks like this:

Stuckey/Shannon Brown/2nd round pick
Rip/Afflalo
Outlaw/Ariza/Sleepy
Aldridge/Milsap/Maxiell
Kwame/Gortat/one empty spot is always good

1) Get a powerhouse, post-dominant 4.
2) Sign/trade for a tough, defensive minded body at the 5
3) Upgrade the 3.

This really doesn’t seem to be a particularly challenging to-do list. Seems pretty obvious and I doubt anyone out there disagrees to strongly about all of these belonging on it. I really really really hope Joe doesn’t try to get too cute with it.

For step one I’d like to see Elton Brand (although I’d settle for Brand), for step two I’d want Darko (kidding! Gortat or Robin Lopez), and for step three I’d want us to use the draft (my vote is for Dajuan Summers, but there’s plenty of options there – Clark, T-Will, Young, Daye, an overseas kid, etc, etc).

@shinons:
Totally. I just don’t see how you take any OTHER plan of action. I’m worried about Brand, I think his injuries aren’t going anywhere, but otherwise I’m with you 100%.

@roll the dyess:
aldrige AND millsap?
outlaw AND ariza?

not to mention that your trade is predicated upon Portland moving Aldrige, which next to Roy I imagine is their only untouchable.

I’m good with moving Amir for more cap. After that, sign Boozer (no more than $13M). See if we can grab Gortat for less than $7. Then extend Bynum and see what’s poppin’ for Tay come trade deadline (but no fire sale).

Man, you guys don’t know nothin’ about rebuilding a team. OK, listen up & I’ll show you how it’s done. First, we re-sign ‘Sheed to a four year, $40 mil contract. Next we work out a three way deal with Orlando and Dallas. We send ’Sheed to Orlando for JJ Redick and half of Stan Van Gundy’s moustache. Orlando sends Courtney Lee and the other half of Van Gundy’s mustache to Dallas, and Dallas gives us Stackhouse and $75. Then we use part of our cap space to coax Keith Van Horn and Latrell Sprewell out of retirement. Now – and this is the tricky part – we buy out Rip and Tay and let them sign with contenders in the East. We keep Kwame, but trade everyone else on the roster for second round draft picks. We use the picks to sign the skinniest, most undersized players we can find – preferably all shooting guards. Then – and this is where you see my brilliance – we use the rest of the cap space to re-sign AI, but, we play him as the ONLY player off the bench when he plays. I haven’t really crunched all the numbers, but I’m pretty sure we’ll still be able to sign Curry to a 10 year guaranteed contract extension, thus cementing the dynasty into history. There, now that you’ve all seen the light, you can stop arguing.

Some interesting numbers from the combine

Comparing Griffin, Mullens, Hill and Harangody

Max Verticle Reach 11’9", 11’11", 11’11",11’5"
Bench 22, 10, 11, 23
Agility (Lower the better) 11,10, 10.95, 12.23, 11.15
Sprint (Lower the better) 3.28, 3.45, 3.30, 3.33
Body Fat Percentage 8.2, 8.5, 6.0, 11.2

Looks like Harangody has the most body fat, the shortest reach but is the strongest. But he matches up okay in Agility and Speed.

He is 6’8" with shoes and 6’6 1/4" without. Therein lies his problem and why if he enters the draft he will most likely fall into the late first round or even second round.

I don’t think he would enter the draft if indications were that he would go in the second round.

Harangody has not yet made a decision

An couple of inteesting side notes. No test numbers for Thabeet and Daye had a big blank under “Bench”. I wonder if he even tried it.

http://www.draftexpress.com/nba-pre-draft-measurements/?year=2009&sort2=DESC&draft=&pos=&sort=6

Harangody weighs draft options

Story Created: Jun 3, 2009 at 6:06 PM EDT

Story Updated: Jun 3, 2009 at 6:06 PM EDT

NOTRE DAME – Notre Dame power forward Luke Harangody is facing perhaps the biggest decision of his career: Stay in the NBA Draft, or come back to Notre Dame for what could be a special senior year.
Related Content

After three stellar college seasons, Harangody figured he owed it to himself to test the NBA waters.

"I think for the past couple of weeks, I’ve felt this way, "Harangody said on April 16. "Sitting down and talking to coach, and him basically telling me I owe this to myself, I think that gave me the confidence to go ahead and make this decision. Obviously sitting down and talking with my family also had a large deal with it too."

rest of story on link

If he enters the draft he should be availabe at #15 and even maybe into the second round.

http://www.wsbt.com/sports/46848737.html

Mike, I read somewhere that Austin Daye couldn’t lift the weights once, so I guess that means he got a 0.

Austin Daye was the slowest guy there. I defiantely dont want him now

Slowest and weakest.

This is far back in the thread, but Bill Higgins pointed out earlier:

“Utah’s president told the media last week that he is committed to keeping Millsap (he said he would pay whatever it took, even going into luxury-tax territory, which he probably meant only as a bluff to scare off other teams from signing Millsap to offer sheets, but still) and that, while he also would like to retain Boozer, he has questions about his defense and ability to lead a team. That kind of public bad-mouthing of a player who’s still on the roster is extremely rare, and to me indicates that the Jazz want Boozer to get the hell out of Utah.”

Yeah man. Not just wanting to excommunicate the Booze from Utah, but I think to sabotage the dude on the open market, saying that about your own dude on roster, is to me, not only revealing your disdain for the guy, but trying to cut a good chunk off his earning potential with his next team.

(Stephen A. Smiff voice) Howeva, Booze has not been classy this year with the things he’s said about potential trades, and look at the screwjob in Cleveland. I got a goddamn laundry list of doubts about him.

Yeah. I get the idea that the Jazz are tired of the Boozer show. It’s the same stuff every year. Back in ‘04-’05, his first season with the Jazz, Boozer looked great, putting up 17 and 9 per game. Then he had his first of many season-ending injuries as a Jazz player, and after the Jazz failed to make the playoffs he was publicly criticized for lack of effort by Larry Miller, the owner.

I don’t know the details of that injury, but I’m guessing that Larry Miller heard extensive reports from his team doctors about its true nature and severity. And, if the situation was bad enough that Miller felt compelled to criticize his franchise player publicly — well, I tend to conclude that Boozer was being a baby.

Professional athletes are paid to play through discomfort. Look at Tayshaun, who was obviously injured at the end of last season but who never said a word about it — the coaches had to tell the media that they knew he was hurting. Tay’s game isn’t perfect, but the man has the heart of a lion. Something tells me that Boozer in an identical situation wouldn’t have suited up.

And something tells me that the Carlos Boozer, Piston era will be an excruciatingly frustrating one for Pistons fans.

When do we find out if Boozer is going to opt out? What is the final day to do so.

I would love to see a list of the NBA’s highest salaries per games available over the last five seasons. Take players’ salaries over a given period of time then divide them by the number of games in that span for which they actually suited up. I bet Boozer is among the highest-priced players in the league by this metric. He may be the absolute highest.

Grant Hill is the all-time king of this category; his salary-per-game-available ratio for a few years was infinity.

I think this Booze bashing is excessive, although understandable. But it shows a stark difference between Brand and Boozer. Brand’s injuries have always been very real, one of the hazards of playing sports for a living, whereas Boozer certainly could have played through some of his. Both are red flags, both are a gamble, but both are the 20-10 dominant low post player that we need.

I understand the reservations, but we need a bona fide big man, not just a “maybe they’ll take the next step” like Millsap or Lee. If there are any realistic options other than Brand or Boozer, feel free to toss them out.

My wife’s mad at me and I’m bored just drinking beer while watching the Sox, so I was looking through random guys on Draft Express. What do you guys think of this guy?

A 19 year old Serbian big man who is the exact opposite of Darko – fat and unathletic, but productive, tough, and smart. Kind of a cross between Glen Davis and Garbajosa.

HTML tag test!

Success.

I think we’re all ignoring the REAL question here: WHAT WILL IVERSON DO THIS OFF SEASON?

(I kid, I kid)

Van Gundy’s mustache, I hear, is untouchable

Onions, I like Elton Brand, but those are long dollars he’s commanding, and I think the Sixers are married to him for a couple more years, and the injuries.

I don’t think he’s an option for the next couple seasons while Phila feels things out with him.

Shinons I like him saw him a couple of weeks ago in the same post while browsing for poss. second round big man picks. I think he’s just what we need can shoot either hand inside or out has size good defender and he’ll slim up once he’s in the NBA ,which should help his lateral quickness I hope we draft him.

I have left this off-season solution on a couple other sites and even had Keith Langlois comment about it in his recent Mailbag.

1) Trade Tay and Maxi for Kaman and Thornton
2) Sign Boozer for $12 mil per
3) If they wanted to, trade Kwame for Chandler to use up the rest of our cap and draft a backup SF or use the remaining $5 mil or so on a backup SF – which is what I’d prefer. So…
3a) Sign Ariza for $5 mil per

Our resulting team would look like this:

Stuckey/Bynum/Lawson or Maynor at 15
RIP/Afflalo
Ariza/Thornton
Boozer/Amir
Kaman/Kwame
*plus our 3 second rounders still

Also, there is another exception called the bi-annual exception that a team can use every other year to go over their cap to sign a player to a $1 million dollar contract. I don’t know if we used this last year (I don’t think we did as far as i can remember), but if we didn’t, I would love to use that on Dice to bring him back one more year to give it one last go.

Stuckey/Bynum/Lawson or Maynor
RIP/Afflalo
Ariza/Thornton
Boozer/Dice/Amir
Kaman/Kwame

If someone thinks it would take more money to get Ariza then we could do that trade to OKC and free up more money, but that team looks pretty good to me and I think the Lakers would have no choice but to let Ariza walk because as it sits right now they are going to be over the cap so the most they could offer him would be the MLE. Just a plan of mine but definitely one that i like.

Elton Brand is done. Wrong side of a 30 and coming off two major injuries. He’s largely a McDyess style jump shooter on offense (and not nearly as effective). We need guys who will actually play in the post.

Boozer’s injury issues are overblown. Prior to this season, he missed a grand total of 9 games the previous two years.

And everyone who doesn’t want Boozer: who do you want? Who do you want that’s REALISTICALLY available?

My plan (comes with visual aids):

1. See if Clippers want to dump Kaman because they have Camby for a year and DeAndre Jordan for the future. Give them Amir for Kaman. That allows them to cut 26mil over three years. The Pistons get a legit Center and one of the few NBA players with actual post moves (with both hands).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmkzXWvUkEg

2. Sign Odom for 10mil or less. He likely won’t get a higher offer from anyone else. That should use up the cap.

Stuckey/Bynum
Rip/Afflalo
Tay/(Terence Williams or Dajuan Summers)
Odom/Maxiell
Kaman/Kwame

3. Since, everyone in the starting lineup has offensive skills and is unselfish, run either the “Princeton” or the “Triangle” offense. Both feature movement and spacing that will be difficult to defend because everyone on the court is an offensive weapon. And neither offense requires a true point guard in the Chris Paul sense.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9WZoTYdsQE

Also, since Odom can get up the floor quicker than most power forwards, the team should push the ball up the floor after every defensive rebound to try to get easy shots before setting up the offense.

4. Next off-season, use the full mid-level exemption to sign a former all-star or other quality player to come off the bench and add some punch to the second unit (some players available include Kirilenko, Richard Jefferson, Pryzbilla, Redd, Jason Richardson, Dunleavy, etc.)

My Erdinger Dunkel-Weizen and I agree with Señor Onions that “this Booze bashing is excessive.”

I think the GM/Owner of thd Jazz is not only trying to reduce Boozer’s future contract but he’s also trying to force the guy to opt out. Boozer said the wrong thing mid-season when he was hurt (making it more problematic) that he was opting out. He should have just said the proverbial “I’m working on getting back, the offseason will take care of itself, yada, yada, yada.” Then again, when you think back to Clev, he’s never been a very bright bulb even though he went to Duke.

Alot of good trade ideas above and I think certainly as bad as we feel about CB being traded none of this talk is possible without the trade. And for every trade each of us can come up with, I gotta believe the Det front office has at least two or three variations of it that nobody has thought of.

We all agree we need to focus on the 4 & 5 and if we can get a stud in return or near stud and a second player then unfortunately Rip or Tay are going to be in the mix. Though the draft doesn’t appear as talented as some of those in the past, because of the multitude of players deemed close together and alot of teams not even having a 1st round pick, this will at least be an interesting draft.

I believe July 1 is the day trades can be confirmed and/or offers can be made to FA’s. Anybody got confirmation on this?

@Bill:

Thanks for noting that quote from Utah front office. I didn’t know about that… not sure if I have strong feelings about Boozer as a result, though. I still think we have one of the best trainers in the biz, so I’m not worried about fragility… attitude? I’m not sure. Could be a lot going on behind the scenes we don’t know about.

@QD
3. Since, everyone in the starting lineup has offensive skills and is unselfish, run either the "Princeton" or the "Triangle" offense. Both feature movement and spacing that will be difficult to defend because everyone on the court is an offensive weapon. And neither offense requires a true point guard in the Chris Paul sense.

I just about shot coffee out of my nose when I read this — not because it’s a bad idea, because it’s a good idea. I’ve been saying we need ball and player movement for far too long…

But did you have a quick case of amnesia and forget who our coach is?

@Kronikjose:

Dice ain’t comin’ back, I don’t think. He all but said that after the playoffs were over… first time he’s ever spoken negatively about this franchise or his teammates — for a guy like Dice to do that, well, I think that’s saying something. Frankly, we should all be fine with that; he deserves a chance to compete.

Further, I don’t think we can get Boozer for 12 mil, and I don’t think we can get Ariza for 5 mil. I’d like to be wrong, but I’m very skeptical of that.

@ brgulker: I agree, I don’t think boozer @ 12 & Ariza @ 5 will work. the only way is to extend the contract (ugh). I think boozer would do 65M/5yrs. I don’t think he’s going to get more years or money. . unless somebody is just absolutely whacked.

As for Ariza, there will be some teams outs there looking for him. He is originally from the LA area and played a year at UCLA. I think for him, the Lakers are the first team (after the Knicks & Orlando) who have actually wanted him to shoot. And let’s face it, and I can’t even dream something like this, but hanging in LA with Kobe, Pau, Bynum and the WEATHER vs Det, Dave Bing and GM (since ObamMan said they can’t move to Warren) seems to me an easy choice. Plus he’s only coming if Tay isn’t here. He’s got a starters gig in LA.

I think we should bring in someone good at slam dunk shots.

The weather is awesomer here right now, Mark. it’s been Late 60’s to 70’s here for a week, and the air smells sweet, the sky’s blue. LA ain’t got none of those things. But I’d trade what you got come January.

I don’t know what GM or Obama have to do with anything though.

I know Dice will MOST LIKELY leave for a contender in search of that elusive ring, but maybe, just maybe, if we make all the other moves first and he sees that we could contend he just might be content in staying in Detroit for 2 more years then retiring. However, if he leaves I can’t fault him because he gave us everything he had right down to the last game. He should have gotten his ring with us in ’05 (fucking Robert Horry).

As for Boozer, I think we can definitely get him for $12 mil per. If we have to pay him more than that I don’t want him. I have maintained all along that I am willing to give Boozer good money, just not MAX money.

As for Ariza, the $5 mil per is wishful thinking. The lakers are going to be over the cap and everyone KNOWS that they want to try and keep Ariza. However, the Lakers will only be able to offer him the MLE unless Kobe opts out to restructure his contract (which is highly unlikely). So in all honesty, I think we would have to offer him more than the MLE, which is set to be between $5-$6 mil, so if we offered him $7 mil per he might be enticed to leave.

Boozer is only making $12 mil per right now and the only reason he is opting out is to get long-term security. NO TEAM IN THE NBA WOULD OFFER HIM MORE THAN THAT. I think 5 years/$60 mil is more than fair, with the 5th year being a TEAM option. I mean, the guy has had injuries so he has to know that he won’t get a max contract anywhere and if that’s what he’s looking for, then if i were him i wouldn’t hold my breath. Besides, that peter vecsey report said that he has been telling his friends that he would either be here or in NJ and NJ would have to pull off some major deals if they want to get him. So that basically puts DETROIT in control because he knows that we are one of the few teams that can actually pay him and might actually want him. This would give Joe D the power to lowball a little bit. Hell, we might be able to get him for 5 years/%50 mil. Probably not likely but you never know.

@ Skylar: ObamMan said he wasn’t interested in running GM and then made a call to Dave Bing saying he wouldn’t allow GM to move their HQ to Warren, even though the office space is cheaper and GM would like to do it. (i.e., iconic symbolism)

Glad to hear about the weather, having spent my first 20 years in Gr Rapids I know this is a treat (lol). . . Forgot to mention when comparing Det / LA – Van Halen California Girls (Yeah !! Baby) and the jail tour to see Phil Spector !!

@ Kron-J: Yeah, but at 7M per he’s still not coming here if Tay is here. He’s got a starting gig in LA which is what he’s wanted for a long time.

As for Boozer, it seems the concensus is he’ll take a max from Memphis (as an example) before he’ll take less from a contender. I think he’s 27 and he figures 5 years he’ll be 32 and then start hunting for a ring with a contender. Not sure he would do that, just the vibes I have after reading some posts and articles.

But yeah, given the economics of teh NBA right now, he should be thrilled with 12M and like you said Joe should start low, not a final offer out of the gate. NJ would have to do major trades and I think his agent (thru friends) is putting that out there to jack up his price and appear he’s “looking” for a contender. Put Memphis replacing NJ and I think most people say “we’ll see your bluff and call ya.”

So here’s a new scenario:

1)Trade Amir and our first round pick to OKC for their late first round pick (I think it is 25) – saves us about $5 mil in cap space.

2)Trade Tay and Maxi to the Clippers for Kaman and Thornton – the salaries are a squash so there’s no hit to the cap and the clippers get a premier SF and free up room in their frontcourt for Griffin. We get a legit 7 footer and a nice young SF with room to improve.

3)Sign Boozer to $12 mil per

4)Sign Ariza for $7 mil per

So our final team would look like this:

Stuckey/Bynum
RIP/Afflalo
Ariza/Thornton
Boozer
Kaman/Brown

We would still have 4 draft picks as well as $3 mil in cap space to work with to fill out the rest of the roster. I really hope the Blazers let Channing Frye go because I would love to see us get him as our prime backup to Boozer. He only makes $3 mil a year anyways so we might be able to get him for our remaining $3 mil in cap space.

Brown exercises 09-10 option

http://basketball.realgm.com/src_wiretap_archives/59577/20090603/brown_exercises_09_10_option_to_stay_with_hornets/

to stay with Hornets. Sorry I couldn’t resist

Besides it gives me an exuse to post my new theme
-—————————
Play him or trade him.

We’re not going to get Ariza. He isn’t going to leave a contender, in LA, with a starting position. Just ain’t happening.

@ Mark: Agree 100%. We need to end the Ariza talk. The only way that happens is if we overpay, however LA can go over the cap to sign their own FAs.

In terms of bigmen, anybody got anything on last year’s 2nd round pick, Trent Plastaid (sp) originally out of BYU? If memory werves me, he was 6’10"-ish.

Even with no Ariza, I’m happy with Thornton, if the scenario i mentioned worked out. He is a second year player that averaged over 16 pts a game. Not a bad start I would say. Plus that would leave us with $10 mil in cap space to fill whatever remaining position(s) we still needed to be filled.

LA can only go over the cap by using their MLE, so they can only offer him around $5 or $6 mil. If we did trade Prince then he would have a starters gig here as well. But OK, i guess i will drop it.

As for Plaisted, he spent most of last season injured, so he will be playing overseas again this year trying to refine the skills he should have been refining last year. Pretty much NO CHANCE of seeing him in a pistons uni this year.

“As for Boozer, it seems the concensus is he’ll take a max from Memphis (as an example) before he’ll take less from a contender.”

Memphis won’t go after him. Neither will Oklahoma City. I have a feeling that Detroit will be bidding against itself. Dumars should offer Boozer a dollar less than what he’s paying Rip. That way Rip is the team leader and can lord that dollar over Boozer whenever he needs to.

“In terms of bigmen, anybody got anything on last year’s 2nd round pick, Trent Plastaid (sp) originally out of BYU? If memory werves me, he was 6′10″-ish.”

I like Plaisted. I watched him play in the Summer League. He’s really athletic. He needs to put on a little muscle but he’s not skinny. He was supposed to play in Europe but a back injury derailed that. I think he can develop in a solid backup down the line. He’s probably worth putting on the 15 man roster and sending to the D-League.

Ariza’s not leaving LA. Lakers will let Odom and possibly Shannon Brown go, but not Ariza.

Alright this is the last thing I will say about Ariza. The Lakers really will have no choice in the matter. The most they can even offer him is the Mid-Level Exception. They don’t have bird rights to him so they can’t offer him more than that. So ultimately, it is either up to Kobe to restructure his contract or it is up to Ariza to want to stay there for less money. OK, i’m done talking about it since no one else even thinks of this as being remotely a possibility.

Hey brgulker — in case you want the verbatim quotation about Boozer from Greg Miller, Jazz president, here it is, from ksl.com. This is from a week or two ago:

In his last interview on ‘locker clean out’ day, Boozer put the ball in the Jazz court saying he wanted to be back and viewed himself as a cornerstone of the team. Do you want to spend to keep Carlos? Miller said, “We’d love to have Carlos here. Carlos is a very talented player. I think he would be one who would be considered a marquee player. But I do have concerns about Carlos’ defense and I have some concerns about his ability to lead the team.” KSL

Per some of the exchanges above, I still haven’t heard a good answer to the apparent fact that, had he simply been more patient and not tossed away Chauncey in exchange for Iverson’s corpse, Joe Dumars could have traded Rasheed for Boozer at the deadline this season and saved his roster both its superstar point guard, Chauncey Billups, and its heart and soul, Antonio McDyess.

Can you imagine? I love Rasheed and am not a Boozer fan, but even I would have to admit that that’s a great deal. We could have entered this past postseason with the core of our extremely successful team bolstered by a new post presence.

I wish Dumars had looked before he leaped. The team would be so much better off today if he had made a smart deal.

(And the lesson seems to be once more that cap space is always, always overrated. Can anyone name me even one team that’s won itself a championship through cap space and free agency? Especially a team without attractive geography? When you play for cap space you gamble on a future reliant on dozens of highly uncertain variables. Trades give you known quantities.)

QD: Just used it as an example of him looking for money vs. a ring. And I agree that we are bidding against ourselves. I think the only way he makes it to NJ is thru a VC trade to Utah. That would certainly satisfy their SG problems and it’d be great entertainment watching Sloan watch VC on D.

@ Bill H: The Rasheed/Boozer is interesting. But remember Boozer had knee surgery and didn’t come back until March, mid-March I think. There was a question of whether he’d come back at all this season and one of the items listed and “motivating” his rehab was to put himself in a position for a contract this summer. Plus, with Boozer having an opt-out this summer, I think we’d be over the cap next year if he didn’t opt out as Sheed’s contract expired this year.

@ Bill H: Plus you’d have Sloan with Sheed. Even though it’d probably be a push, Sheed’s expiring vs. boozer having already said he’d opt out, and with Millsap playing the way he did, the only reason UT does this trade is to match up to LA/Den/Duncan. Plus, all of this was before Okur was hurt in the playoffs. So now they would have had Okur & Sheed launching 3’s.

Bill Higgins, in hindsight, Boozer for Sheed might have worked. As MarkButter said, Boozer was hurt at the time. The Pistons would be over the cap so maybe they could throw the MLE at Gortat and end up with Chauncey, Rip, Tay, Boozer and Gortat. Stuckey, Afflalo and Bynum off the bench at the guard position.

Another good way to go would have been to trade Rip instead and have Stuckey at the 2 so you have two ball handlers in the backcourt (with Chauncey’s range to open things up for Stuckey).

Man on a side note – I just got some BOMB ASS DRO (really enjoying my decision there)

OK back to basketball: I can’t believe no one has even mentioned any of the nice, young RFA’s to be had on the market. Milwaukee has Sessions and Villanueva and they can’t keep both of them. Rumor has it they want to keep Sessions so that means Villanueva would be made available. I also heard that Portland might not want to try and resign Channing Frye (at least from what I’ve read on their website and heard from their fans on their forums) so he should be able to be had for cheap. I mean the kid is only 26 and is 6’11" and can play around the basket. Portland seems to have given up on him so I say one team’s junk is another team’s treasure.

@ Kron-J: I like the Channing idea. He’s on the lean side but would be great coming off the bench (assuming boozer is here) if he’s happy with that.

He in Cali – we’ve got perscriptions. Just name your flavor. Midnight Ball. Train Wreck. Blueberry Tickle.

Mark, I think the Pistons could have extended Boozer (giving him a decent raise) without incurring the luxury tax even though they were over the cap, because I believe they would have had his Bird rights. They could then have added Gortat per QD’s suggestion, because as an over-the-cap team they’d have the MLE to give.

QD, remember also that the Pistons would still in this scenario have Antonio McDyess on the roster for 2009-10; Dyess only expired this year because he was traded and bought out and re-signed at the vets’ minimum after the Chauncey trade. So your roster would be Chauncey, Rip, Tay, Boozer, Dyess, and possibly Gortat, with Stuckey and all the rest off the bench.

Boozer was hurt at the trade deadline, that’s true, but if I remember right Langlois was dangling Boozer as a possible Pistons acquisition on his blog even before Boozer had returned from his injury and shown that he was not permanently damaged. So the dude seems to have been on the Pistons’ radar at that point regardless; and if you’re Dumars at the trade deadline and you’d still like to make some kind of change this year, and you know you won’t have Rasheed back anyway next season, you might figure that you’ll take a spin with Boozer, knowing that, worst case — i.e., if Boozer’s badly hurt and can’t really play anymore and therefore doesn’t opt out — you have a decent-sized deal set to expire in 2010, when all the good free agents are available anyway.

Indeed, because Boozer was hurt and his recovery was not certain at that time, you might even have been able to get away with throwing a couple of worse players than Sheed to Utah in exchange for Boozer. Maybe some package involving Kwame and Amir, both of whom have short-term contracts and both of whom are not terrible.

It just seems like a far superior scenario any way you look at it.

I’m telling you, trades and the draft! That’s how teams win championships. Cap space and free agency should be used in moderation.

@KRONIKjose:
puff puff give, money.

Per some of the exchanges above, I still haven’t heard a good answer to the apparent fact that, had he simply been more patient and not tossed away Chauncey in exchange for Iverson’s corpse, Joe Dumars could have traded Rasheed for Boozer at the deadline this season and saved his roster both its superstar point guard, Chauncey Billups, and its heart and soul, Antonio McDyess.

@ Bill, I don’t mean to be antagonistic, but as far as I can tell, your question is based completely on a hypothetical scenario.

I have yet to read, hear, or see anything that indicates that Sheed for Boozer was ever seriously discussed. And even if it were, if Utah didn’t want to make the trade, then it doesn’t matter how much discussion there was.

No offense intended at all, really, but it just seems very naive.

What does Utah gain by trading Boozer for Sheed? Sheed’s expiring. Boozer’s opting out. Either scenario is free cap space, and Boozer is the better player (I think).

Your question was why no one had given you a good reason why the trade wouldn’t have worked out. I’ve just given at least three.

1) No indication (of which I’m aware) that such a trade was discussed.
2) Even if it were discussed, and Joe D wanted it, Utah would have had to have been willing.
3) I don’t see a compelling reason why Utah would be motivated to make such a trade.

Milwaukee has Sessions and Villanueva and they can’t keep both of them.

@Kronik: I mentioned CV31. I like him; I think he’d be a good pick up, but not a great pick up.

Hey Brgulker,

I was a little unclear. Sorry about that. I’m not saying a trade for Boozer was ever discussed at the beginning of the year. I’m saying rather that when Dumars made the Iverson trade, if all along it was about freeing cap space for this offseason (as he insists now that it was), then he must have had in his head when he made the trade a target free agent or two to pursue with the freed-up cap space. It would be idiotic to make the trade without that kind of plan for after the season. The evidence we have right now points to Boozer being the first guy Dumars had in mind.

I believe Utah would have gained tremendously by getting rid of Boozer at the trade deadline. At the deadline, when Boozer was hurt and his return was uncertain, Utah found itself at risk of having Boozer decline to opt out this offseason. Had that happened, Utah would very likely have lost to free agency Paul Millsap, whom they much prefer to Boozer. By getting rid of Boozer for a sure-thing expiring deal Utah would have earned itself peace of mind, knowing it could keep Millsap without any doubt. (Besides, Utah seems to want a divorce from Boozer even beyond the fact that his presence hurts their chances of keeping Millsap.)

Is that clearer? Sorry not to include it all in the first post.

@ Bill H: I don’t think you can pick up a player’s bird rights that way. I think they actually have to be with you longer or it’s part of being a contract you extended. I’m not sure on this though.

And for sake of arguement, let’s say CB is still here and we’re just behind Clev in the standings. Can you imagine the outcry of trading Sheed for Boozer at that time? For a player who isn’t even playing, not sure if he’ll make it back this year, is most certainly going to opt out for a healthy Sheed? Sheed goes away, boozer doesn’t come back and then opts out and doesn’t resign with Det. In essence, you just waived Sheed mid-season while being in 2nd place behind Clev and probably with a 4-5 seed at worst at the time.

Boozer’s injuries are overblown? True Boozer missed only nine games combined in 07’ and 08’, but he missed 37 games THIS season. In ‘06 he missed 49 gms; 05’ 31gms. This averages out to 56 games played a season since the 2002-03 season. If that’s overblown then Tracy Mcgrady’s yearly injuries are understated. I mean it’s like saying Mcgrady only missed a combined 27 games in 07’ and 08’. Well that also is true but he missed 35 games THIS season.

Since the 1997-98 season T-Mac has played in 784 out of 984 regular season games which averages out to about 65 games per season. I can see why Houston isn’t as high on Mcgrady as they were in the past. That’s too bad because he is one of my favorite players. Both players have been injured more than they have been healthy since their NBA careers began. Boozer would be a heck of an asset for Detroit, if healthy. Does Joe D really want to take a chance on him; ala Elton Brand?

Mark, I don’t think you’re right about the Bird rights thing. At least Wiki disagrees with you:

“…when a player is traded, his Bird rights are traded with him, and his new team can use the Bird exception to re-sign him.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBA_Salary_Cap

But Wiki has been wrong before.

Re: the public outcry, I can see how it would be uncomfortable for Dumars to make that move at the trade deadline, but I don’t think it’s a good reason not to do it. If you’re Dumars your obligation is to improve the team as much as you can, no matter how the fans think about your move in the short run. That’s the reason you’re the GM and not the fans — theoretically you are able to see things that they cannot, and plan for the long term in a way that fans are not inclined to do. You’ve sold “tough” decisions to the fans before (Darko was not universally beloved when drafted, but people came around, before they realized years later that he was never going to be good), and you can tell them again that, while the team is doing fine this season, you don’t think the players in the end will beat Cleveland in the playoffs. You’re making the tough calls for the sake of a brighter future, because you’re the far-sighted GM. (You’ve also built into the scenario the added benefit of seeing this year’s Pistons play for awhile. It is, after all, possible they could have won without a trade! Orlando is in the Finals, which no one expected either. In this world Dumars would get to take the real quality of the old roster into account when he finally make his move, whatever that move turned out to be — and there’s value in that knowledge.)

In the end, waiting would have got Dumars Boozer, the guy he seems to have had in mind when he made the Iverson trade, at a much lower cost then he will wind up going for this offseason.

Counterfactuals are difficult in that when you make them you are privy to all kinds of information that people could not have known at the time decisions were made. I understand and appreciate that. But in this case it seems that simple patience and a willingness to hold out for fair trade value for your players would have done the job. You wouldn’t have needed any special ability to forecast the future.

I’ll go with you on the bird thing. I have no clue.

I don’t think you can sell

“and you can tell them again that, while the team is doing fine this season, you don’t think the players in the end will beat Cleveland in the playoffs.”

Alot of fans are going to have a hard time believing that. But that’s pure conjecture.

As for cheaper, boozer opts out this season whether he’s with us or Utah. He’s got 12.7M coming from us or Utah this year. He opts out whether from us or Utah, it’s still going to be the same amount of cash. And if someone offers him 15M, do we really want to invoke our bird rights at that amount? (though I don’t see anyone able to do that)

That’s not to say I wouldn’t be intrigued by the trade. I just don’t think it ever really materializes, and if it did he’s going to cost us the same amount of money either way next year if we sign/re-sign him this summer.

BH, you still say that “In the end, waiting would have got Dumars Boozer”. Your making a HUGE reach to say that. Also, you’re not acknowledging that there was an enormous amount of pressure on Joe to shake up the roaster well before the billups trade. In hindsight, patience might have been the better road, but you continue to make statements that it would, in fact, have worked out a certain way. Utah was in a dog fight for playoff positioning, and I don’t think at 32-23 they were looking to take on Sheed and his baggage (bad enough with joe covering for that trade, how does utah sell that to their fans??).

@ Bill:

I was a little unclear. Sorry about that. I’m not saying a trade for Boozer was ever discussed at the beginning of the year. I’m saying rather that when Dumars made the Iverson trade, if all along it was about freeing cap space for this offseason (as he insists now that it was), then he must have had in his head when he made the trade a target free agent or two to pursue with the freed-up cap space. It would be idiotic to make the trade without that kind of plan for after the season. The evidence we have right now points to Boozer being the first guy Dumars had in mind.

I think Joe D anticipated a few things. First, that the roster as it was wasn’t good enough; hence, it’s rebuilding time.

Second, given the state of the economy, it was important to free up cap space earlier rather than later — drafting, trading, and signing is how one rebuilds a team. We’re set up very well to do all three. We have four picks. We can absorb contracts that other teams will not be able to afford to keep via trades. For example, we have two expiring big men, Amir and Kwame (assuming option). Both are useful to some degree, their contracts are small, and they are expiring. It is entirely possible that we can cash in on a fire sale. If you wanna learn about all the teams with serious cap concerns, check this out: http://nbaroundtable.wordpress.com/?s=2009+cap+concerns

We are positioned to be one of the only teams in the league with the financial flexibility to take advantage of the shrinking/holding cap. There are bound to be some really, really good deals out there…teams looking to get rid of quality players just to ditch the contract.

Third, I think he realized that there are some very quality FA’s this summer and that a lot of people are going to hold on to their money to spend next summer. Supply and Demand. Boozer knows full well that he can’t wait until 2010 if he wants to get paid. He can’t compete with the rest of the stars looking for deals in 2010. And there aren’t many teams who are going to spend on a guy like Odom, because they’re pinching their pennies for 2010.

So Bill, to your point about Joe D having or not having a plan. We have so many damn options it’s almost ridiculous. There are only 1 or 2 other groups of fans in the entire NBA who could even realistically have the debate that we’ve been having here for a couple weeks now. We are going to be the #1 team in the conversation for any big trades that will happen this summer and at the trade deadline.

And I think that is the plan, and it’s a good one in my view, all things considered. I’m glad Joe hasn’t targeted one specific player. I’m glad he’s playing his cards close to his chest. The FA’s and their agents know Detroit’s financial situation, too; Detroit is their best bet to get paid. If Joe comes out and says, “We want player X,” suddenly all that competition is gone.

Re: the public outcry, I can see how it would be uncomfortable for Dumars to make that move at the trade deadline, but I don’t think it’s a good reason not to do it. If you’re Dumars your obligation is to improve the team as much as you can, no matter how the fans think about your move in the short run. That’s the reason you’re the GM and not the fans — theoretically you are able to see things that they cannot, and plan for the long term in a way that fans are not inclined to do. You’ve sold "tough" decisions to the fans before (Darko was not universally beloved when drafted, but people came around, before they realized years later that he was never going to be good), and you can tell them again that, while the team is doing fine this season, you don’t think the players in the end will beat Cleveland in the playoffs. You’re making the tough calls for the sake of a brighter future, because you’re the far-sighted GM. (You’ve also built into the scenario the added benefit of seeing this year’s Pistons play for awhile. It is, after all, possible they could have won without a trade! Orlando is in the Finals, which no one expected either. In this world Dumars would get to take the real quality of the old roster into account when he finally make his move, whatever that move turned out to be — and there’s value in that knowledge.)

In the end, waiting would have got Dumars Boozer, the guy he seems to have had in mind when he made the Iverson trade, at a much lower cost then he will wind up going for this offseason.

Rip- 11.3m
Dice- 7m
Amir- 3.6m
Kwame- 4m

First problem: As I see it, Amir and Kwame expire next off-season, not this one… assuming Kwame takes his option (which he will; has he already?).

So really, we have Dice, Sheed, and Rip expiring in your scenario.

Which leaves us with Stuck, CB, and Tay as guaranteed players around which to build.

Second problem: Where are we going to get a better 20 point per game SG for the same price as Rip? And if re-signing him in the summer is the best option at SG (assuming no extension), then why not extend him? The only other viable option I see at SG is Ben Gordon, a player that I’m not very fond of and doesn’t mesh well with a Stuck+CB backcourt, at least in my view.

Third problem: If we were to lose Dice, Sheed, and Rip as presented in your scenario, then we have three gaping holes instead of two: SG, PF, C.

Currently, we have gaping holes inside, and the money to fill them. In your scenario I see three, and I don’t see enough money to address all of them.

Fourth: What if we can’t find trade partners for CB and Tay this summer as you proposed? It does take two to tango, after all, and while I think we end up moving Tay or Rip this offseason, there’s no guarantee we will. Just as there’s no guarantee that we would have been able to move CB or Tay, had the trade not happened.

======

I guess my main objection to Gabe and Bill would be that the arguments are based in pure hypotheticals. Hypothetically, we could have moved anyone else, and it would have been better for us, and even if we didn’t move anyone this season, we would have had cap space; but, not nearly as much cap space, and we would have had the exact same problems: giant holes at 4 and 5 …

Frankly, in theory, I would agree with you.

I think CB was undervalued, AI was overvalued, and so was Stuckey (I’m still not sold on the kid). I’d rather have CB+Rip+Stuck, and I wondered why we didn’t move Sheed+another expiring/young player for a quality big instead of CB.

But, we didn’t, and I’m fairly convinced that’s because we couldn’t — I doubt that Joe would have moved CB if he could have moved someone else, especially old, expiring Bigs like Sheed and Dice.

Frankly, in theory, I would agree with you.

Should have said…“I would agree with you on one important point…”

QD,

Odom has Dirk Nowitzki speed, Rodney Stuckey range, Rasheed Wallace height and Mehmet Okur defensive ability…

pass

The thing that’s attractive about Odom to me is that he can play the 3 or 4 comfortably, and he’s going to be relatively cheap.

Let’s say we get a guy like Boozer. And let’s say we end up moving Tay for a guy like Kaman. We could still afford Odom, and he can start at the 3.

I’m not convinced that:

Stuck
Rip
Odom
Boozer
Kaman

is a contender, but I think it’s closer than we were this year, and we still have Amir and Kwame as expiring, affordable contracts to either 1) trade to add another piece or 2) let expire and use the money next summer.

@ brgulker: yeah, that’s an improvement and with Kwame/Amir/15th we could definitely get some return value. And the best part is that Odom doesn’t have to be first or second fiddle because of Boozer and Rip. But at times, we all will want to slit our wrists collectively.

Also says in one of the Bosh articles that the writer said AA isn’t ready for big minutes. Not sure what he means by “big” minutes, but I’d be comfortable with him getting 15-25 minutes a nite depending upon the match ups. Is a starter on a contender right now? No. But we’re not a contender.

I like the possibility of having Bosh instead of Boozer in my above example, because that gives us two good defensive players at 4 and 5. But, I think it’s increasingly unlikely that we’re landing CB4.

I am still intrigued by CV31 as well. If the Bucks keep Sessions, they can’t keep CV, and I think CV is fairly similar to Odom in that he can play both positions (although not as naturally at the 3). Plus, he’s a better defender and a solid rebounder.

CV31 at the 3 is intriguing. But don’t we all get into the “who is going to gurad Bron” thread again? Not possible with one guy, but he’s at least gotta be able to stay in front of him thru half court.

brgulker: Good post, I agree with a lot of what you’re saying, but there’s a couple specific points that I think can be cleared up:

“…we’ve lost Sheed via trade and likely lost Dice because we won’t have enough to money to re-sign him after extending Boozer.”

Without the trade, Dice would have had another year left on his contract, so we wouldn’t have lost him. Also, even without the trade we would have been well under the luxury tax (though not far under the salary cap), so we definitely could have extended Boozer. That’s a big reason why the trade was poorly thought out, as there was a chance that trading Sheed on his own could have brought back roughly equal value to what we got for BOTH Billups and Dice (because they both had years left on their deals, so neither was at their peak trade value).

You’re right that it gets hazy to just hypothetically say everything would have been better without the Billups trade, but I do think there’s a decent chance Bill’s hypothetical Sheed for Boozer trade would have been a possibility and it could have worked well for us, as we would have had Boozer AND still had Billups and Dice.

“As I see it, Amir and Kwame expire next off-season, not this one…”

I should have been clearer, but I was assuming that Rip didn’t opt out of his contract, so he would have been on an expiring deal for next season (2009-2010) along with Amir/Kwame. And Dice had 2 years left on his old contract at the time of the trade, so his would have also expired after next season.

“Where are we going to get a better 20 point per game SG for the same price as Rip?”

We have a guy who can play SG already on the roster who costs a fraction of what Rip will cost over the next few years: Stuckey. IMO, a Billups/Stuckey backcourt would have been very effective as their strengths would seem to complement each other, and Rip on an expiring deal would have been a very valuable trade piece (hypothetically, maybe Utah would have preferred Rip instead of Sheed for Boozer?). Also, I don’t think we necessarily NEED a 20 ppg scorer at SG.

“Currently, we have gaping holes inside, and the money to fill them. In your scenario I see three, and I don’t see enough money to address all of them.”

Ultimately I think it comes down to what holes one thinks are more gaping, and this is obviously subjective, but I just think a core roster of:

Billups/Stuck/Bynum/Rip/Tay/Dice/Amir/Max/Kwame, with Rip/Dice/Amir/Kwame all on expiring contracts is in a better position to greatly improve then this:

Stuck/Bynum/Rip/Tay/Amir/Max/Kwame, with Rip no longer on an expiring contract.

IMO we would have had less holes to fill, and more trade assets to fill them with, but much less money to spend. Currently we have a nice amount of cap space/money to spend, but few trade-able assets. It basically depends which route you think could have improved the team more effectively.

I’d take Marion over CV31 or Odom playing the 3. I think he’d be cheaper, is more of a natural 3, and I trust him more against LBJ.

Although not a natural fit for our style of play (MCurry), I think Marion is a player who has been largely overlooked as a FA for the pistons. Provides versatility (3/4, can handle the ball), solid defender, and can hit the 3. Sounds like exactly the kind of player we could use on the team. Attitude problems aside, he could assume a bigger role here then either pho/mia/tor could offer him, too. Why not?

I agree with Shinons— I’d prefer Marion over Villa, and Odom over Villa as well. There is very little power in CV’s “power forward”, not to mention that he has huge consistency issues. I’m a fan of his, but I just wouldn’t want to see him in a Pistons uniform.

@ Gabe:

That makes much more sense now. I misunderstood your first post and got confused with all the contracts. Makes sense.

Ultimately I think it comes down to what holes one thinks are more gaping, and this is obviously subjective, but I just think a core roster of:

Billups/Stuck/Bynum/Rip/Tay/Dice/Amir/Max/Kwame, with Rip/Dice/Amir/Kwame all on expiring contracts is in a better position to greatly improve then this:

Stuck/Bynum/Rip/Tay/Amir/Max/Kwame, with Rip no longer on an expiring contract.

What’s the hypothetical cap space between the two? What about extending MFWB (which I think we have to at this point; he’s terrific)?

And what about the idea that the CB that Denver has isn’t the CB that we had? I personally think the trade reinvigorated his career. I could be wrong, but that’s my impression.

======

@MBinSoCo:

CV31 at the 3 is intriguing. But don’t we all get into the "who is going to gurad Bron" thread again? Not possible with one guy, but he’s at least gotta be able to stay in front of him thru half court.

Iguodala? Pietrus? Prince? Pierce?

I hear what you’re saying, but I think the best way to guard Lebron (and the Cavs in general) is to sag off LBJ, crowd the rest of their shooters, and have an intimidator in the paint. If we get a dominant interior defense, I’m not worried nearly as much about the SF position…

I agree with Shinons– I’d prefer Marion over Villa, and Odom over Villa as well. There is very little power in CV’s "power forward", not to mention that he has huge consistency issues. I’m a fan of his, but I just wouldn’t want to see him in a Pistons uniform.

Is it an either/or?

@brgulker:
Is it an either/or?

Not sure to what you’re referring.

@ brgulker: Agreed. No one person will stop Kobe/Bron/Dwight.

I was looking at Howard’s line last nite: Do shot attempts while getting fouled still count as shot attempts? Only 6 shots? So I’m thinking no since he shot 10+ FTs.

I was trying to cleverly ask if we can sign more than one of those options.

Wow, this thread is like a broken record. Every other post is saying how Joe D made a horrible trade and WHY it was so horrible. We are all just fans people, not GM’s. I think brgulker had it right, if Joe D could have gotten us a better deal just by SIMPLY trading away Rasheed wallace and a couple other expiring bigs don’t you think he would have done that? especially with the way Sheed has been playing the last couple years (doing more harm than good). What has Joe D done so horrible to make you guys question him besides maybe have a couple bad draft picks? From what I can remember he has had NOTHING but good trades (i guess until up to this point). All people are doing is merely speculating on what they thought COULD HAVE happened. I don’t think any of us were on the phones making calls to prospective trade partners (and if some of us were then i apologize). I mean, you talk about chauncey not being traded at his peak value, how do you figure? Because he wasn’t an expiring contract? That’s ridiculous. He was traded at his peak because he wasn’t going to get any better playing for us. So we traded him while he was still considered an asset to another team (the takes 2 to tango thing). Sure we could have waited for his “peak value” like you call it, but if chauncey would have kept going the way he was by the time it would have come down to trading him he would have only been a 15 and 5 guy at best because his legs would have been so worn down (he was slowly declining over the years). Who wants to trade for that? Let alone trade us something good like a $20 mil expiring contract? I am not trying to bash Chauncey, he was my favorite player and i was sad to see him go, but this is a BUSINESS! Changes had to be made and Chauncey was easiest to move because we already had another good, young PG in Stuckey just waiting in the wings. And Stuckey is just that…a POINT GUARD. Not a shooting guard. He is a PG that can create for himself and others as well as shoot the ball, which is why Joe D said he wants to play him off the ball, because he can offer us MORE than just being a PG. He can be more than just a pg. The emergence of Will Bynum helped Joe into saying he would like to play stuckey off the ball because he can have 2 penetrators on the floor at the same time, not stuckey’s bad play (as some people seem to assume). Can you imagine practically being a rookie (he didn’t even play half of his first season) and taking the reins of a veteran team that has been together for 5+ years? Of course you are going to defer a little bit and be slightly passive because you want to make sure all of the veteran stars are happy. Stuckey is our PG of the future so everyone will just have to get used to it. I can’t believe that with all of the seemingly knowledgeable people that are on this website that it seems like I am one of only a few people that think Joe D made the right move and that Stuckey is indeed a PG (our PG). I am going to stop now because now I feel like a broken record sitting here trying to defend Joe with almost every damn post I write.

Thank you Kronikjose . I agree 100 percent Joe made the not only the right move but the only move he could . as for Stuckey i think your right on there to no point guards does well there first yr. with a few rare exceptions Stuck’s development is right on track as far as i’m concerned .Now we just need to surround him with some young guys 27 or less and let him and the rest of the young guys were keeping develope .

Yeah, I’m not sure why everyone is so down on Stuckey. It’s gotten to the point where some don’t even think he’ll be a good player as if he’s already a finished product.

Personally, I see greatness in this kid. Both athletically and in his demeanor. He had his struggles, but that’s to be expected. He lost all three of his point guard mentors (Chauncey, Lindsey, and Porter).

That being said, it’s essential that they bring in a former point guard or veteran point guard to mentor him and Bynum.

I would not mind bringing in a veteran PG, but i think it’s more likely that they will just draft another young PG in the draft.

But, I’d still like someone like Terry Porter on the bench to mentor the young PGs.

I noticed the public opinion on Stuckey going against him as of late as well, I think people are pissy that 1. Chauncey was jettisoned in part to further groom Young 50, and 2. He had that 40 point game and got everyone thinking he was primed to explode this season.

I think two things happened that have affected the opinions on Stuckey.

1) He played great the first third/half of the season- he had one of the top-10 PER’s at PG, so it seemed as if he was really breaking out. Then his numbers collapsed.

Here’s his first two seasons stats:
http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/s/stuckro01.html

I like Stuck’s game, and I like that he’s already pretty much a league average PG offensively, so we know he’ll be a good player, but his numbers didn’t improve enough from his first season to make me confident he’s going to be an elite player (they hardly improved overall). If he’d made a big jump this season, up to a PER of 18-19, then if he made another jump next year it would have brought him up to an elite, 20’s PER.

It’s rare for a player to suddenly become a top-5 player at his position, it’s usually more of a process where they first reach the top10-15 range then make another jump, so I think it’s reasonable to be a little concerned that Stuckey didn’t complete that first jump upward in production. Though, he’s still pretty young, so maybe it will just take a few more years.

I think QD is on to something where as time passed it seemed like the further Stuckey got from his previous mentors, and as Curry became the central mentor/authority figure for Stuckey, the more struggles he had.

2) The other big factor is that as Stuckey was struggling, Will Bynum started playing really, really well, and this was at the end of the season, so people remember it more clearly.

I don’t think people would have gotten as down on Stuckey if the timing had been different- hypothetically, if Bynum had played great early in the season then declined in the 2nd half, and if Stuckey’s season had been reversed (bad start, great finish), I think people’s opinions/impressions would be very different.

ya but people still need to realize that young 50 (i like that reference becuz it is so true) really only has ONE FULL SEASON under his belt. And in that one full season, he was handed a veteran team loaded with former all-stars. Just being a starting PG your first season is hard enough, let alone be given a team full of veterans that all played together for 5+ years with the PG that you are replacing. Everyone had a certain game that they played and Chauncey knew that from playing with them over the years. He knew how to distribute the ball evenly – mainly, who to give it to and when to give it to them. Stuckey will learn all that. He WILL be better. I’m not worried so much that he didn’t really take that “next jump” like you said because I’m fairly confident he will do that this year. But in all honesty, I don’t need an all-star at the point, I just want a guy to go out there and give me 15 and 10 (or around there) and take care of the basketball. That’s it. If he does that then I’m more than satisfied.

In an ESPN interview in February, Stuckey spoke publicly about his struggles after his breakout in December and January. He said quite specifically that he had never played this much before. After being injured in his rookie season, this was the first time he had played so many consecutive games with significant (i.e. starter’s) minutes. Quite simply, he was exhausted.

After he hit that wall, the other issues took hold— the AI drama, MCIAFI, lack of a backcourt (or hell, frontcourt) identity, too many egos, etc.

I think it is quite safe to assume that Stuck will improve this next season. Instead of 13/5/4, it’s likely that we’ll see 15/6/5 in ~ 34mpg, sharing time at the point with Bynum and the 2 with Rip (and Afflalo). In fact, I think those numbers are a worst case scenario, if he can really focus on conditioning next season.

see mike, and thats really all im asking for. anything more than that is a big plus for me.

Stuckeys going to be fine people need to ease up on him ,were not talking about a number 1 draft pick he was drafted 15 and he far exceeding most of the point guards taken at that level in there first few yrs. Hell he’s done better then Billups in his first 2 yrs. and he was drafted what number 3 , his jump shot wa much better last yr then his first yr.and i’m sure it’ll be that much better again this yr with more range once this guy can hit the three comfortable he’s gonna light up guys.

@ brgulker – I want to respond quickly to your objections from a few days ago; sorry not to respond sooner; was at a wedding all weekend, and just returned.

Had the Pistons traded for Boozer and had Boozer opted out after this past season, the Pistons could still have extended him without incurring the luxury tax because by acquiring him through trade they would have had his Bird rights. Bird rights give you the ability to pay a player more money even though you’re already at or above the salary cap.

The Pistons also in that scenario would not have lost Antonio McDyess, because Dyess’s contract before he was traded was due to expire after next season, not this one. The only reason he’s a free agent now is because the Nuggets bought him out and he re-signed with the Pistons for the vets’ minimum.

So the Pistons really could have had Boozer for Sheed alone and nothing else, while retaining the rest of the roster.

Hope that clears things up.

Bill Higgins, in your scenario, the Pistons could extend Boozer, but not give him a raise should he want one without going into luxury tax land. So, it’s possible he would opt out after this year or not resign the year after (not that that’s the end of the world) and the Pistons would have to replace him with a player using the MLE because they would still be over the cap.

Regardless…

All of this is fine in conjecture, but my guess is that it was never an option, especially from Utah’s perspective. Boozer didn’t become expendable until Milsap showed he could put up big numbers as a starter. So, Utah would basically be trading Boozer for an older, less productive player in a year where they expected to be a contender.

I don’t think there’s any way that Dumars could have foreseen that Boozer would get hurt, make some stupid comments about opting out, and that Milsap would come in and putting up 20/10, making Utah desperate to get rid of him.

QD, I’m nearly certain that Bird rights are set up such that teams can extend their players with raises up to the maximum salary, even going over the cap to do it. This is the key to NBA salary structures; it’s supposed to allow teams to keep continuity in their rosters by giving them the best possible chance of retaining their own guys if they want to keep them. So, no, the Pistons would not have hit tax land. Please let me know if I’m wrong – you may simply know more than I do about this stuff – but I am almost 100% sure of this particular point.

I agree with you that there’s no way Dumars could have foreseen that Boozer would get hurt. But that’s not what I was trying to say. I was trying to say that a smarter strategy entering the season would have put Dumars in a position to take advantage of a wonderful opportunity that would have arisen had he held out. What looks like good luck is the usually the result of a series of careful decisions that put someone in a position to be lucky.

Had Dumars entered last year with three commonsense principles in mind, namely:

1. I will trade my players only if I get real value for them in return

2. I will not dump salary, but will rebuild the team through the draft and through trades for players whom I feel can be long-term building blocks, because the second strategy is much more successful historically

3. I will not make panicky moves but will be patient and let opportunities come to me

Then a Boozer-Sheed deal could easily have happened last year, and might well have been inevitable. It’s not about foreseeing the future; it’s about making smart, patient decisions along the way that put you in the best place to exploit good fortune when it arises. Is any of the three premises I’ve listed above at all controversial? Not one of those would have permitted the Chauncey-Iverson deal to happen. All would have had Dumars wait on something like a Sheed-Boozer deal, which would have been just exponentially better for the Pistons’ future than the deal that actually took place.

I think Dumars panicked and gave away value in the Chauncey deal because he didn’t have in mind a real strategy for how he would restructure his team. He could have done things in a much smarter way.

In ur scenario bill higgins, we wouldn’t be able to make over the team like we are able to now. We are in essence cutting the rebuilding process in half. we have all of our cap space this year because of sheed (the guy you wanted to trade) and iverson (the guy we actually traded for), so in ur scenario, we would have no cap space unless boozer opted out. so lets say for arguments sake boozer DID OPT OUT, our cap space would be significantly less (if any at all)than we got right now because, like i said before, we would still have chauncey and dice getting paid by us. granted we would still have chauncey and dice but if i remember right i think his last year was going to be a player option anyways, so he would have had to pick that up, but lets just say he does. so we would have chauncey and dice and practically NO CAP SPACE. well we could re-sign boozer (with his bird rights like u said, u are correct on that), but then the organization would be paying the luxury tax on every dollar over the cap they are (and that could get expensive). however, with how the deal went down, yes we lost chauncey and we MAY lose dice, but we get to spend our 17+ mil in cap space the way we see fit without having any tough contractual obligations (mainly chauncey). I loved chauncey, he was my favorite piston and still one of my favorite players, but he was on the downside of his career and we had un up-and-coming PG in stuckey, so he was the easiest to move without changing TOO MUCH of the team at the time. Now we were able to get younger by letting stuckey get game experience and have the cap space needed to fill our other voids with younger, hungrier players.

So in a nutshell, yes ur right in the fact that ur way we would have been able to keep chauncey and dice AND STILL GET BOOZER, but we would be stuck in the same rut(team) that we have been in for years. it is time to move on. with the trade that went down, we were still able to compete this year as well as next year and into the future, with a team that can have a whole new look in just one offseason. with ur scenario that would not have been possible. patience may be a virtue, but my lil cuzin likes to say, “you snooze, you lose”.

I don’t think there’s anyway Utah accepts a Sheed for Boozer trade. They were coming off a year where they went to the WCF’s and making that trade makes them a worse basketball team. Besides LA, they were right in that next tier of teams even though Derron Williams missed some time at the beginning of the year and Boozer was out the majority of the year. I can’t see Jerry Sloan signing off on that trade and bringing in Sheed. Boozer had said earlier in the year that he’s opting out, so from Utah’s point of view they would be trading an expiring contract for an expiring contract and becoming a worse bball team.

Bill Higgins, if a team has the bird rights to a player than they can sign him to whatever they want. But, the luxury tax is a threshold that once you go over it with your total payroll, you have to pay an extra dollar for every dollar you go over. That tax goes to the league (I think).

This year the salary cap will be around 57mil. The luxury tax will be around 69mil I think. The Pistons were right below the line during the season (they bought out Alex Acker so they could get under).

I’m pretty sure Dumars was given a mandate by Davidson that he stay under the luxury tax threshold with his total payroll. I don’t know this for certain but it’s probably true given how fiscally conservative Dumars was during the six year ECF run by trying to find veteran minimum players to put them over the top.

In your scenario, if Boozer wanted a raise, Dumars would have had to go over the luxury tax threshold and although he COULD do it, he probably WOULDN’t do it because of orders from above.

Your idea isn’t a bad one (and the only criticism of Dumars I’ve heard so far that shows reasoning), but I still think it’s hindsight being 20/20.

QD:

Not sure if this is 100% accurate, but doing the math quickly I’m pretty sure we would have been far enough under the luxury tax to easily re-sign Boozer.

Here’s our current list of salaries:
http://hoopshype.com/salaries/detroit.htm

If you add back Billups’s 12m and Dice’s 7m, that still just brings us up to around 53m committed for next season, about 16m under the luxury tax, so we could have offered Boozer a raise and still been under tax.

Gabe, I was about to ask whether someone could do those sums quickly. Thanks.

Jim, to repeat a bit of the exchange above, by the trade deadline the Jazz were desperate to shed Boozer and almost certainly would have loved to take Rasheed in exchange for him.

Jose, I think Chauncey’s play this past season has clearly dispelled any claims that he was declining. He’s a top-three point guard in the NBA. Stuckey may wind up being good – I really hope he does – but he’s certainly not yet, and he may never be. The Pistons team we had at the beginning of the season plus Boozer minus Rasheed plus a decent draft pick plus some three-point-shooting brought in with the MLE would have a legitimate chance of contending for a title. Sadly that will never happen now.

Bill, all of your arguments are revisionist. This year Chauncey is a top point guard – last year he would be lucky to be top five. And somehow Dumars was supposed to know in August that Boozer would be available in January.

Also, your assumption that Utah would have done backflips for a Boozer-Sheed deal is faulty. Otherwise, why the hell wouldn’t we have done it? Sheed had checked out for the season, we sucked, Boozer pretty much said he was done in Utah. If your claim that “by the trade deadline the Jazz were desperate to shed Boozer and almost certainly would have loved to take Rasheed in exchange for him” is true, then this would have happened regardless of the Chauncey deal.

ya we would have been able to contend for the next 2 years, if we were lucky. now we can challenge for the ship in a couple years and have a window of at least 5 years to win it, much like this past pistons team. i’ll take that any day. saying that we will NEVER have a chance of contending for a title now is a pretty bold statement for one little trade. i hardly think it was THAT big of a deal, and frankly, people have really talked about it too much already. what’s done is done.

As for billups, he is a stud, but him getting traded to his hometown team rejuvenated him. denver’s chauncey was not our chauncey, at least not the past couple years. idk how many times i gotta say it but chauncey was, and is still, one of my favorite players, but the man lost a step. he can be a top 5 PG for the next couple of years but after that who would take him if we wanted to trade him? he would be like bibby, nash, and kidd right now. good pg’s at the end of their careers that no one really wants to pay for (or trade for in our scenario). The ONLY thing i could say that I liked about your scenario, in all honesty, is that we would have been able to keep dice for another year. however, he left it all on the floor for us even in the midst of being swept, so he deserves a chance to go play for a contender and try to get his ring.

Myth-busting time!

Chauncey was not rejuvenated by his trade to Denver. At least, he wasn’t in any way numerically. He shot worse this year, turned the ball over at a higher rate, and his assist rate stayed the same. All of this despite a lower usage.

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/players/hollinger?playerId=63&action=upsell&appRedirect=http%3a%2f%2finsider.espn.go.com%2fnba%2fplayers%2fhollinger%3fplayerId%3d63

@Birdman:
And he was on fire in rounds one and two against… undersized PGs? How unlike him!

Again, Shinons, I haven’t said once that Dumars should have known that Boozer would get hurt. That’s unfair to my argument. I said rather that using a commonsense strategy (e.g., the three prongs I outlined above) in evaluating potential moves would have put Dumars in a position to make a deal like Sheed for Boozer, which would have been much more value-accretive to the Pistons than the Chauncey-Iverson deal that Dumars in fact made.

Once more, it’s not about having psychic powers. It’s about making smart decisions along the way to put yourself in a position to exploit opportunities that arise. In my view Dumars didn’t do that. He openly professes now to have pursued a salary-dumping, cap-space approach to rebuilding. This approach, though employed often throughout NBA history, has never once as far as I know produced a championship team. There were much better ways to skin this cat.

Re: the idea that Chauncey somehow improved this year and was falling off last year – people keep saying this, and I don’t get it at all, because the statistics show otherwise. His numbers from this year are almost identical to last year’s. Check them out:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/b/billuch01.html

Chauncey didn’t play well at the end of the playoffs last year, but he was injured then, as we knew at the time. So that’s not a fair measuring point.

As to why Sheed for Boozer didn’t happen at the deadline this year: that deal didn’t make sense in our post-Iverson-trade world, because, post-Iverson, the Sheed-Boozer trade wouldn’t have helped the Pistons’ financial structure in the way that it would have had Iverson never become a Piston. The Pistons post-Iverson were going to be under the cap this offseason even if they’d acquired Boozer for Rasheed. In order to use that cap space they would have had to forfeit Boozer’s Bird rights.

As discussed above, Boozer’s Bird rights were the big reason why a Sheed-for-Boozer deal would have let the Pistons get and retain Boozer while still keeping the rest of their roster. Once the Pistons had lost the chance at those rights (as was inevitable post-Iverson), it made sense to wait and see if Boozer would heal and then, if he healed, to sign him in the offseason, because the cap effect would have been the same either way. Tell me if you’re unclear on the technical stuff here; I can try to get into it in more detail.

To return to the main point, though: I’m not revising history. I’m merely saying that GMs looking to change their teams need to have strategies in place before they make moves. If Dumars had had a strategy in September and October, the Pistons’ future would look a lot brighter today.

Thank you, Birdman! I was writing my post while you were addressing the point yourself.

To correct my last paragraph: they need to have good strategies in place. According to Dumars, he had a strategy – he was dumping salary to get cap space. It just was a bad strategy, or at least inferior to the alternatives available to him.

Man, this is quite an argument for a past-tense hypothetical.

You’ve got it backwards, Mike! The past-tense hypothetical is evidence to support the broader criticism. It’s one way the world might logically have played out had a sound strategy been employed from the start.

To return to the main point, though: I’m not revising history. I’m merely saying that GMs looking to change their teams need to have strategies in place before they make moves. If Dumars had had a strategy in September and October, the Pistons’ future would look a lot brighter today.

So the main point is that you’re assuming Dumars’ strategy before actually seeing it, and that yours (which, by the way, is 8 months after the fact) is better?

No, Shinons, I’m repeating the strategy that Dumars has told us he is using. He hasn’t made a secret of it or anything. Just check out any of Langlois’s blog entries from the last several months.

And yes, I’m saying I think “my” strategy is better. It’s not mine actually; it’s too simple to belong to anyone. It’s just: build your team through the draft and through trades for players that you envision being long-term contributors, rather than dumping salaries, forfeiting certain key financial advantages inherent in the CBA, and betting on the volatile free-agent market. That is it.

I don’t see the significance of the timing of my writing this. It seems to me that salary dumps have been failing to create championships for the last decade or two. The evidence has been there for a long time.

Ah, let’s take Keith Langlois’ word on what Dumars’ strategy is – that’ll be much more accurate than waiting and see what Dumars actually does.

Hmm. Dumars has told the media on multiple occasions that he traded Chauncey Billups to take a spin on Iverson and then to clear cap space. Also, Dumars pays a man named Keith Langlois a salary in American dollars to post on the Internet messages that put his actions in the rosiest light possible. Forgive me if I don’t think Keith is going rogue on Dumars.

Can I take it from your nitpicks that you agree with me on the big stuff, Shinons?

Yep! Dumars should have traded Utah a guy they didn’t want for a guy that wasn’t available! What a dumbass!

Hey, thanks for engaging my actual argument seriously. I appreciate that. That’s why I come to Detroit Bad Boys – for respectful discussion among people who like to think and talk about basketball.

At the end of the day, I don’t think Sloan buys off on this trade for Sheed/Boozer. Why screw up the clubhouse like that? Boozer already said he was going to opt out.

Sure, he can opt out (assuming trade went down) and then we can resign him for more due to his bird rights. But we also can do a sign-n-trade with Sheed to a team. Not likely, but possible.

But one thing has to be clear: Boozer wasn’t even playing at the trade deadline. And though most thought he’d be back before the season ended, there was no guarantee. And now we would have moved Sheed for somebody we’re waiting for to come off the injury list? Really have no concernible plan for a “fill-in” until boozer would have returned, we’re battling for a playoff spot and we just basically “waived” our best low post defender who matched up well with D. Howard. And if I’m not mistaken, boozer was already complaining about his knee not being 100% in training camp. So Joe D. took the best he could get.

After how seriously you took all counterpoints against your arguments, just dismissing them? You’re welcome! After all, that’s why I come to DBB – to hear people bash their opinions over and over, ignoring any reasoned debate. In lieu of that, I’ll just go with sarcasm.

Gabe, I think the hoopshype salary listings don’t factor in Maxiell’s 5mil. Plus, you have to add a couple more contracts to get up to the 13 player minimum.

@Shinons:
On the bright side, at least the AI fanboys are long gone.

I’m not going to jump in the middle of this disagreement. I would, however, like to remind everybody that one of Joe Dumars’ most underrated skills is controlling the media. He has an official mouthpiece in the form of Keith Langlois, and he also has Chris McCoskey who will run with whatever garbage Joe decides to have somebody in the organization leak to him. What’s written in the media can be quite useful when viewed in that light.