NBA Offseason 2009

[Captain Hate]

btw, Terry Pluto finally got back to me on my question of why the Cavs didn't deal for Shaq last season: "But there was no trade to be made, the Suns pulled all their offers off the table for Shaq, Amare, etc. and tried to make the playoffs."

[The G Man]

I started thinking about the dismantling of the Suns and went back to read Bill Simmons' column from last year.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/st ... ons/080501

Here's an excerpt:
2006 SUNS

Relevant Details: 54 wins, 108.4 points per game, 102.8 points allowed, .479 FG%, .399 3FG%, 2,097 3s attempted, lost in Western finals (Dallas, six games).

Eight-Man Rotation: Nash (43.9% 3FG), Marion, Diaw, Barbosa (44.4% 3FG), Raja Bell (44.2%) 3FG, Tim Thomas (42.9% 3FG), Eddie House (38.9% 3FG), James Jones (38.6% 3FG), Kurt Thomas, Stoudemire (injured).

Comments: Probably my favorite Suns team because of their 3-point shooting (40 percent on nearly 2,100 attempts?!?!?!?), the playing-bigger-than-we-are thing (inspiring), and the gritty way they responded after losing Amare for the season. Remember, this wasn't a strong year for the league -- Dallas was good, but not that good, and Miami ended up being the weakest champ of any team this decade. Switch Diaw for Johnson, give them Bell and Thomas, make Amare healthy and you're looking at the 2006 champs.

(Uh-oh, cue up the ominous "Behind the Music" music.)

But that summer, everything changed ...

Mistake No. 1: For financial reasons, they traded the No. 21 pick (Rajon Rondo) to Boston along with Brian Grant's contract (chopping $1.9 million from their 2007 payroll) for the rights to Cleveland's 2007 first-round pick. This was a double whammy because they acquired that Rondo pick two years before by giving up the No. 7 pick in the 2004 draft (for luxury tax reasons). So if you're scoring at home, they downgraded from "Luol Deng or Andre Iguodala in 2004" to "Rondo in 2006" to "selling the No. 24 pick in 2007 for cash" (we'll get to that in a second) ... which means that, effectively, they traded a No. 7 pick in a loaded draft for $4.9 million. Phoenix fans, you may now light yourselves on fire.

(What makes that one even more painful: Instead of signing Richardson before the 2004-05 season to a six-year, $42.6 million deal, they could have drafted Deng or Igoudala that summer and paid one of them two-fifths as much as Richardson over that same time frame. One year later, they swapped Richardson and the No. 21 pick in 2005 for Kurt Thomas, who they dumped on Seattle last summer along with two more No. 1's just to get him off their cap. As astounding as this sounds, Bryan Colangelo's decision to sign Richardson instead of drafting Deng or Iguodala -- which was dumb at the time, by the way -- ended up costing them a whopping FOUR FIRST-ROUND PICKS! Would you rather have Richardson, or would you rather have the No. 7 pick in 2004, the No. 21 pick in 2005, and your first-rounders in 2008 and 2010? Hold on, this gets better. Your 2005 NBA Executive of the Year? That's right, Mr. Bryan Colangelo! I love the NBA.)

Mistake No. 2: They sold the No. 27 pick to Portland (that ended up being Sergio Rodriguez). What's confusing is that they traded/sold those No. 1s for luxury tax reasons, and yet ...

Mistake No. 3: Two weeks later, they signed Marcus Banks to a five-year, $24 million deal to back up Nash. Marcus Banks!?!?!? Can you think of a worse guy for NashBall? He can't shoot 3s, he's a career loser, he's never won in college or the pros, it's unclear whether he'd ever accept a reduced role behind a two-time MVP ... let's get him! Why not just draft Rondo at 21 (or Marcus Williams, or Kyle Lowry, or Jordan Farmar) and develop him as a backup for one-fourth the price of Banks? Why not draft Rodriguez at No. 27 and hope he pans out for one-fifth the money?

(You're lucky I'm not a Suns fan -- I would have written 15 consecutive columns complaining about this paragraph alone. For the life of me, I will never figure out the appeal of Marcus Banks for $24 million. All they had to do was hit one freaking Celtics message board from the '05-'06 season and check one of the 35 "MARCUS BANKS SUCKS" threads. My god.)

Mistake No. 4: Giving Diaw a $45 million, five-year extension before waiting to see if he could co-exist with Amare. Just senseless. He would have been a restricted free agent in the summer of '07 -- why not wait a year and make him play for the contract? (In the biggest non-surprise of the '07 season, Diaw showed up for camp woefully out of shape, proving yet again that you can't trust the French.) Also, would you rather pay $14 million a year to Diaw and Banks or just give that money right to Joe Johnson, the quintessential swingman for the S.S.O.L. Era? I'm telling you, this was a Greek tragedy.

[Noj]

I started thinking about the dismantling of the Suns and went back to read Bill Simmons' column from last year.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/st ... ons/080501

Here's an excerpt:
2006 SUNS

Relevant Details: 54 wins, 108.4 points per game, 102.8 points allowed, .479 FG%, .399 3FG%, 2,097 3s attempted, lost in Western finals (Dallas, six games).

Eight-Man Rotation: Nash (43.9% 3FG), Marion, Diaw, Barbosa (44.4% 3FG), Raja Bell (44.2%) 3FG, Tim Thomas (42.9% 3FG), Eddie House (38.9% 3FG), James Jones (38.6% 3FG), Kurt Thomas, Stoudemire (injured).

Seriously, this team was insane. The 108.4ppg, while high, doesn't begin to describe the games when opposing teams didn't defend them well and the shots were dropping. They'd put up 140.

[jon abbey]

the best year they had from an entertainment standpoint was the Amare/Marion/Quentin Richardson/Joe Johnson/Nash version, which I believe was Nash's first year there. if Joe Johnson didn't get hurt in the playoffs (and then Q totally disappeared when they needed him to step up, after a season where he led the league in threes made), they could have made a serious run.

but yeah, that's four legit All-Stars in their prime, I watched most of their games that year.

[jon abbey]

oh, looks like they took San Antonio to six games in the Western Conference Finals even without Johnson.

[jon abbey]

wow, this is crazy, Yao Ming likely out for all of next season, if not longer:

http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=a ... &type=lgns

[Noj]

That's awful, I really like Yao. He's all class. I hope he can make a comeback.

[Captain Hate]

Sounds like Yao is going through the type of foot problems that used to bedevil Ilgauskas that now seem like a distant memory, but back then it seemed like he'd never play a complete season.

[jon abbey]

Iverson with one last casualty in Detroit, Michael Curry fired today (odd timing!):

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=4297296

[Harold Baines]

Villanueva could definitely help someone. Cleveland, maybe?

[Borat Pri Hagafen]

Chris, check out page 1 of this thread. Apparently this was a Villanueva tweet...


@CV31 wrote:
well, twitterland like I said there will be more trades to come, very interesting, Shaq to Cleveland, nice, all Cleveland need is a PF now]

[Mo Noyz]

That's awful, I really like Yao. He's all class. I hope he can make a comeback.

I like him, too. But it's not looking very good.

He and Artest are like Carson and McMahon. One says a bunch of goofy shit, the other laughs his ass off. They are pretty damned entertaining, though.

Too bad Circuit City closed down. Ron might have been able to get Yao some part-time work while he was rehabbing.

[Captain Hate]

Iverson with one last casualty in Detroit, Michael Curry fired today (odd timing!):

I'll wanna hear Nags on this because this is definitely Joe D tossing his "friend" Curry under the bus and maybe drawing attention away from what looks like a horrible draft.

[edit]Just read on Henry Abbott's blog that this is mainly due to a rift with Rip Hamilton; I'm sure what was written was accurate but imo it's a sad fucking day when a player of Rip's caliber can be able to shitcan a coach. He pretty much did big fucking nothing for the Wizards before MJ gave him away for fellow Tarhole Stackhouse and Rip happened to fill a role perfectly on the championship team. Wow; just fucking wow.

[jon abbey]

Chris, check out page 1 of this thread. Apparently this was a Villanueva tweet...

@CV31 wrote:
well, twitterland like I said there will be more trades to come, very interesting, Shaq to Cleveland, nice, all Cleveland need is a PF now]

this was sent even before Milwaukee didn't tender him also, so even more likely now.

but the interesting twist is that Sheed will likely go to Boston if Cleveland goes with Villanueva. is that the right way to go for the Cavs (as opposed to getting Sheed themselves)? tough call, and how does Varejao factor in?

[mshiflet]

Well, I know a couple Cavs fans, who probably represent a very high percentage here in Ohio, that would rather stab themselves in the neck than see Rasheed in wine and gold. I'm wouldn't go that far myself, but can't imagine him getting much more than a lukewarm reception if he ends up here. Unless LeBron really wants it to happen, I don't think they'll go after him.

[Enforcer]

Iverson with one last casualty in Detroit, Michael Curry fired today (odd timing!):

I'll wanna hear Nags on this because this is definitely Joe D tossing his "friend" Curry under the bus and maybe drawing attention away from what looks like a horrible draft.

[edit]Just read on Henry Abbott's blog that this is mainly due to a rift with Rip Hamilton; I'm sure what was written was accurate but imo it's a sad fucking day when a player of Rip's caliber can be able to shitcan a coach. He pretty much did big fucking nothing for the Wizards before MJ gave him away for fellow Tarhole Stackhouse and Rip happened to fill a role perfectly on the championship team. Wow; just fucking wow.

Yes, the word is that it's about a Curry-Hamilton rift. But it doesn't just end there; apparently, the rest of the players don't care for him, either.

I fault Joe Dumars for putting a rookie coach in a position like that in the first place. Trading Billups for Iverson set Curry up for failure. Billups was the leader of the team, a solid guy and by all accounts the one who smoothed the waters between the coach (all 4 of them) and the rest of the team. Iverson, as we all know, is a selfish cock. So when Curry has to make tough decisions like benching a star player (Iverson or Hamilton), he's fucked.

I also don't think a coach can play it like Curry did. Chuck Daly was way ahead of his time on this point: You have to understand that your job is getting the players to let you coach them. That's probably 80% of coaching in the NBA today, more true now than it was when he was coaching. This isn't the NHL where players do what the coach says and shut the fuck up about it. Like Cap says, even a player like Rip Hamilton can get a coach fired in the NBA.

I think firing Curry is the right move. But hiring him was the wrong move. Now who's going to coach? Avery Johnson? Doug Collins? Nobody very appealing.

[Captain Hate]

Now who's going to coach? Avery Johnson? Doug Collins? Nobody very appealing.

Avery's getting a lot of run at the freeper site as is Jon's favorite member of the Bad Boys, although a lot of naysayers are talking about how WNBA success doesn't translate well to the NBA. I just don't see Collins taking the job; it's got to be painfully obvious to him that his true talent is as a color commentator and *not* a head coach. Plus Detroit was the cause of his first coaching end of the road and Joe D remembers that.

Interesting that Chauncey was the intermediary between the rest of the players and the head coach beginning with Carlisle. I'm not sure what was Larry Brown's greatest achievement, coaching the Pistons to a championship or getting an AI team into the Finals. I'm leaning toward the latter.

[jon abbey]

I like Avery Johnson, and maybe he could help Stuckey take it to the next level.

Stale Ale has found his niche coaching women, he should stick to what he's good at.

[jon abbey]

Detroit signs Ben Gordon and Charlie Villanueva. I guess Gordon has agreed to come off the bench, or won't this lead to the exact same problems they had last year with Iverson?

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=4301111

[Borat Pri Hagafen]

Cavs talking to Artest. Lebron talked to him face-to-face yesterday. Damn, how that would rule. Maybe a sign-and-trade for the Fundamental? I can't say enough how much I'd love to get Artest, but it'd be much nicer if they could do it and keep Varejao too.