July 2008
2 posts
Poaching the Lakers
Despite losing in the Finals, everyone with a brain stem expects the Lakers to have a championship-caliber team next season. And honestly, it’s difficult for team’s to do much of anything to prevent it, short of cloning a certain coach on the Boston bench.
One approach opposing GMs could take is diminishing the Lakers bench by poaching their RFAs or, at the very least, kindly over...
The Maggette/Posey Merry Go Road
Posey’s agent says that his client is down to San Antonio or Boston in terms of his next contract. Curiously, Corey Maggette will likely land on whichever team Posey doesn’t sign with, whether that’s because he beats Posey to the punch remains to be seen. In either case, Boston and San Antonio will come out fine; Maggette and Posey will be fine. Classic can’t lose.
Note:...
June 2008
33 posts
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Nicolas Batum Receives a Promise from the Spurs?
It’s being suggested that the Spurs have promised to draft Nico Batum at 26. In exchange for that promise, Batum’s camp is not, at least by appearances, releasing recent medical tests which are said to confirm that his heart is healthy. Without those test results, most teams could not afford to draft Batum in the first round. In other words, Batum and the Spurs have cleverly...
Still Cheering for Nicolas Batum
Last week, I took my seat in the Batum cheering section. I’m still there.
If he’s a player with whom you are not familiar, this piece by European Prospects is a must read.
Kevin Pritchard, Fantasy GM
Some of my readers are probably suspicious that I’m a Blazers fan. Not so, I promise. But I really like Kevin Pritchard. He’s sharp and ballsy, which can be a great combination. I wish the league had more like him.
Chad Ford is reporting that the Hornets have sold pick 27 to the Blazers. From the Hornets perspective, this move is consistent with what Hornets 24/7 reported...
"Cap Space Footprint" and other good stuff →
Draft Storylines I: Nicolas Batum and Bill Walker
Each year there are a hand full of story lines that make the draft worth watching, and this year is no different. Most of the attention is focused on the first few picks of the draft, and especially on what Miami might do, whether wildly speculative or realistically measured. I think of the draft as the end of Act 1 of a player’s career, with most careers concluding in Camus-like anticlimactic...
San Antonio Spurs Go Green
Sometime back David Stern said he felt that the climate crisis was the biggest threat of our time. Peter Holt was listening, apparently. The Spurs have made the move to become the first wind-powered franchise in the league. One wonders what this portends for the rest of the league and if the Spurs will find success setting another standard.
It's Better to Build through Free Agents and...
The good folks at DX have posted an updated and sobering account of how much improved success a team should reasonably expect from the draft. The short answer is not much. The majority of drafted players never pan out, and the one’s that do are rarely selected late. Follow the link for the long answer.
The message fans should take from this is that it’s okay if your team trades out...
David Stern, Take a Lesson from Kevin Pritchard
Some teams shroud the draft process in a cloak of secrecy, but not the Blazers. They’ve more or less opened their draft process to the public.
Since arriving at Portland, Kevin Pritchard has transformed the team into something of a model franchise. On the court, they’re a soon-to-be powerhouse with legitimate championship aspirations. Off the court, Pritchard and the PR department...
WatchDJ Augustin Works Out for Portland
WatchKevin Pritchard Discusses a Slew of Swings
Manu Ginobli May Miss Olympics
The sharp people over at SpursTalk (HT: to the posters there for breaking the news to those of us who speak English) have stumbled across a Buenos Aires press conference wherein Manu Ginobili acknowledges that his ankle injury is worse than previously thought and that he may in fact miss the Beijing Olympics. The former gold medalist is a patriotic and spirited competitor, so that’s saying...
Who Will Draft Bill Walker?
KSU freshman Bill Walker is able to do some pretty amazing things on a pair of suspect legs. When word broke earlier this week that he had injured a knee, yet again, nearly everyone expected him to pull his name out of the draft. But he didn’t, and now he’s a lottery talent that is a projected 2nd round draft pick. Strange, to say the least.
From everything I’ve read, no team is...
Danny Ainge, GM Pacesetter
Over at Hornets 24/7, the latest post reads, “The Boston Celtics: your 2008 NBA Champions. From rock bottom a year ago to the top of the mountain today.” True enough, and there is a lesson here. Two of the last three NBA champions were propelled to the title on the strength of a pair of blockbuster off season trades. Those teams were Boston and Miami.
The lesson in this for the...
The Kobe is a Killer Myth
Remember the 2004 NBA Finals or the time when Kobe Bryant mailed in a Game 7 in 2006? Did you just watch the Finals? Kobe Bryant is the most talented player on the planet, no one would dispute. He is one of the best players in league history. But the notion that he is a can’t miss cold-blooded killer in high stakes situations has fallen on hard times. It’s probably best to disabuse...
Poaching the Would Be Dynasty
After such a underwhelming performance in the Finals, Mitch Kupchak may decide to add more veteran leadership this off season. But despite their lackluster and inexcusable Finals collapse, the Kobe-Bynum-Odom-Gasol Lakers remain the most talented team in the league and should enter next season as favorites to win the title. I’m confident that league GMs will not sleep on the Lakers while...
Locating Value in the 2008 Draft
Most experts wanted to take last year’s draft class to the prom. She was easy on the eyes. This year’s draft class is like that girl who doesn’t catch your eye at first, but seems to get better looking as they year rolls along. By the end of the year, you fidget when she comes around and your friends tease you for liking plain Jane.
This year’s class is deceptive. It has three franchise talents...
Kobe Bryant, the Next Dirk Nowitzki
If Kobe Bryant is not the next Michael Jordan might he be the next Dirk Nowitzki?
In 2006 Dirk Nowitzki had an MVP caliber season while leading his deep and talented Mavericks past the dreaded Spurs into the NBA Finals. The Mavericks played the Heat that year, and should have won the title. They were the better team. Instead they raced off to a 2-0 series lead before famously squandering a 15...
A Great Lesson from Ettore Messina
“Messina focused primarily on what he describes as the most important fundamental in basketball-passing. He reiterated to the young prospects that their teammates are much more likely to do things like rebounding and defending if they are getting touches, as players who are just standing around offensively watching others play by themselves will quickly lose their motivation to do anything...
Jonathan Givony Interviews Nicolas Batum →
Atlanta Stuck With Mike Woodson
Last week I “sent a memo” to Rick Sund asking that he hire Avery Johnson. Apparently, he didn’t get it. The Hawks will sign Mike Woodson to a new contract. Some delusional fans will point to the fact that the Hawks pushed the eventual Eastern champs to 7 games as justification for resigning Woodson. But I doubt that this is actually the reason.
The truth is that the Atlanta...
More from Haralabos Voulgaris →
Tom Thibodeau: Finals MVP?
The Most Underrated Finals Performance Ever? →
Don Nelson's Return to Warriors Spells Doom
After several weeks of faux deliberation, last week Don Nelson confirmed that he would return to coach the final year of his contract with Golden State. Many Golden State fans received the news with glee, but I’m less than sanguine.
Chris Mullin is heading into the most important off season of his front office career and now faces an impossible dilemma. Most of Mullin’s roster is in...
Giorgi Shermandini, Spinning His Way Into the 2nd...
Shermandini’s agent is trying to sell ribald to Judd Apatow by spreading word that his client has received a first round promise while still running through the motions of workouts and camps. One of those activities is a front, and I’m betting on the former.
Pure Conjecture on Neven Spahija
On the same day that Tau announced the resigning of Tiago Splitter they released a statement saying that Neven Spahija would not return as coach.
Tau and Spahija have been at odds for many months, so his departure is of no great surprise. But one wonders if the Splitter resigning was not the final straw for Spahija. This may seem counter-intuitive—what coach would not like to see his best...
From Indecisive to Impetuous?
Steve Kerr and John Paxson waited weeks to hire replacement coaches for their teams, and when they did their choice was to roll the dice on two men whom were not exactly hot with a bullet. I can’t help but think that each man was foolish not to wait another week to at least interview Tom Thibodeau. Perhaps Porter and Del Negro’s stars would have remained brighter than...
It Pays to Have Friends
For those of you who like to connect dots, grab your pencils.
Late last week Suns GM Steve Kerr hired his former teammate Terry Porter to coach Phoenix. Porter was the only Suns coaching candidate to have this connection with Kerr. And now John Paxson, another former teammate of Kerr, hires Vinny Del Negro, Kerr’s assistant GM and—you guessed it—former teammate to coach the...
Tiago Splitter Resigns with Tau, a Sympathetic...
Tiago Splitter, one of Europe’s best players, was drafted by the San Antonio Spurs in 2007. Splitter is a lottery talent that fell to the back of the first round because of concerns about his European contract. The Spurs, said pundits, were both fortunate and smart for drafting him when he fell into their lap. Couple this with Splitter’s dominant season in Europe, and all looked...
Rethinking Ron Artest's Market Value
Sam Amick reports in the Sacramento Bee that Ron Artest and his agent, Mark Stevens, believe it would be a mistake for Artest to opt of his contract this month because he’d leave money on the table. In all likelihood Artest couldn’t get more than the MLE in this summer’s market; the MLE is around 6 million, Artest currently makes 7.4. Earlier this season, Stevens suggested that...