1. "Ben Wallace is the centerpiece of the trade." Is he the biggest name? Yes. Does he make the most money? Somehow, yes. Is he the most productive? No. Does he add something new to the Cavaliers? Not really. In fact, my favorite comment is that Wallace adds experience playing in the NBA Finals. Someone actually said that, as if the entier Cavaliers organization had no experience, despite their loss in the NBA Finals last season. The players the Cavs traded away had NBA Finals experince, too. The trade helped the Cavs. However, just as in Chicago, where I believed Noah and Thomas duplicated what Wallace offered, Vareajo, at this point, offers the same things - rebounding and defense mostly - in a younger, more athletic, taller, longer player. To me, acquiring the shooters on the perimeter in West and Sczerbiak is the centerpiece, although I still think Joe Smith ends up making the biggest contribution and is probably still the best player the Cavs acquired. Wallace's positive impact will more than likely be in the locker room. Yesterday, someone said Wallace will make the difference defending Tim Duncan. However, last time Detroit faced San Antonio, Rahseed Wallace defended Duncan more than Ben Wallace. I remember because I criticized Ben Wallace at the time because everyone makes a big deal about his defense, yet he was not even guarding the opponent's best player. Wallace is not the same player he was in 2004 (and I thought he was overrated then). If I believed Wallace was the centerpiece, or the most important acquisition, I would think it was a bad trade.
2. "With Pau Gasol, now the Lakers are a championship contender." Did anyone watch the Lakers in the 1st half of the season with Andrew Bynum? Somehow, in the media, the Lakers have morphed from Kobe and a bunch of guys who can't play to the most talented team in the NBA simply by acquiring Gasol. I like Gasol. He fits well with the Lakers. He makes them better, especially with Bynum injured. But, the Lakers had the best depth in the NBA last season. They were a championship contender from the jump this season. Gasol helps and provides insurance with Bynum's injury, allowing him time to recover without rushing back, but the Lakers had the same depth last season. They had sasha Vujacic, Jordan Farmar, Ronnie Turiaf, Vladimir Radmanovic, etc. They got lucky with Derek Fisher this summer, the final piece they needed to add some experience for a play-off run, and acquired the injured Trevor Ariza to add more athleticism earlier in the year, but they did not suddenly acquire depth or talent. In the beginning of the year, Skip Bayless said that LeBron's supporting cast was better than Kobe Bryant's. That's insane.
3. "Imagine what Texas would be like this year with Durant." Look, college basketball is a monor league. Get used to it. We do not need to spend every season bemoaning the players who left early. Enjoy Beasley this year and then let him go. Enjoy Rose and then let him go. Next year, enjoy whomever is the number 1 player. But, stop spending your time talking about things that are not going to happen. Talk about how good Texas is right now. Talk about the development of James to replace the void left by Durant. But, stop worrying about players who leave early. They should be allowed to go to the league right away anyway - that's what a Development League is for.
4. "Player X should stay in school to improve." I know the media obsesses over college basketball and thinks players develop in college. But, college coaches are paid to win games. They have limited practice time. Most admit that they will not change a player's shot in college, regardless of his shooting percentage. Some players need more college seasoning. Kids who lack upper body strength could use another year in a college weight program. However, why should Beasley stay for a second year? Is he perfect? No. But, what else is he going to develop in college? Why should Kevin Love stay in college? Is he a top 10 pick? Probably not. Would another year make him a top 10 pick? I doubt it. The biggest knock on Love is going to be his height and his lateral quickness. Staying in school will not make him taller. So, the question is whether he can improve his lateral quickness to such a degree that he makes a giant leap on the draft boards. Do I like the 1-and-dones? No. I think it hurts the academic integrity oif universities and I wish the NBA would allow teams to draft HS seniors and put them in the NBDL rather than develop players fo free in college programs willing to sacrifice its educational mission for the athletic bottom line. However, from a player's perspective, if there is nothing staying can do to improve your draft position significantly, why stick around, unless you are one of the few who actually went to college to get a degree and enjoy college? If you are like Joakim Noah, great. But, business-wise, I'd go.
Finally, I saw this on True Hoop:
Jim Alexander of The Press-Enterprise: "It's not hard to overlook Derek Fisher, or to take him for granted...He also has a lot of wisdom to offer. Jordan Farmar is listening. Where Fisher is the savvy veteran, Farmar is the 21-year-old prodigy from LA Fairfax High and UCLA with the high basketball IQ."
If you are getting paid, check your facts. Farmar attended Taft High School in Woodland Hills, not Fairfax High School in Los Angeles. Also, I don't know if a 21-year-old back-up PG in the NBA qualifies as a "prodigy."
1 comments:
I haven't posted a comment here in a while, but I've been thinking a lot about these things lately, so here goes:
1) The trade helped Cleveland because it gave them some much-needed depth. Gooden's skills duplicated Varejao's to a greater extent even than Wallace's, and Hughes wasn't giving them much and wasn't a great fit for their system. The Cavs were able to turn two marginally above-average players into four usable guys who are a better fit for their system. Wallace isn't the centerpiece, but he's better than Donyell or Gooden, in my opinion. Like Rodman on the late-90's Bulls, he'll get by on his reputation more often than not, but he's still going to be a best and he's going to make opposing big men work a lot harder than Gooden was going to. I felt like throwing a beer bottle at the screen last June every time a Spurs big man got an easy lay-up because Gooden missed a rotation; that won't happen with Wallace and Smith.
2) You are right to say that the Lakers have had a lot of great role players for the past couple of years, but they've struggled because the role players were asked to do more than just play roles, because the team didn't have a second scorer to take the pressure off of Kobe. I've always felt that Pau was a little over-rated, while Lamar was one of those good-on-paper guys who was always a little over-rated - in hindsight, doesn't his selection for the 2004 Olympic team seem totally absurd? I've always thought that Lamar Odom reminded me of Toni Kukoc; now his role is that of Kukoc's from the late-90's Bulls. Once a series he'll go for 25 and 12 and help them win a game they otherwise would have lost, and his passiveness is suddenly okay because now, in the fourth quarter, he can defer to not one, but two legitimate stars.
A lot of teams would kill to have the Fisher-Turiaf-Walton-Radmonovic-Farmar supporting cast . . . its phenomenal.
3) I totally agree. What would North Carolina in the 90's have been like if Rasheed, Stackhouse, Vince Carter and Antawn Jamison had stayed in school? What would the 2001 Blue Devils have looked like if Elton Brand was a senior? You can play this game all day. Some players, for instance Tyrus Thomas and Stromile Swift, clearly turn pro before learning all they need to learn in college, but when somebody like Kevin Durant or Chris Paul turns pro early, its hard to argue they had anything left to learn by continuing to play in the NCAA>
4) I predict that Kevin Love is going to fall to the middle or end of the first round, end up being drafted by a pretty strong team, then making a big contribution in 20 minutes a game as a rookie.
I love Derrick Rose's game, but, especially since he's a point guard, I hope he ends up on a team that's willing to bring him along slowly, perhaps under the tutelage of a solid veteran. Since he'll go at the top of the lottery, this is unlikely, but you never know - perhaps he'll end up on the same team as Andre Miller or somebody like that.
Michael Beasley is a beast. I wonder if, now tha tall of the best players have to go to college for one year, if we won't have a Kevin Durant/Michael Beasley type player every year for the foreseeable future. For a long time, players like those would have just turned professional, but now that they have to enter a depleted NCAA, 25 and 12 freshmen may not be as rare as they once were. Unlike Durant, though, when Beasley turns professional the team that drafts him will play him at his natural position, so he should have a smoother transition into the pros.
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