SB Nation User Blog: Sports2

KC Responds to an Email: Bulls were pulling '08 BG offer regardless

Sports2 — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 14:57:47 -0000

I'm making this a FanPost because it's kind of long and wordy. Doug reports "Bulls wanted to dump Gordon no matter what?". He reports on a email sent to KC from RealGM poster Homo Sapien.

HomoSapien:

The Bulls benched Gordon for Chris Duhon for a season and a half. They benched him for Larry Hughes for 25 games. They offered him much less money than Luol Deng, and then took away his offer the moment he was ready to accept it. This off-season Reinsdorf was quoted as saying that Gordon wouldn't have been able to get playing time behind Rose, Hinrich, and Salmons. Gordon is arguably the best player amongst this group, and currently has the highest PER. Are the Bulls brass just delusional or are they just really disrespectful towards him?

KC:
Disrespectful to him. Never understood their stance with BG. As for the pulled offer, I've heard they decided they made a mistake even offering it to him so even if he said he wanted to sign it, the offer was going to be pulled.

Doug is flummoxed and pissed.

What it seems to point me to is that the Bulls, even more than treating a sport like a business, treat business like a matter of personal friendship and business personal at a ridiculous level. Certain guys are described as and treated like family, despite glaring flaws. Other guys could walk on water and will never be family. It's messed up, and it's no way to run an muli-million dollar business.

Could Jerome James be traded for useful depth?

Sports2 — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:47:21 -0000

Obviously we're very close to the luxury tax and we're finding our "depth" of Gray, Pargo and Hunter is (to everyone's complete shock) not very good. One way to acquire another player or two without going over the luxury tax threshold would be to find a team over the luxury tax that would like to save money by unloading an unneeded player onto us for James.

Here's a couple examples of how it'd work.

Bulls trade Jerome James ($6.6M, but insurance is covering his contract, so the true bill to the team is only $1.3M).

Bucks trade Luke Ridnour ($6.5M)

Bucks trade Joe Alexander, Fran Elson, Roko Ukic ($5.6M)

In either trade, the salary cap ramifications are basically neutral, but the Bulls go from collecting insurance on James to actually paying that much salary. So the downside for the Bulls is they have to spend more money. But, they actually get players who may be useful.

The Bucks, on the other hand, have little use for any of those players, as none of them but Ridnour play much. Ridnour is actually a useful player, but the Bucks have Jennings, Bell, Redd, and Delfino, as well as Jodie Meeks, to suck up most of the minutes.

By trading Ridnour for James, the Bucks save about $5M. We'd have to spend about $5M

A similar deal could be had with the Lakers. We trade James, and the Lakers trade Adam Morrison and Jordan Farmar. That'd save the Lakers something on the order of $6.5M when it comes to luxury tax bill. Of course, maybe the Lakers are more interested in winning and wouldn't give up Farmar for nothing. But it'd be worth exploring.

Of course, from a Bulls perspective, any of these deals would increase our payroll, even though they wouldn't put us into the luxury tax.

Trade ideas: Hinrich for Kevin Martin / Ship out Salmons

Sports2 — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 17:22:33 -0000

Bulls trade Kirk Hinrich, James Johnson ($11.1M this year, $10.7M next year)

Kings trade Kevin Martin ($10.6M this year)

Why this works for the Kings.

Tyreke Evans looks mostly like a wing player who would be well-complemented by a solid PG. The Kings don't have a solid point guard. It's unclear how well Evans and Martin will work together since they both appear to work best at the same position. Hinrich would fill the PG role and, because his salary declines over the next few years, constitute savings vs. Martin. Johnson is still a decent prospect, and if he turns out not to work, the Kings can save money by not picking up his options down the road.

Why this works for the Bulls

We are so screwed in the scoring department for this year it's not even funny. Martin seems like an ideal fit in that respect. He's a good scorer and a very good shooter from distance. In those senses, he seems like he'd be a very good player to fit between Deng and Rose. Defensively I don't think he's quite as good as Kirk, but I don't think he'd have a tangibly negative effect on team defense either. We'll live and die up front.

In the longer run, this is essentially a push financially, so it doesn't kill the idea of getting a 2010 free agent. We'd still need to ensure Salmons opts out, or is traded to have significant cap space, but that's been the name of the game up to this point anyway. With Martin in the fold, however, our reliance on a risky plan would go down quite a bit.

After the jump, another trade and some general thoughts for a Bulls plan for success

I started thinking of the K-Mart Hinrich trade in the context of someone on S2 suggesting Deng for K-Mart. Unfortunately, I don't know that Deng for K-Mart would do much for us. I sort of like the idea of Kevin Martin, but I don't know if trading Deng to get him makes us much different. He's rather less injury prone, but still pretty injury prone. I don't know if dollar for dollar he's much of a better risk than Deng.

The best case scenario for that is we've recreated the devastating Salmons/K-Mart attack the Kings had going for them last year. Oh wait....

Maybe we're better off just ignoring the risk of everyone's injuries and trying to combine Deng and K-Mart. I'd like it better than the Salmons/K-Mart movie, which was a bomb the first time around.

Beyond that, it fits into my thinking of a balanced offensive attack, by adding a true outside threat to complement Deng's mid-range game and Rose's ability to attack the basket. Getting Tyrus back and getting good production up front would be the ideal final step, but first lets focus on what we can control.

Speaking of control and Salmons, a concern especially after this sort of trade would be our prospects for free agency next year. We need Salmons to opt out, or we need to trade him for expiring contracts. Also, we need to worry about depth. If we trade away Kirk and JJ, even getting back a guard leaves us with no real backup PG. Trading Salmons leaves our depth on the wings iffy.

So the ideal situation would be a second trade that sends out Salmons -and, if we could manage it- pulling the plug on Pargo- and replacing them with real depth that could help us throughout the rest of the season, then be off our cap.

With those thoughts in mind, how about

Salmons for Keyon Dooling and Jarvis Hayes?

Salmons and Jerome James (and potentially a 2010 protected 1st rounder) for Mike Miller and Randy Foye?

Both of these trades would fill out the team with actual, somewhat capable depth without hurting our longer run position.

Thoughts on trades that work for the Bulls

Sports2 — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:34:59 -0000

Consistent with my thoughts on the season, I see three sorts of trades that make sense and have some likelihood of working out for the Bulls.

1. Trade for a FA target if their team falls apart. That'd be Wade (very unlikely since the Heat look good), James (pretty unlikely, but we're hearing rumblings of unhappiness), or Bosh (They're 3-4, and looking better but not outstanding). This really doesn't need any analysis in basketball terms. The only relevant fact is if one of these guys tells his team he wants to be traded and he wants to come here. Otherwise, a deal like this ain't getting done because a team won't trade a superstar unless he is holding a gun to their head.

Still, this is the sort of deal in which I'd consider trading Luol Deng and/or, since we'd both get an upgrade in talent and offset most of the salary of the incoming star. That would allow us to, potentially, add that star (say Bosh) and then go out and make a pitch to a guy like James that he could and should come join up with a Rose, Bosh, Noah trio.

Example: Deng, Tyrus, JJ, Pick for Bosh. That, I think, still leaves us with enough cap space to make a realistic pitch for Lebron or Wade. Dynasty baby.

2. Trade for a player that combines short-run help and an expiring contract. The goal here is to clear additional cap room (by offloading Salmons and maybe punting on our "Tyrus Problem") and getting back a guy who is obviously better than those guys.

Example: Trade James/Salmons/Tyrus for Tmac and change. I'd be willing to throw in James Johnson too.

Another idea would be the much mentioned Boozer for Jerome James + Salmons/Tyrus idea. I'm a little iffier on that since I think we're weaker on the wings than up front (who'd replace Salmons in the backcourt?), but it'd probably be an upgrade.

3. Trade Trade for a younger player on a rookie deal we can afford to keep without giving up on FA dreams. And oh yeah, the youngster needs to really be able to play. Tyrus, who we can't afford to re-sign, would be the obvious bait, but if we found a team willing to take on salary next year too, that would be ideal (That is, Salmons or Kirk, perhaps).

Example: I think the early returns on James Harden are looking pretty good, but I don't see that the Thunder have immediate plans for him, and they look like the stereotypical team that is just a veteran or two away. Kirk + Tyrus for James Harden, Sean Livingston and Etan Thomas works in the trade machine. I think this would be a calculated risk, because we remove a veteran at a time we need to make a playoff push, but I strongly believe Harden would contribute immediately and we'd cover two others bases. We both create more cap space for next year (Harden will make several million less than Kirk) and we cover our SG position in the long run since it's unlikely we actually fill it in free agency next summer. Similar targets might be Gerald Henderson, Stephen Curry, Brandan Wright, Eric Gordon etc.

What I really think about the Pacers

Sports2 — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:54:12 -0000

Firing Mel Daniels over his (rumored) spilling the Pacers guts to Peter Vecsey seems like more of a distraction from the story Vecsey ran with than the story itself. Last year Vecsey got loudly bashed by the Bulls organization for writing that John Paxson was going to step down as GM. And after loudly bashing Vecsey, Paxson.... stepped down as GM.

So that brings us to the Pacers and Larry Bird. Based on the various articles and interviews directly with him I've heard, I find it very believable that Bird might step down at the end of the year. He's never looked like a man happy with "living the life" to me. And if that's the case, I think it's especially improper to extend the coach. If you're a short-timer, don't commit the team to a multi-million dollar expenditure to lock in your buddy. That's not right in any case, but it's especially not right in the case of a that's already struggling financially in a small market

When you see stuff like that going on, it explains why the Pacers are struggling so badly. Good businesses don't do that. Also, good businesses don't have to hire pollsters to tell them what their fans are thinking. It's a relatively extravagant expense that doesn't yield any thing useful. If the Pacers brass is too dense to figure it out on their own, they're going to be too dense to figure out how to use the information they paid for.

At the end of the day, the "cultural" problems are important, but the biggest killer is that this team has repeatedly made poor decisions on talent. Looking across this team, what I see is a serious lack of NBA talent. We've got one star, Granger, and one guy, Dunleavy, who's an above average but not star player who must be accounted for by opposing defenses. And of course, he's going to be returning for a career threatening injury (or not), so we don't know what he'll really bring. We've guys are are legitimate NBA starters, Murphy and Ford, but who are certainly not above the average for what NBA starters should be.

That's 4 guys, and maybe only 3, with any credibility at all. And you need five guys to start. As prospects go, I think Hibbert and Hansbrough are decent, but good teams don't rely on big contributions from prospects. I think Rush is a mediocre prospect. They're not proven players. Jeff Foster is an above average backup, but paid a lot. Sol Jones is fine, but I'm not sure he's much better than a replacement level player.

Dahntay Jones, Earl Watson, Luther Head... none one of these guys brings much of value in my eyes. If you disagree, fine, but I think if anyone of them went down today, we could find a free agent off the street who could perform at basically the same level. That's especially bad when it comes to D. Jones, a guy we've locked into for 4 years.

So this team has 3-4 good players and three prospects who might become good players but aren't now. And by the way, it's not like we project them to be all-stars. Can't win with that.

Unfortunately, I don't see any easy ways out, either. Not that there ever is from bad decisions, but the Pacers are capped out, don't have a surplus of draft picks, and don't have players and contracts that look to be in obvious demand to, well, anyone. So I don't see any obvious means of improvement through trade. To get shorter contracts (and thus flexibility), we'd have to give up talent, and we don't have much talent to give up. To get more talent, we'd have to give up shorter contracts, and we don't have much in the way of short contracts to give up.

Poor management? Check!

Poor talent? Check!

Poor finances? Check!

In short, this team has been run into the ground.

Big Baby Davis has thumb broken by college teammate

Sports2 — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 19:44:59 -0000

Big Baby Davis has thumb broken by college teammate

Salacious speculation: Tyrus?

If I were Jerry Reinsdorf (a double duty fanpost)

Sports2 — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 02:57:27 -0000

Not in Reinsdorf's position with my desire to win basketball games, but in Reinsdorf's position with his prioritization of cost, flexibility, loyalty and winning, I'd be thinking hard about what the new CBA is gonna look like.

I've been mulling over what the likely effects are of the CBA negotiations coming down the pike. Everything I read seems to indicate the owners are going to push hard for a smaller cap, a hard cap, shorter contracts and probably smaller contracts. I've seen lots of folks that suggest the new CBA will benefit the owners. I've seen no one suggest the new CBA will benefit the players (versus the current situation).

These facts might make a cautious owner with an eye on the bottom line not want to sign any contracts next summer (under the current CBA) - during the "2010 bonanza" - because they could be especially overpriced under the new CBA.

For that matter, it might also behoove them to make an Okafor for Chandler type trade with Luol Deng. The idea being that Deng's contract, while in line with what a player like Deng could expect under the current CBA and good economic times, is prohibitive and out of line with what you'll pay Deng under the upcoming CBA. Which would be another reason to trade him (in addition to the ones I wrote here, but didn't have the guts to post here after that trade Rose fanpost).

Anyway, since Jerry proclaimed Deng a future all-star, trading him is either exactly what he's thinking or the last thing he's thinking. I guess we'll see. Of course, Jerry's got a lot of other stuff on his mind at the moment. Continue reading after the jump to find out what's up with Jerry's latest adventure...

... turns out his bid to buy the NHL's Phoenix Coyotes is in a bit o' trouble.

Glendale and the NHL are desperately trying to salvage an offer for the Phoenix Coyotes that was put in jeopardy after confidential Bankruptcy Court files were leaked that showed the bidder wanted guarantees of millions of dollars from the city and an escape clause to move the team.

Chicago sports mogul Jerry Reinsdorf, who with other investors has offered $148 million for the professional hockey team, was outraged by the leak of court documents Friday and threatened to withdraw his offer. It left Glendale and NHL officials scrambling over the weekend to repair relations with one of the few potential buyers wanting to keep the Coyotes in the Valley

This went down on Monday. What's really interesting to me is there's another ownership group that has apparently bid significantly more, and plans to move the team to Ontario (where, you know, they actually like hockey).

Moyes' attorneys had indicated to Glendale before filing that they planned to submit the documents to the judge under seal.

Glendale and the NHL, however, painted it as a ploy by Moyes to undermine Reinsdorf's bid, which does not include money to repay $104 million Moyes said he loaned to the team.

Moyes prefers a $212.5 million offer from Canadian businessman Jim Balsillie that would move the team to Ontario and put some money back
in Moyes' pocket.

One document was removed from the Web site by the court clerk. Another document containing a brief summary of the sealed facts remains.

Glendale City Manager Ed Beasley asked Baum to hold in contempt Moyes' counsel at Phoenix-based Jennings, Strouss and Salmon.

So basically it seems to me that the Canadian guy is offering $60M more dollars, plus he's not asking for millions of dollars of subsidies from the city of Glendale, AZ, population 250,000, to support hockey in a place where no one gives a shit about it.

This seems to me like a pretty classic case of the local government throwing good money after bad. It's spent an ass-load to build a hockey arena, and there's just not much of a market for it in Phoenix. The team is pretty much bankrupt. Shouldn't they just let it go instead of wasting more money on it (Yeah, if the Coyotes leave, they don't get any money from leasing them the arena, but if that's offset by paying out millions in subsidies, they're pretty well screwed there anyway. From the documents, Reinsdorf's proposal mostly seems to center around getting more revenue from the city by imposing taxes on restaurants and hotels servicing Arizona Cardinals fans.

Anyway, it appears Jerry was dealt another blow today when the bankruptcy judge overseeing the case ruled bidders who intend to move the Coyotes can enter the auction for the team.

U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Redfield T. Baum ruled Wedneday that PSE Sports and Entertainment, led by Jim Balsillie, will take part in the highly anticipated Sept. 10 auction, along with other qualified bidders, looking to take over the Phoenix Coyotes.

That ruling is a blow to the city of Glendale and the National Hockey League, which have animatedly voiced disapproval of moving the team to Hamilton, Ontario, as proposed by Balsillie.

"From the time his bid was launched, Jim Balsillie has said that all he is asking for is a chance to bid for the Coyotes at auction through the bankruptcy court process on a level playing field and let the best bid win," Bill Walker, Balsillie’s spokesman, said in a statement. "That’s fair and transparent. It’s the best outcome for creditors and for the future of the franchise."

Attorney Gary Husk, who is representing the city of Glendale, said the west suburb is supportive of having a "Glendale-only option," so that "reduces the risk a little bit."

Glendale built Jobing.com Arena, where the Coyotes play.

Husk said the ruling expedites the process and will provide for a side-by-side comparison, but it isn’t detrimental to Glendale.

"The side-by-side analysis will be very positive to determine which bidder has the more favorable proposal, not only for the city of Glendale but for all the creditors."

National Hockey League owners on July 29 voted to back Jerry Reinsdorf’s $148 million bid to buy the Phoenix Coyotes hockey team from owner Jerry Moyes. Reinsdorf owns the Chicago White Sox and Bulls.

The Coyotes are in Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization and the NHL and Moyes are battling over who can buy the team. Moyes wants to sell the Coyotes to Research in Motion CEO Balsillie for $213 million.

Reinsdorf’s $148 million bid to buy the Phoenix Coyotes hockey team includes little or no cash from him or any of his investors. Instead it centers on assuming and reworking debt. His offer is a stark contrast with the $213 million all-cash bid tendered by Balsillie. Balsillie would use part of his personal fortune to buy the Coyotes.

In short, Jerry's business accumen basically amounts to getting an incedibly sweet deal from powerbrokers who are willing to ignore $60M in cash. Score!

Completely serious trade Derrick Rose idea

Sports2 — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 17:27:34 -0000

As I said, we're at a crossroads. some win now guys and some win later guys. Up to this point, we've largely talked about building the team around Derrick Rose, since he's clearly going to be our best player and his best years are clearly ahead of him.

I'm going to suggest we do the opposite. Our current older players are not bad. They're good compliments if we had those stars to put them around. The problem is we don't, and our star is only 20 years old.

As I mentioned before, I think we don't have enough cap space next year without making trades that undercut our ability to actually land a FA. And if we do nothing, we've got an incoherent mix of young and old without the obvious ability to get better.

The best case scenario I see presented is something like we dump Hinrich, Salmons opts out, and we get Dwyane Wade next year". That leaves us with a team of
Rose
Wade
Deng, JJ
?
Noah

That's nice, but the reality is that Wade is in his late 20s, in his prime, and is quite a bit more "ready to win" than the rest of the team. It's not the sort of fit anyone will be looking for. The problem is, to get Wade, we'd have to jettison most of our veteran complementary players. It doesn't look like a very well-conceived plan to me, which is why I'd have preferred to keep Gordon and then make a push for Bosh, who could have been the third leg of a team that would all hit its prime together. But that's not gonna happen now. But since that's water under the bridge, the question is how, if we got Wade, we'd build a good enough team around him to win. We'd need exactly the sort of complementary guys - Miller, Salmons, Hinrich - that we wouldn't be able to keep.

I think the solution is to look at what we could get for Rose, and consider if we couldn't get Wade now, thus enabling us to keep the veteran sort of players around him we'd need to win with.

Besides the general theory that you need to build a team of appropriately complementary, mostly similarly aged players to win with, we also might be presented with another requirement. Opportunity.

I think under normal circumstances, any call to the Heat about Wade would be met my laughter and a quick hang up. However the recent going on in Miami, I think, create at least some potential for getting him.

Wade has been offered an extension, within a context of some disagreement about whether he'd sign one. The Heat and Wade seem to be playing a game of chicken. Wade says he won't sign till the Heat get better, and the Heat say they can't make a decision about getting help until they've got Wade locked up.

Sounds like a breakdown in trust to me. I have to think that if Wade follows through and doesn't sign the extension, the Heat have to at least consider moving him

Oh, did I mention that Wade wants to play with Carlos Boozer?

Boozer, for his part, is a guy the Jazz are deperately trying to unload with little salary coming back, given their financial situation and desire to keep Paul Millsap. Understandable... I'd rather have Millsap too, but I'd take Boozer.

So why not try for two great tastes that taste great together (and want to be together), and land both Wade and Boozer. And oh, by the way, have a solid, mostly veteran team to put around them.

Here's the deal:

Bulls trade Derrick Rose, Tyrus Thomas, and Tim Thomas to Miami and Jerome James's 80% insured contract (true cost $1.3M) to Utah.
Bulls receive Dwyane Wade and Carlos Boozer

1- Hinrich
2- Wade
3- Deng, Salmons
4- Boozer, Johnson
5- Noah, Miller

I don't know if that's a title team or not, but it's certainly a contender, and it's a young one that can conceivably be kept together for several years. This is the best we could conceivably do, and I think it works pretty well for the Jazz (mission accomplished on immediate savings for Boozer) and the Heat, if things are actually deteriorating that badly with Wade.

This is a repost of my original post at S2. What do you all think? I think Rose is one of the few players who might make the Heat consider. And I think Wade is one of the few players who, especially with Boozer as well, might turn the rest of this team into something good.

The Pistons have reached deal in principle with Ben Gordon

Sports2 — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 23:03:42 -0000

The Pistons have reached deal in principle with Ben Gordon

[From the FanShots. More later, count on it. -ed.]

The Pistons have reached deal in principle with Bulls guard Ben Gordon, a source with knowledge of talks tells Y! Sports Adrian Wojnarowski

My James Johnson Profile

Sports2 — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:59:39 -0000

Good:

He's got excellent size and athleticism for both forward spots. He's a ridiculous 257lbs, but he's really athletic, posting good times in the sprint and agility drills, bench pressing a ton, and jumping out of the gym.

In short, he compares very well physically to plenty of successful players. The closest contemporary comparison might be Ryan Gomes, but with way more athleticism. Perhaps Lebron James if Johnson loses 10-15 lbs. Yes, really.

He's a trained martial arts expert, which suggests to me excellent body control and the potential for good discipline.

Productively, he's demonstrated good but not great returns to his unworldly physical abilities. First, Wake Forest played at an NBA Pace. That's something that's not generally noted, but it's pretty important when considering how guys adjust. For example, Blair and Pitt played a game that had something like 80 possessions per 48 minutes. The slowest paced NBA team, the Blazers, played 86.6. The Bulls played 93 I think. Wake Forest played about 90 possessions per 48 minutes. So he might be a bit more used to that sort of play from the get-go.

Within this background, he produced at good but not great levels. He's got range out to the 3 point line, he can rebound, and he finished pretty well. He appears to be able to pass the ball.

Bad:
The only physical negative I see is that weight. He's got 12% body fat in a world where the average successful NBA SF has 6-7% and the average PF has 8-9%. With proper conditioning, I'd guess his proper playing weight would be about 245lbs.

Statistically, he was right on the margin of "troubling" in two areas. First, he fouled quite a bit, though he's not a foul machine. Second, he was just under 70% as a free throw shooter, which isn't all that great, but marginally acceptable. Third, for a guy with his physical tools, he really didn't get to the line a lot compared to what really top notch guys do.

Other:
* He apparently annoyed Chris Paul so badly that Paul told the Hornets not to draft him if available. Usually good players want their college teammates, especially if they think they can be good pros. That's sort of annoying.
* He's talked about an MMA career if basketball doesn't work out. The upside of that is he's a bad ass. The downside is I don't want him thinking aobut what happens if basketball doesn't work out.
* He came to basketball a bit late. I think I read he only started playing a couple years into high school.

Conclusions:
James Johnson has the tools to be an absolutely spectacular player. His physical gifts are second to none, even for the NBA. And his skills are impressive. He's demonstrated every tool you'd want from a basketball player on the court. Except... an overwhelming commitment and drive to succeed.

That's the common theme.

Physically he's gifted, but he's not in the best shape he could possibly be in. Productively, he's demonstrated superb skills, but hasn't produced to the level one could imagine a player with his skills producing at. In short, it's all there, and even if he half-asses it, he can still be useful. But if he really commits and works his ass off, he could be amazing.