last week i started my weekly blog spotlight with Tyson Chandler, with mixed reviews. this week, i bring to you Gilbert Arenas.
this is a portion of his blog (that guy types entirely TOO much to quote it all) and for the most part, he speaks on the trades of this year.
http://my.nba.com/thread.jspa?threadID=300026301
The Trade Loophole
There’s excitement going around the NBA about this trading. I was very excited at first. I was excited about what Phoenix did because I thought they did a legit trade. What I mean by legit is, Marcus Banks and Shawn Marion, for Shaq. OK, congratulations guys, that’s a fair trade. Now, that Laker trade and this Dallas trade are really not sitting well with me.
There’s this loophole there, and I don’t want to get into too much detail because it’s a little iffy, but the loophole that the Lakers did and Dallas did was pull two players … who are not even in the NBA still … pulled them into the mix because they didn’t sign their retirement papers yet to make the deal happen. One was Aaron McKie, this man was a player development coach for the 76ers, but the Lakers had his rights so they pulled him in to make a deal happen and same thing with Keith Van Horn. Keith Van Horn was chillin’, minding his own business … I know some players are like, “Yeah, get that money, $4 million, come back and sit for 30 days. Do whatever you need to do.” But what players don’t look at is the oversight of the whole thing: That’s two jobs that somebody else could have had.
I know when I came into the league it was like 420 of the best basketball players in the world, now I think those numbers are shrinking. It’s got to be around 390 now. What they’re doing is just recycling old players to make deals happen, which I don’t think is fair because there are other guys out there that deserve a chance to make a team.
What I don’t like about the deals is what happens if now I go to a big name myself that’s on the trading block like Jermaine O’Neal was last week. “Look, J.O., we want you. They don’t want your contract anymore; we would love to have you. Here, look, I’m going to get a bunch of players together. I’m going to get Chris Whitney, I can get Harvey Grant and I can get LaRon Profit. OK, you make $17 million? We have to get within 80 percent of that so I’ll give them $5.5 million each prorated down for the 30 games left or whatever.” We’ll give them $5 million each, we’ll give that to Indiana, and we’ll get Jermaine O’Neal. Indiana, you cut them at the end of the year and that means you paid $5 million basically to get rid of $60 million left on his contract because of a loophole because these players aren’t signing their retirement papers.
So as a player, guess who’s not going to be signing his retirement papers?
The big one that stuck out, but the league shut it down quick, was Jerry Stackhouse. He exposed it a little bit of it when they were going to put him in a trade and he said, “I don’t care, I can sit for 30 days and come on and sign back.” Wait a minute, hold on. You can’t do that! That is manipulating the system. You get rid of Player A to get Player B to come in a trade, then Player A gets waived and you bring Player A back. Whoo! These owners …
As a player who is out of the league, it’s giving them opportunities, but for future players, it’s taking jobs away from them. That’s the thing. What if I’m No. 400 and there are only 399 jobs and the last one goes to somebody like Keith Van Horn? I’m like hey, hey, hey, you can give me that! I’ll do it! I’ll play! I just think it’s an unfair part of the rule because it’s taking away jobs from other players. Instead of making this business bigger, making the NBA a larger community, we’re actually shrinking the community because I know the numbers are smaller than what they were when I came into this league.
Talking Trades
# PHX-MIA: It’s going to take Shaq some time. Truthfully, he is not here for the regular season. Until people get that through their head, they’re going to judge the team by what’s happening right now. He’s not here for the regular season, he’s here for the playoffs. That’s what Shaq is built for – the playoffs. That’s all they’re doing, trying to get him in tune for the playoffs.
# DAL-NJN: Dallas got pretty good. They got one of the best point guards since John Stockton exited the league. You can’t say “since Magic” because John Stockton was after Magic. Since 2002 when John Stockton left, Jason Kidd has been the best point guard in the league. Steve Nash has really only come onto the scene strong in the last three years.
New Jersey got a young point guard out of the deal, but is he going to beat out Marcus Williams over there? They didn’t get trash back, they got a couple pieces who can compete in the East. They got a decent return though.
For Dallas, I think it gives them a leader. I know people will get mad and say, “Dirk’s already the leader, he’s the MVP,” but it’s hard to be the leader when you’re the four man. Let’s be honest. Was Karl Malone the leader of the Utah Jazz? No. Was Charles Barkley the leader of the Suns or was he just the vocal leader? Was Kevin Johnson running the team at the time? You can say Hakeem was the leader on the Rockets, but you still had Sam Cassell, Kenny Smith and Mario Elie at the time. The guy who dominates handling the ball is the natural leader, no matter what else you have on your team. So Dallas got a floor general. They got somebody who can mimic what Avery Johnson wants out there. I think if they had to make a move without losing any major pieces, that was the best move they could make.
# ATL-SAC: I like what Atlanta did with Mike Bibby. Even though he got hurt and he might be out for a couple weeks, he might be out too long for them to make the playoffs, I hope not, but I think that was a great move by them too. They got a point who can shoot, who can control the system, who can move the ball, who don’t really turn the ball over that much. The offense is going through Joe Johnson, but now you have steady hands giving it to him now and somebody who has a midrange game that’s out of this world. Don’t forget what he did in 2001-02 against the Lakers in that series. That’s what got him paid. He still has it in his system, he just has to get healthy.
# UTA-PHI: You know what team that got better but nobody talks about this deal? Utah. Kyle Korver. I don’t know what Philly was thinking at the time, because he doesn’t have a bad contract. His contract wasn’t bad, you know. Now the Sixers are a bunch of run-and-gunners, a bunch of jumpers. It reminds me of the Cleveland Cavaliers when LeBron James first got there, when you had all just athletes. You had LeBron, Ricky Davis, Darius Miles … you just got all these athletes. You don’t have one shooter, you don’t have one midrange guy, you don’t have none of that. I think that opens up Iguodala a whole lot when you have that shooter out there. But now Korver is over with the Utah Jazz and you can see the difference. They’re like 19-3 since he went there. It’s something ridiculous like that.
# CLE-CHI-SEA: Larry is in Chicago and happy. He’s going to get to run more than he ran in Cleveland. I think that’s what he thought he was going to do more of when he first got to the Cavs. I don’t want to speak for him, but we are texting back and forth and he seems happy.
They’re getting an older Ben Wallace. I don’t like writing players off, but Big Ben was good in that Pistons system just like Larry Hughes was good in our Wizards system and that’s what made them both special, a certain type of system. When Wallace went to Chicago, he wasn’t successful because he was used to Detroit’s system. He might be better in Cleveland than he was in Chicago though. Who knows?
They got rid of big man scoring from Gooden and a guard who can play defense and stick all of the other teams’ best guards in Hughes. Now they don’t have that anymore. The Cavs don’t have anybody who can do that anymore, unless LeBron is going to stick Kobe and Tracy McGrady and all of these key players which you really don’t want him to because you want him to have all his energy for his scoring. Other than that, they don’t have anybody like that. Delonte West and Daniel Gibson won’t be able to guard the powerful twos and the powerful ones that are playing in the league. So, they got hurt there.
You can give Wally Szczerbiak dap, but what’s the difference between him and Pavlovic? He’s just like a Pavlovic, so are you going to make Szczerbiak your two or are you going to make him your four? Because, him and LeBron are both the three. So it’s like, what did you actually get? Is Delonte West going to be your point guard, or your two? Is Daniel Gibson going to be your two or your point guard? Gibson is more of a spot up shooter. So, there’s some questions to be answered. Now you’re going to have Ben Wallace and Varejao in at the four and the five sometimes which gives you no low-post scoring. They’re going to have to have that lineup sometimes, Ilgauskas can’t play all day with the both of them. They’re going to have to play together. So is Ben Wallace the four and Ilgauskas the five, or is Ben Wallace coming off the bench and you’re putting Varejao in? Before, Drew would be in with Ilgauskas, and then you took Ilgauskas out and put Wild Thing in, then you take Drew Gooden out and put Ilgauskas back in so you always had somebody out there who could actually put a basket in manning the low post. Now you don’t when Ilgauskas goes to the bench.
It’s hard to tell, you see so many potential holes in the moves they made, but at the end of the day it comes down to how they use it. Maybe you put LeBron at the one and go from there, since he dominates the ball anyway; it just depends on how they want to play it out.
I almost forgot about Joe Smith. Joe Smith is consistent; he doesn’t take a bad shot. That will help them. He can hit that outside jump shot. But they got old. They got older from the move but they’re still one of those teams you got to look at.
# DET-TOR: Juan Dixon gives them a healthy Lindsay Hunter. That’s what Juan Dixon does, same feisty player that can shoot and score in bunches, they just picked up a youthful Lindsay Hunter.
# HOU-NOH: It was a good move. They picked up a veteran, a guy who can get it done and he’s been getting it done for as long as he’s been in the league. New Orleans gets Mike James too and Mike James is one of those players, if he knows he’s getting consistent minutes, he’s going to play consistently. With the Rockets he didn’t get to show what he was doing because they had so many stacked pieces at those positions, it was like a lottery where they’d just pull somebody’s name each night. Some players can’t play like that. I wouldn’t be surprised if you saw a different Mike James when he gets there.
# HOU-MIN: That’s kind of bad, he’s been traded twice already since his rookie year, young fella who just won the dunk contest. None of that matters though. All it takes is the team you lay with. One successful year and you’re in. Stephen Jackson was cut 11 times before he won that ring with San Antonio. Chauncey Billups was on like seven teams before he landed with the Pistons. All it takes is one team that plays your style of basketball and the coach believes in you and you’re there ready to show your talents. I’ve seen the kid Green play before. He can shoot, he can jump, he has moves – so he has all the tools to become good, I don’t know his work ethic though.
# SAS-SEA: I think that was a great move for them. I thought it was a bad move when Phoenix got rid of him because I thought he helped Amare out a little bit. Now San Antonio picked him up and it’s going to help open up the floor a little more. They’re one of those teams that are picking up those little pieces, like Damon Stoudamire, that are helping them out and nobody is paying attention too.
So, the teams that were powerful got more powerful and some of the mid level teams got even better too.
I really don’t know how the West will play out, I can honestly say that. But, I’m going to be watching. I know New Orleans has the best record now, but playoff time, these veterans are winning. Me and Chris Paul are 100 grand strong, I love what he’s doing with his career in turning the franchise from zero to 60 in less than two years, I just think that’s great, but these other teams in the West got better. A lot better.
To be the ninth spot in the West, that is crazy. Ten games over .500 and you’re in the ninth spot.
The only thing the East is hoping that happens in the playoffs is that the Western Conference beats themselves up, just beat themselves up and let the East team sneak in.
this is a portion of his blog (that guy types entirely TOO much to quote it all) and for the most part, he speaks on the trades of this year.
http://my.nba.com/thread.jspa?threadID=300026301
The Trade Loophole
There’s excitement going around the NBA about this trading. I was very excited at first. I was excited about what Phoenix did because I thought they did a legit trade. What I mean by legit is, Marcus Banks and Shawn Marion, for Shaq. OK, congratulations guys, that’s a fair trade. Now, that Laker trade and this Dallas trade are really not sitting well with me.
There’s this loophole there, and I don’t want to get into too much detail because it’s a little iffy, but the loophole that the Lakers did and Dallas did was pull two players … who are not even in the NBA still … pulled them into the mix because they didn’t sign their retirement papers yet to make the deal happen. One was Aaron McKie, this man was a player development coach for the 76ers, but the Lakers had his rights so they pulled him in to make a deal happen and same thing with Keith Van Horn. Keith Van Horn was chillin’, minding his own business … I know some players are like, “Yeah, get that money, $4 million, come back and sit for 30 days. Do whatever you need to do.” But what players don’t look at is the oversight of the whole thing: That’s two jobs that somebody else could have had.
I know when I came into the league it was like 420 of the best basketball players in the world, now I think those numbers are shrinking. It’s got to be around 390 now. What they’re doing is just recycling old players to make deals happen, which I don’t think is fair because there are other guys out there that deserve a chance to make a team.
What I don’t like about the deals is what happens if now I go to a big name myself that’s on the trading block like Jermaine O’Neal was last week. “Look, J.O., we want you. They don’t want your contract anymore; we would love to have you. Here, look, I’m going to get a bunch of players together. I’m going to get Chris Whitney, I can get Harvey Grant and I can get LaRon Profit. OK, you make $17 million? We have to get within 80 percent of that so I’ll give them $5.5 million each prorated down for the 30 games left or whatever.” We’ll give them $5 million each, we’ll give that to Indiana, and we’ll get Jermaine O’Neal. Indiana, you cut them at the end of the year and that means you paid $5 million basically to get rid of $60 million left on his contract because of a loophole because these players aren’t signing their retirement papers.
So as a player, guess who’s not going to be signing his retirement papers?
The big one that stuck out, but the league shut it down quick, was Jerry Stackhouse. He exposed it a little bit of it when they were going to put him in a trade and he said, “I don’t care, I can sit for 30 days and come on and sign back.” Wait a minute, hold on. You can’t do that! That is manipulating the system. You get rid of Player A to get Player B to come in a trade, then Player A gets waived and you bring Player A back. Whoo! These owners …
As a player who is out of the league, it’s giving them opportunities, but for future players, it’s taking jobs away from them. That’s the thing. What if I’m No. 400 and there are only 399 jobs and the last one goes to somebody like Keith Van Horn? I’m like hey, hey, hey, you can give me that! I’ll do it! I’ll play! I just think it’s an unfair part of the rule because it’s taking away jobs from other players. Instead of making this business bigger, making the NBA a larger community, we’re actually shrinking the community because I know the numbers are smaller than what they were when I came into this league.
Talking Trades
# PHX-MIA: It’s going to take Shaq some time. Truthfully, he is not here for the regular season. Until people get that through their head, they’re going to judge the team by what’s happening right now. He’s not here for the regular season, he’s here for the playoffs. That’s what Shaq is built for – the playoffs. That’s all they’re doing, trying to get him in tune for the playoffs.
# DAL-NJN: Dallas got pretty good. They got one of the best point guards since John Stockton exited the league. You can’t say “since Magic” because John Stockton was after Magic. Since 2002 when John Stockton left, Jason Kidd has been the best point guard in the league. Steve Nash has really only come onto the scene strong in the last three years.
New Jersey got a young point guard out of the deal, but is he going to beat out Marcus Williams over there? They didn’t get trash back, they got a couple pieces who can compete in the East. They got a decent return though.
For Dallas, I think it gives them a leader. I know people will get mad and say, “Dirk’s already the leader, he’s the MVP,” but it’s hard to be the leader when you’re the four man. Let’s be honest. Was Karl Malone the leader of the Utah Jazz? No. Was Charles Barkley the leader of the Suns or was he just the vocal leader? Was Kevin Johnson running the team at the time? You can say Hakeem was the leader on the Rockets, but you still had Sam Cassell, Kenny Smith and Mario Elie at the time. The guy who dominates handling the ball is the natural leader, no matter what else you have on your team. So Dallas got a floor general. They got somebody who can mimic what Avery Johnson wants out there. I think if they had to make a move without losing any major pieces, that was the best move they could make.
# ATL-SAC: I like what Atlanta did with Mike Bibby. Even though he got hurt and he might be out for a couple weeks, he might be out too long for them to make the playoffs, I hope not, but I think that was a great move by them too. They got a point who can shoot, who can control the system, who can move the ball, who don’t really turn the ball over that much. The offense is going through Joe Johnson, but now you have steady hands giving it to him now and somebody who has a midrange game that’s out of this world. Don’t forget what he did in 2001-02 against the Lakers in that series. That’s what got him paid. He still has it in his system, he just has to get healthy.
# UTA-PHI: You know what team that got better but nobody talks about this deal? Utah. Kyle Korver. I don’t know what Philly was thinking at the time, because he doesn’t have a bad contract. His contract wasn’t bad, you know. Now the Sixers are a bunch of run-and-gunners, a bunch of jumpers. It reminds me of the Cleveland Cavaliers when LeBron James first got there, when you had all just athletes. You had LeBron, Ricky Davis, Darius Miles … you just got all these athletes. You don’t have one shooter, you don’t have one midrange guy, you don’t have none of that. I think that opens up Iguodala a whole lot when you have that shooter out there. But now Korver is over with the Utah Jazz and you can see the difference. They’re like 19-3 since he went there. It’s something ridiculous like that.
# CLE-CHI-SEA: Larry is in Chicago and happy. He’s going to get to run more than he ran in Cleveland. I think that’s what he thought he was going to do more of when he first got to the Cavs. I don’t want to speak for him, but we are texting back and forth and he seems happy.
They’re getting an older Ben Wallace. I don’t like writing players off, but Big Ben was good in that Pistons system just like Larry Hughes was good in our Wizards system and that’s what made them both special, a certain type of system. When Wallace went to Chicago, he wasn’t successful because he was used to Detroit’s system. He might be better in Cleveland than he was in Chicago though. Who knows?
They got rid of big man scoring from Gooden and a guard who can play defense and stick all of the other teams’ best guards in Hughes. Now they don’t have that anymore. The Cavs don’t have anybody who can do that anymore, unless LeBron is going to stick Kobe and Tracy McGrady and all of these key players which you really don’t want him to because you want him to have all his energy for his scoring. Other than that, they don’t have anybody like that. Delonte West and Daniel Gibson won’t be able to guard the powerful twos and the powerful ones that are playing in the league. So, they got hurt there.
You can give Wally Szczerbiak dap, but what’s the difference between him and Pavlovic? He’s just like a Pavlovic, so are you going to make Szczerbiak your two or are you going to make him your four? Because, him and LeBron are both the three. So it’s like, what did you actually get? Is Delonte West going to be your point guard, or your two? Is Daniel Gibson going to be your two or your point guard? Gibson is more of a spot up shooter. So, there’s some questions to be answered. Now you’re going to have Ben Wallace and Varejao in at the four and the five sometimes which gives you no low-post scoring. They’re going to have to have that lineup sometimes, Ilgauskas can’t play all day with the both of them. They’re going to have to play together. So is Ben Wallace the four and Ilgauskas the five, or is Ben Wallace coming off the bench and you’re putting Varejao in? Before, Drew would be in with Ilgauskas, and then you took Ilgauskas out and put Wild Thing in, then you take Drew Gooden out and put Ilgauskas back in so you always had somebody out there who could actually put a basket in manning the low post. Now you don’t when Ilgauskas goes to the bench.
It’s hard to tell, you see so many potential holes in the moves they made, but at the end of the day it comes down to how they use it. Maybe you put LeBron at the one and go from there, since he dominates the ball anyway; it just depends on how they want to play it out.
I almost forgot about Joe Smith. Joe Smith is consistent; he doesn’t take a bad shot. That will help them. He can hit that outside jump shot. But they got old. They got older from the move but they’re still one of those teams you got to look at.
# DET-TOR: Juan Dixon gives them a healthy Lindsay Hunter. That’s what Juan Dixon does, same feisty player that can shoot and score in bunches, they just picked up a youthful Lindsay Hunter.
# HOU-NOH: It was a good move. They picked up a veteran, a guy who can get it done and he’s been getting it done for as long as he’s been in the league. New Orleans gets Mike James too and Mike James is one of those players, if he knows he’s getting consistent minutes, he’s going to play consistently. With the Rockets he didn’t get to show what he was doing because they had so many stacked pieces at those positions, it was like a lottery where they’d just pull somebody’s name each night. Some players can’t play like that. I wouldn’t be surprised if you saw a different Mike James when he gets there.
# HOU-MIN: That’s kind of bad, he’s been traded twice already since his rookie year, young fella who just won the dunk contest. None of that matters though. All it takes is the team you lay with. One successful year and you’re in. Stephen Jackson was cut 11 times before he won that ring with San Antonio. Chauncey Billups was on like seven teams before he landed with the Pistons. All it takes is one team that plays your style of basketball and the coach believes in you and you’re there ready to show your talents. I’ve seen the kid Green play before. He can shoot, he can jump, he has moves – so he has all the tools to become good, I don’t know his work ethic though.
# SAS-SEA: I think that was a great move for them. I thought it was a bad move when Phoenix got rid of him because I thought he helped Amare out a little bit. Now San Antonio picked him up and it’s going to help open up the floor a little more. They’re one of those teams that are picking up those little pieces, like Damon Stoudamire, that are helping them out and nobody is paying attention too.
So, the teams that were powerful got more powerful and some of the mid level teams got even better too.
I really don’t know how the West will play out, I can honestly say that. But, I’m going to be watching. I know New Orleans has the best record now, but playoff time, these veterans are winning. Me and Chris Paul are 100 grand strong, I love what he’s doing with his career in turning the franchise from zero to 60 in less than two years, I just think that’s great, but these other teams in the West got better. A lot better.
To be the ninth spot in the West, that is crazy. Ten games over .500 and you’re in the ninth spot.
The only thing the East is hoping that happens in the playoffs is that the Western Conference beats themselves up, just beat themselves up and let the East team sneak in.
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