At this point, I'd say waiting til the trade deadline is the best possible scenario... And then after that, we can wait for the NBA Draft.
Move to Plan C, or D, or whatever they think will marginally improve the roster. Locking up Roy for five years seems to be Plan Z at this point.
It was always going to be matched, but kudos to KP for trying. What he fucked up was not trading at the deadline. I don't look forward to hearing "we like our team", and "we will look to use our cap space for a lopsided trade at the deadline"
I would really like to know what the Blazers' thinking was on this one..... it was obvious to everyone that Utah would match. They did it anyway. I don't think Pritchard ever had any intention of signing Millsap, so what was the motivation? Was it: A) To stick it to Utah simply because he could? B) Set up a trade or signing of another player? There has to be a reason.
Exactly. His excuse is without making a move we'll have flexibility by the deadline to make a lopsided trade. Uhh... We had a fucking gold mine last season in Raef's contract and he did nothing. Kudos, KP.
Maybe to stall and give himself time to think and make it look like he's going after someone so the ridiculously dumb fans will get off his back? Maybe.
IMO I think KP pays more attention to his fan base than any other GM in the league. So, maybe. I also think it's ridiculous that fans are DEMANDING a move be made or else KP is a failure. Just amazes me.
I don't think most of the fans who are unhappy with how things have gone would say KP is a failure, but I do think we have a right to be unhappy. We watched RLEC go down the tubes, and now we're scared that our cap space is going to be wasted as well. I think these concerns are legitimate.
Let me preface what I'm about to say with this, I think this off-season has mostly been somewhere between a series of missteps and possibly an utter failure ... but with the projected cap dropping to 50-53 million dollars I do think there are going to be two types of opportunities that could present themselves where the team can acquire an impact player. 1) I think there's a good chance some teams are going to see revenues continue to stagnate and their bottom line continue to take a hit; teams that borrowed that money for operating expenses could be faced with needing more loans to cover their expenses. 2) With the fairly sizeable number of teams who have worked hard to position themselves for 2010 free agency seeing the cap fall anywhere from 5-7 million dollars could throw a serious monkey wrench into those carefully laid plans, these teams might be motivated to dump some salary in order to increase their cap room for next summer. So I won't be shocked if teams want to at least give themselves the opportunity to make a run at some of the big names and if they were potentially looking at having 15+ million in cap room and that figure could be dropped to 10-8 million just because of a declining cap. Maybe KP can capitalize? On the other hand I think KP is going to run into the same problems he seems to have with the rumored trade proposals he keeps offering to teams and they keep rejecting, because he's not altering the principles of the deals; he has to soften his (seeming) unwillingness to "give something to get something" -- I'm not exactly hopeful he has it in him at this point.
It's funny - all these threads say the Jazz plan to match Millsap... I picture the Jazz braintrust sitting round in a couple of days looking smug and eveyone saying, so, it's good we matched Millsap, right? So, who actually did it? ... Anyone? Somebody did do it, right? Who was that player whose agent forgot to send in the paperwork to re-up with Miami, giving them unexpected cap room and losing that player untold millions? I want to say Anthony Carter?
That's really the crux of the issue. There seems to be a growing trend where KP refuses to include someone like Batum, or Outlaw, or Bayless.... I wonder if he's stressed because he has created this image, the pritch slap, and he feels like he can't make a deal unless it's an obvious home run. Although, the Sergio trade was anything but a home run. Does anyone else get the feeling that the next player to be over-valued will be Cunningham?
My worry is we will talk ourselves into thinking saving the cap space to the trade deadline is a good idea. Portland would not be in the drivers seat no matter what KP says. GM's will know that we lose that space if we don't make a deal by that deadline, so we aren't going to get some great addition to our team. Look more for a MLE type of player to replace someone injured. I'm also starting to think KP value Blakes really high. I haven't heard on rumor other then Hinrich for a PG
That'd be nice, I'll buy anyone on the board 10 beers if we get him. http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=4334968
I think to get the best deal you have to be prepared to wait out for no deal. When buying a car you get the best price if your actually willing to walk out.
