Ben Gordon, who must approve any sign-and-trade scenario, announced to the NBA he wants $10 million annually — at least. http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baske...0,4845292.story
This is what we reportedly offered Gordon for last offseason, so perhaps, if that is what he's asking ofr this time around, we offered him less than that? That would be inexcusable if we lowballed him. 10 million a year would be .5 million more than Kirk is making, and Gordon is better than Kirk by a lot. If this is all Gordon wants, there is no reason he shouldn't be resigned by the end of the first day of free agency.
Well maybe the owner feels because the pieces didn't mesh well enough to make the playoffs last year, is it worth it financially to give Gordon that contract and still not make playoffs?
Who else is going to pay him that kind of money? There aren't many teams with cap space and the ones who have it don't want a 6'2 jumpshooting SG at 10 million a year. Let the market dictate his value.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Swish @ Jun 28 2008, 08:53 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Rumor has it that New Orleans is going to make a push for him next offseason.</div> This offseason actually. The tried to trade for him at the trade deadline using Julian Wright, and some type of expiring contracts for cap relief purposes. Thank God Paxson declined. I think Portland would do a sign and trade, trading Bayless to us...which scares the hell out of me for three reasons...1. We wouldn't have Gordon...2. While we have Bayless, we would just trade him at the end of his rookie contract like most of our guards and 3. How the hell would you be the Blazers? Hopefully Paxson gets things done in the first week with these guys. All parties involved know that there is no free agent market for them, so hopefully they all come into it levelheaded, and for my own selfish reasons of wanting to watch Gordon play in FIBA ball this summer, hopefully if he is just taking the QO, they just agree on going that route early.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (CelticKing @ Jun 28 2008, 09:11 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>So is Hinrich going to be traded?</div> I'd assume so. Hinrich could come back if he is willing to come off the bench and be the 6th man, since there is no way Gordon comes back to come off the bench. PG- Derrick Rose (34) / Kirk Hinrich (14) SG- Ben Gordon (34) / Kirk Hinrich (14) Something like that would work in the backcourt. Hell, Hinrich would probably get like a full 30-32 minutes since we like to go to three guard sets. It's tough though. Hughes sucks, but what do you do with him? He is going to cause all kinds of problems if he isn't playing I'd bet. Maybe sit him out Tim Thomas style if he acts up? Then Thabo will want minutes, but unlike most Bulls fans, I don't think Thabo will ever be that great of a player. Just a guy that you use situationally.
I'm pretty sure that Hinrich won't like coming out of the bench either just like Gordon. So one of them has to be traded. Are there any reports on who they're talking with? (like what teams are interested)
Well Gordon has been willing to be a bench guy for a while, maybe he would do it another season. And Hinrich hasn't been playing well enough to warrant a starter spot if the Coach wants to start Rose over him.
I agree, he hasn't played well enough but if he doesn't like being on the bench than he can either demand a trade or disrupt the team and their chemistry. (we've seen it before on other teams)
Yea, its possible. If the Bulls thought that Kirk would do that and they wanted to keep Gordon then they should look to trade him before it would happen.
I can't see Gordon coming back for less than he turned down purely based on saving face. When we're talking about competitive athletes that's going to be a major issue. About the best sort of deal I can see working with the Bulls is the same amount for a longer period of time. Like, a 2 year deal would make a pretty fair amount of sense for him and the team (assuming Kirk or Hughes gets traded, of course).
Hinrich to LA for Vlad + scrubs + picks... Would you do it? Vlad gives you a legit outside threat hahahah BTW, i almost sh*t my pants when i read that NOH was trying to snag Gordon... It would put them at the same level as the Celtics and Lakers are. Chicago should jump the gun on signing Ben Gordon. Not very often will you come along a player like him asking for only 10M! For God's sake Odom makes more, Kwame makes almost 9M LOL
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (kobe23 @ Jun 29 2008, 09:02 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Hinrich to LA for Vlad + scrubs + picks... Would you do it? Vlad gives you a legit outside threat hahahah BTW, i almost sh*t my pants when i read that NOH was trying to snag Gordon... It would put them at the same level as the Celtics and Lakers are. Chicago should jump the gun on signing Ben Gordon. Not very often will you come along a player like him asking for only 10M! For God's sake Odom makes more, Kwame makes almost 9M LOL</div> They should resign Gordon and trade Hinrich, but not to LA...I think they can get better elsewhere, besides LA doesn't have another first rounder to trade until 2011. they have traded their 1st rounders for this year and next to Memphis...and if I'm not mistaken, doesn't that prevent them from trading the 1st rounder after those? That's why Miami couldn't trade this years pick but had to draft and then they could trade that players draft rights.
You can't trade 1st round picks in consecutive years. I think the rule is such that you must have a 1st round pick every other year, though it might be someone else's 1st pick if you've traded for one. I do think Gordon is easily worth the $10M he wants, but he's not worth it to the Bulls. When your team philosophy is to pay most of the guys rookie scale wages, you can't afford to keep many of them when their rookie deal expires. The Bulls are faced with $10M+ to Hinrich, $10M+ to Deng, $10M+ to Gordon, $7M+ to Nocioni, and then there's Thomas and Noah. It's conceivable you need $57M for just those guys. Then there's Hughes at $12M, Gooden at $7M, and eventually Rose.
We really can't afford to have all these guys that we drafted the last few years. We should really sign and trade one of Deng or Gordon. There was an interesting trade offered by Cavs to Nets where cavs offered Wally's expiring contract worth ~11M for Carter. Could we work out something like that, or get a contract that expires for the 2010 offseason where some big name FA's will be available? However wasn't one of the reasons Hinrich played so poorly last season due to all those trade rumours with Kobe and then just never getting back into the flow of things? If it was think of the struggles he will have this year with Rose in the picture now. So it might be better to trade him rather than Gordon for now. A lot of things to consider, hate to be Paxson right now...
Nice avatar! Unless we trade Kirk or Hughes for an expiring deal, I don't see the point in playing the cap game by going after some aging vet on a big contract.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (dtay @ Jun 29 2008, 08:17 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>We really can't afford to have all these guys that we drafted the last few years. We should really sign and trade one of Deng or Gordon. There was an interesting trade offered by Cavs to Nets where cavs offered Wally's expiring contract worth ~11M for Carter. Could we work out something like that, or get a contract that expires for the 2010 offseason where some big name FA's will be available? However wasn't one of the reasons Hinrich played so poorly last season due to all those trade rumours with Kobe and then just never getting back into the flow of things? If it was think of the struggles he will have this year with Rose in the picture now. So it might be better to trade him rather than Gordon for now. A lot of things to consider, hate to be Paxson right now...</div> http://sportstwo.com/NBA/LeagueSalaries#jump_CHI I think it's possible, but it's gonna be tough to get 2010 cap room. Basically in order to have significant cap room they need to get any two of Hinrich, Nocioni, Gordon and Deng off the books. My guess is we re-sign Deng and keep him, use a Gordon sign and trade to move Nocioni off the books, and hang on to Kirk for another year. That's not a totally awful plan either. I think ideally I'd keep Gordon and move Kirk (and that might be a backup plan in case a Gordon S&T can't be worked), but Kirk is (at least if we forget last season, which we should never speak of again) better and more versatile defensively than Ben and better at running the point, which will probably help ease Rose into things. Or so the theory goes. In the longer run, I'd like to trade Kirk though because he makes way too much to be Rose's backup and he's not good enough an SG to start there. Just looking around, if I were the Bulls Tracy McGrady would be starting to look good because he would give us some short-term star power and come off the books at the right time. We'd also have to trade a couple of our guys to make salary room and thus end a logjam at at least one position.
I agree on trading Kirk, as you said, too much for a backup, not good enough to start at the 2. The only issue I have with BG is that 6th man is a perfect role for him. But he seems intent on being a starter. I think it just puts us under too much pressure to have him as a starting 2 long term. He can't play 2 down the other end. That puts us under a lot of pressure defensively because there are a lot of good 2's in the league. Also he can't pay the 1 on the offensive end, he is pretty much only a 1 dimensional scorer. I don't think such a kind of player is worth $10M+ annually. I'd give it to him in a heartbeat if he was a 7 footer though. The Tmac idea is intriguing, but would be extremely difficult if not impossible to pull off, even with TMac's stock dropping in the last couple of years...
