RealGM picked up on the story and made it sound like BG was planning on leaving. I still think it could go either way. Did you read Sam's article about how FA's should sign with their teams this year to lock in longer, larger contracts? It was nice of KC to wait until BG had a big game to run this article, although that meant he'd been waiting three weeks to do it.
RealGM should be ashamed of themselves. I'm not just talking about the BG article here, but they have been sensationalizing wiretap stories for awhile now. They have fabricated quotes before, and it's just awful.
I agree, they try and sensationalize everything. That BG leaving thing was completely secondhand and unimportant, but KC's article wasn't much better.
K.C. was just writing an opinion piece, which I don't see much problem with in general. I think where K.C. gets in dangerous territory is when he says, the Bulls should offer $8 million a year. Oh really? That's $40 million over the first 5 years. A max MLE offer will be somewhere around $34.2 million, otherwise, $8 million a year to play for the Bulls, ~$6.9 to play anywhere he wants on a max MLE. Does that offer really leave Gordon with much incentive going to the Bulls? If he goes to say the Cavs, they throw Delonte West to the bench, and Gordon becomes "the Pippen" so to speak to Lebron...then a situation could easily arise where Gordon is getting an increased Nike endorsement, and is all of a sudden doing commercials with Lebron. Same with a team like New York. Lets take this down to three years now. The first 3 years would come out to pretty much exactly $7 miillion per year. It would be ~$6.4 million per a year for the MLE deal. So he could go, sign in New York, while giving up very little financial concessions, get to be the man for one year, and then they will bring in some big talent around him, and then once they secure his bird rights, they reward him with a monster contract. $8 million won't be enough to bring back BG imo. It could end up being the most that Gordon can get on the market THIS YEAR, but looking long term, I don't think it's attractive enough for Gordon to take it.
The best thing the bulls could do would be to get the knicks to overpay for BG like they did for Jamal Crawford.
Unless he was a sixthman at 5 mil at most a year I would never re-sign him. He does more harm then good most of the time when playing extended minutes.
KC and the Trib have really taken a nose dive over the last couple seasons. I concede that this team has been hard to deal with, but it's kind of funny to see how Mike McGraw pretty openly mocks KC and Hanley's ambulance chasing. Though in fairness McGraw, who I think is the best of them, downplays everything consistently, even when there probably is an issue (ie when he tried to say Deng and the Bulls were on the same page wrt his leg, even though they pretty clearly aren't. They might be on the same page now, but they don't all appear happy about it).
And again, why should Ben Gordon sign to come off the bench here, when he can sign for ~2 million less in Miami, be a starter, and be on a better team?
Why would he start in Miami? Is he going to start over Wade? BG still isn't a PG and eventually Wade isn't going to be handling the ball so much. And he still can't guard anybody, so why would you play him next to Wade.
Ben Gordon said he wants to play point guard, so he will probably be looking for a place to start as the point guard. Chauncey Billups didn't look like much of a point guard when he was young. He averaged less than 4 assists a game in his first year in Detroit, and they still were a 50 win team and made the conference finals. Just because Gordon hasn't been a point guard in Chicago, doesn't mean he can't be a good point guard if he goes to Miami. I'm sure talking with Eric Spolestra and Pat Riley, Gordon will probably learn some real things on how to be an NBA point guard. Ben Gordon/Dwyane Wade is a versatile backcourt. You add the best penetrating guard, and a legitimate superstar, with one of the best shooters ever, who is a stone cold killer in the clutch? I'm sure Miami will be open to finding ways to make those two pieces working. It's also a normal sized backcourt, so that takes away some defensive issues.
Not trying to knock BG7, but there is no way he's going to play point for any team. He just isn't a strong enough ball handler, facilitator, or passer to play point on a consistent basis.
Ok, off topic, but this a question I always wondered about. What is Tim Duncan? Is he a center playing some center and mostly PF, or is he a PF who moves to center when they want to play "small". I ask because if he is a power forward, he is (at least in my book) the best all around power forward of all time. If he is a center, well, he could be considered top 10 at best. Be easier to quantify what he was and how his legacy will ultimately be judged.
Um, was there a better PG on that team than Harper? Somebody who would have made bigger contributions offensively, and in that case defensively than Harper? There is a better PG on Miami than BG. And actually, Pippen was the point guard on that team, so the question should be was there a better SF than Harper? Either way, there is a better PG than BG on Miami.
The Bulls did play Pippen at PG on offense, freeing the SF spot on offense/PG on defense to be a guy like Harper. Harper did defensively what Gordon does offensively. We don't have a 2nd option to score behind Gordon like the Bulls had MJ+Pip, so it's a specious argument. MikeDC's point is well taken. You don't bring your best players off the bench unless you're really deep at every position. We're not.
