Thoughts? I think he loses credibility on winning right now. But idk if i say that cuz im biased as fuck...
Oh I dont think theyre gonna win it this year either. Chalmers is an ALRIGHT starting pg. Theyre gonna have to trade beasley for a Center cuz clearly chris bosh aint gon play it (joel anthony might take that qualifying offer they gave him) filling out that roster with minium salary players not gon help that much. So wat does Mike Miller do? What do they do if he accpets the offer they gave him? Do they structure the Trifecta's cotracts around it so they can afford him?
If I'm NY, I'm throwing Miller a nice little contract because Amar'e + Miller + pieces they have now should be good enough to get in the playoffs.
Miami has a lot of work to do. But I don't think there are a lot of guys in the league anymore with the pride to stand up to a team of superstars like Miami will be. Teams will be intimidated and rolling over. I'd say they are at least a top 4 seed right now. LBJ took a shitty team to the finals. Injuries are the only thing that can derail this. The scary thing is the rumor that this has been in the works since the 2008 olympics. And that Chris Paul is in on it too. Put him on the team and things get stupid.
Magic *will* compete against these guys. Celts too if they get the the playoffs without major injuries. I hope the Bulls can say the same. p.s. speaking of injuries, Heat need to cross their fingers too.
Well, that was an hour of TV that proved to be just as vapid, predictable and pointless as I expected it to be. Unfortunately, I don't think it'll matter too much to his legacy. If they win several titles, they'll have some struggles on the way and it'll still look relatively hard. Teams with two or three really good players (Kobe/Gasol, KG/Pierce/Rondo, Howard/Lewis, maybe Boozer/Rose?) could give them trouble with a very strong cast. Point is, it's not quite going to be a slam dunk. I figure they'll figure out a fair number of guys to fill in around them: 1- Chalmers, Arroyo 2- Wade 3- James, Q 4- Bosh, Haslem? 5- Anthony?, Magloire? Center is where they really need someone. Dare I say they'll offer Brad Miller and Big Z the gig?
Metaphorically, this is just what happened to the NBA: [video=youtube;Zwr1dTrLbY0]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zwr1dTrLbY0[/video] Lebron James = Hulk Hogan Scott Hall = Dwayne Wade Kevin Nash = Chris Bosh. Cleveland = Macho Man Randy Savage
I don't think it will matter much either because IMHO he was already slotted behind MJ. But this should seal it. Bill Simmons agrees http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/100708
I think this first year they run into some trouble. Probably not enough time and money to put anything but has beens and D-league scrubs on the rest of the team, and there aren't really any end-of-the-road all stars that could latch onto their gravy train besides Shaq. However, after that I don't think it should be too difficult to field a team around them. If they have one decent draft pick, one decent MLE signing and one vet that comes on the cheap, I think they should be set.
I think folks are overstating how much they need to do. They won 47 games last year just with Wade. I don't see why they couldn't get Haslem, Q, Wright, and Arroyo back for the min, and they all played pretty substantial minutes along with Chalmers So that's 5 guys, plus Wade, Bosh and Lebron. That gets to 8, which is your average rotation size, is it not? I don't want Mike Miller
I'd go for a guy like Iggy hard before I settled for an older spot up shooter. Some guy who can't do anything but shoot is going to be terrible. If you want to think of this team and a shooter, think of Kyle Korver last year on Utah. I know Miller is better than Korver, but he's also older and had many nagging injuries. He's likely to slow down and get worse. Utah had exactly the same sort of combination of guys we'll have. Good scoring PG and Boozer. And they concluded they couldn't afford to have a guy out there just to spread the floor in terms of everything else he gives up. So he didn't play much. Same with various other shooters (Kapono, that guy that got traded from the Bobcats to Mavs, etc). You can only have a guy who does that if your other offensive options are just otherworldly. Not good as in Rose or Boozer, but great as in Kobe or MJ. Iggy is not a great 3 point shooter, but he's actually a notch above Deng and will shoot them. Perhaps when playing with two very effective scorers like Rose and Boozer, his % improves because his looks are better. Beyond that, if you have lots of offensive options, you can create good spacing without simply spotting guys up. If your coach isn't Vinny, anyway.
Iggy might be better if he wasn't the first option. He could be a good defender, but he's not a great 3pt shooter, and he's been the guy for so long in Philly that he might have trouble transitioning to being a defense first type of player. He's got a lot of years left on that contract, so it's risky. How much would it take to get him?
