Yes, the Lakers would get Paul but we would get the reason they won two championships. The most skilled 7 footer in the league. Felton/Matthews/Crash/Aldridge/Pau can contend. When was the last time we had a center who could score? Even with Chris Paul, the Lakers get worse this year, esp since they lost Odom too. Reggie Williams takes Batum's bench minutes at the 3. Maybe we add Landry too. That's a title team.
Does the league value Batum that much? I would say no since they wanted Gordon and the Minny pick. Would definitely rather have Gordon and the pick is debatable.
We'd be hurting the Lakers. We'd be taking their best big man and giving the Lakers a player (Paul) that would take the ball out of Kobe's hands and piss Kobe off. the Hornets wanted Batum in the proposed Paul trade last year, didn't they?
We don't have any valuable picks and Batum is not close to enough value to get Pau. Your talking about our 5th best player who comes off the bench being enough to snag an all-star big in a trade with an MVP candidate...
Gasol was pretty good for two years in which Kobe was able to keep him motivated; he seemed to fall off last year. I would not want a player at his age who has problems motivating himself.
Gasol was worn out, he was coming off 3 years of deep playoff runs to the finals and international play in the summers. Sure, he had a bad playoffs last season but its silly to dismiss how dominant he was the previous three seasons. Next year when the Mavs don't win a title people will probably say the same things about Dirk. Only one team in the league can win a title, that doesn't mean all the other teams stars weren't motivated.
Gasol is a star and he fills the void left by ODEN. We'd finally have a center who can score. An All Star center, that is. Crash/Aldridge/Pau is best frontcourt in league and we would contend with Matthews at SG.
Also- are you kidding? We have a star. LaMarcus Aldridge was third team all NBA ahead of that "star" Blake Griffin. And Gerald Wallace is a star in this league. And if we got him, Pau is an international star. Brandon was cool and all but we can win without him. We showed that last year.
If you have a center like Pau who has to be DEFENDED by a center, then Aldridge doesn't have a center hanging on him. Last year, Tyson guarded LaMarcus. If we had Oden or Pau, he guards them and then Aldridge has it a little easier. A lot easier.
I would love to see Pau with the ball in the post with a 7 ft option on the wing if they try to double. Depending on who else would go in the trade, we become instant contenders. LA complained of being tired late last year when we have not made it out of the first round and he did not play summer ball. Will give Pau a pass since his Lakers had just made two long playoff runs and he played internationally. Pau is not someone to build around, but he certainly can be a huge piece of a championship puzzle.
what does the league want? We know that LAL would take Paul for Odom and Gasol and late picks. Odom's gone, but if they could get CP3 straight up for Gasol and late picks, I'm sure they'd pull the trigger. So what do we have that would make that happen? League wants expiring contracts (or, if you prefer, not to take on long-term debt for non-superstars). We have Felton, Batum, Wallace (kinda), Camby. You can have up to 31.4M in expiring contracts, which means NOH could send out somewhere around 45M and save some short- AND long-term $$ League wants young players with upside to build around. Felton and Batum qualify. Wallace is a Scola-plus player, in terms of talent...yeah, he's a little old and shouldn't be the centerpiece of something like this, but great complimentary piece if you're getting cap relief AND young players and picks. League doesn't want to look like it got hosed. With POR involved, it's 2 "little" teams getting helped by trading with the big team, so it looks a bit less lopsided. If it was something like CP3/Ariza to the L*kers, Blake/Gasol/Okafor to us, Felton/Batum/Crash/L*kers' picks/Camby to NOH We're left with: Blanky/Smith/Johnson Crawford/Wes/Elliot Wes/Ariza LMA/Okafor/Thomas Gasol/Okafor/CJ/(Oden) That's awfully light in the backcourt, but a monster frontline rotation. NOH now has 6.7M (16.2M if Wallace picks up his option) tied up in summer 2012 contracts...Jarrett Jack, Quincy Pondexter and maybe Crash. That's between 40-50M in cap space...you could buy the team, move it to Vegas and get 3 almost-max players. LAL gets CP3 and Ariza for Blake and Gasol.
Gasol is too old. Even if he's better now than Batum will ever be, I want to see what Batum can do. I'm tired of having broken down old stars (Pippen) long after their glory years for other teams. Also Gasol would be miserable, and be wanting to leave for Spain all the time, and we've been there, done that.
I'd take my paintball gun and shoot up the windows at the Rose Garden if we traded for Gasol, especially for Batum. Gasol is 2nd on my hated player list. Kobe is 1st.
