Paul Pierce at age 34 is not the answer, nor is Steve Nash at age 38.... You mention Chris Paul as an option, but he was never going to come here...and he certainly wasn't going to stay if POR paid whatever the price to get him here....Besides POR did not have enough talent\assets to acquire him at the time anyway...Batum and a 1st round pick wasn't going to cut it...It just wasn't a realistic option.. You can mention guys like that all you want as why POR didn't go get them, but your not being realistic to the fact that POR 1) Didn't have the assets to acquire them in the 1st place and 2) the guy didn't want to come here anyway.... Not to mention trading away a bunch of assets for a guy who has no intention of being here and you hope you can CONVINCE to stay is way too risky I like Carmelo....I would consider trading for him...but they are going to want a lot....both picks, Batum to start...Is he worth it? Yeah, possibly...probably a better fit next to LA than he is next to Amare...I agree, POR should inquire about him, but again I don't really expect NY to trade him away...He had a bad year, lot of bad press, but they are not going to trade away a core piece a year after they got him...I think that is a fishing expedition....
Pierce @ 34 and Nash @ 38...go for it. Try to open a quick window, and then deal with the repercussions later after they retire. You'll have that cap room again. So we give up replaceable talent, big freaking deal. The thing I realized that taking 3-5 years to acquire young players and let them develop rarely works outside of getting top 3 picks in the draft (i.e. OKC...hell, even Portland with ROY/ODEN/LMA barring the injuries). So you just need to be in constant flux and trade for talent and not hold too much player loyalty. The thing is if the knicks aren't clicking, they have to do it. You can't wait around and wait for shit to click if it isn't, you have to move fast in the league, otherwise they will be stuck in cap space hell again for multiple seasons. As far as trading for mid-level talent, you still need those guys. Important part of winning, you just need that + superstars. Young players rarely contribute.
