<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">PHILADELPHIA - With apologies to Oscar winner Hilary Swank, Chris Webber is the Sixers' new $62.156 million baby. That's how much they're going to have to pay him, whether or not his creaky left knee - which he admits isn't close to 100 percent - holds up over the next three years. That's not including the pro-rated remainder of this year's $17.531 million tab, which adds up to another cool $6 million. Shell out more than $68 million for a guy and you ought to get some kind of guarantee. Some assurance you're not just throwing your money away under the illusion that a priceless championship will be your reward. Considering their plight, a team treading water in an Atlantic Division that appears to be anybody's for the taking, it wasn't a bad gamble. Pairing a five-time all-star like Webber, a career 22.0 scorer and 10.1 rebounder, with Allen Iverson gives the Sixers their best 1-2 punch since Julius Erving and Charles Barkley were on the same side in the mid-'80s. </div> Source
It is a huge risk to outlay that type of cash on an athlete of Webbers age and especially with his injured knee, but hey, people deal for shonky contracts all the time. At least the sixers now have a genuine chance of winning a championship. Once they gel and stay healthy, learn the system and how each other plays and mix in the young guys with a little more experience and i think you have to take that gamble. On paper anyway, the sixers look like a great unit, similar to the one that went to the finals a few years back. At least they took a calculated risk with the prize being a championship, rather than just leave the team in limbo in the Atlantic.
