Another shot from Simmons

BTW, Aldridge is nowhere to be seen on Simmons' list of "25 worst contracts in the league that have 3-plus years or at least $25 million remaining".

BNM

 

FWIW.

Simmons clearly states that his "top 40" list takes contracts into consideration. His clear implication was that LMA missed the cut because of his contract. I have no real argument with that.

 

LMAs contract will look good in that 4th year. When he is finally good.

 

He has a PER of 18+ the past three years. That's good, isn't it?

 

anyone notice what he said about Zach Randolph?

If you need two points at the end of a tight game, and you could throw it inside to any low-post player, he's the pick this season. It's true.

Damn. That's just what we need on our team.

 

Also- note that he places Batum as a starter on the All-French Team:

Starters: Parker, Mickael Pietrus, Nicolas Batum, Boris Diaw, Joakim Noah. Bench: Ronny Turiaf, Rodrigue Beaubois, Yakhouba Diawara, Johan Petro, Alexis Ajinca, Ian Mahinmi.

 

And Simmons actually hated on the Bynum extension too, with similar reasoning. Why sign somewhat unproven (based on play or health) players to an extension, making them virtually untradeable until the extension kicks in.

 

Revisionist history?

"What if the Celts had landed the No. 1 or No. 2 pick in 2007?" (they would have taken Durant in either spot and built around Durant, Jefferson, Rondo, Pierce and a bunch of draft picks and expiring contracts

Wasn't the entire city of Boston hoping to get Oden?

 

Interesting also:

So they're 0-guards. Ideally, you want to surround 0-guards with spot-up shooters, one rebounder and a pick-and-pop forward who can make 18-footers. Gilbert Arenas created the 0-guard position, for better or worse; Dwyane Wade mastered it; Brandon Roy strikes the best balance between selfish and unselfish; and Evans might have the most raw talent of any of them.

 

Well, BS has this anecdote that Durant was #1 on Ainge's board. It rhymes well with his mancrush (and hindsight), so he goes along with it, I guess.

The thing about this whole 'should have taken Durant' situation... Let's say, in an alternate universe we take KD #1, Seattle takes Oden and his injuries don't happen. At the same time, Durant takes 7-10 (instead of 17-20) shots a game in his first three years in Portland, Oden dominates on a crappy Sonics team, while we run a Lamarcus/Zach/KD frontcourt, and all of a sudden everybody's saying we should have taken the center.

 

I get what you are saying - but do you realy think Oden would be healthier if he had been drafted by another team? The other part of the hypothetical - KD not getting as many shots on that Blazer team - has merit. He would have been forced from the beginning to diversify his game...and who knows how that would have played out. It might have been good for him, or he might have been a brat about it.