OK, I starting a SG thread a while back, but after thinking it over more, I basically think I was being very optimistic about our chances. So first, let's think through some "Why these guys won't happen": Their teams are shooting for the playoffs (or better) and don't want to dump them for less: * Iggy, Joe Johnson, Jamal Crawford, OJ Mayo. Sorry. These guys are over the hill, and/or so expensive as to make a trade impractical given their contracts: * Steven Jackson * Rip Hamilton * Michael Redd These guys are probably obtainable, but not at the right cost. And these guys aren't that good * Fran Garcia- has three years left on his deal, and I think the Bulls would only take a guy with that sort of deal if they were getting a guy who was a very obvious long-term fit. Garcia is a nice player when healthy, but aging and injury prone. * JR Smith- Expiring contract, but one that's big enough that we'd have to give up a rotation player to get him, so we'd just be trading one hole for another. These are the guys I think might be realistic to think about, because they have the following combination of traits: 1. Their contract is short enough that if we don't want them around in a couple years, they'll be off the books. 2. Their contract is small enough that we don't need to trade one of our main rotation players to get them. 3. Their current team is either so far out of it, or so deep at their position that the player in question is not playing very much, and the team would credibly prefer future savings/draft pick/James Johnson to continuing to have that player. Courtney Lee - I'd give up either Asik or one of our picks+JJ for him. Maybe Asik + our pick if we really don't have any other options and it'll get it done. Rep as a good defender and smart player. Has developed into a good three point shooter. Basically, a better, younger version of Bogans. Might be a long term solution. Martell Webster - JJ/Bogans/Scal for Webster. Not even giving up a pick. Why? Because the TWolves are awful it'll knock his $5.2M salary off the books in exchange for JJ's $1.8M. Most noted for being the guy the Blazers basically gave up Deron Williams to get, and for being pretty injury prone. A big guard who's athletic but not super agile. Very good spot up shooter. Think Dennis Scott. Would space the floor something awesome. Downside is he might not defend much better than Korver. Upside is that we get another shooter at a low cost, and quantity has a quality all its own. Brandon Rush - The Pacers are shooting for the playoffs, so I'm not sure they'd do this, but Rush has fallen entirely outside of the rotation behind Dunleavy, Paul George, and Dahntay Jones. Rush has amazing basketball tools. He's a very good shooter, athletic, and can defend. He'll have a stretch of spectacular play, then he'll utterly disappear. His head is full of rocks and weed smoke. I'd offer JJ to get him, because Rush is a much better fit, and because I think the rest of this team has little chance of being poorly influenced by him and some chance of positively influencing him. And because we don't seem willing to use JJ anyway. So anyway, I think these are the gettable prospects. I think they all offer some upgrade in the quality of minutes they can provide over Bogans, and I think the cost for all is a reasonable one. That being said, I don't see any of them, aside from Lee, as a very likely longer-term answer to our problem. That is, if you tell me Brandon Rush is getting minutes for the rest of the year, instead of Keith Bogans, and I'm happy. If you tell me Brandon Rush is our main guy next year and I'm not all that happy. Likewise with Webster. Lee... I can see it working a little better.
When I think about SG targets, I usually group them into two categories. One is the 'Low Hanging Fruit' guys (Courtney Lee, Aaron Afflalo, Marcus Thornton, Brandon Rush, etc), and the other are the more Marquee guys who might be available for one reason or the other (Iggy, KMart, Mayo, etc). The Low Hanging Fruit have the advantage of being easily attainable, and having one of them around removes the need to have Bogans in the rotation. However, none of those guys are clearly better than Korver or Brewer, and we'd still have a SG-by-rotation and a disadvantage at the position most nights. On my optimistic days, I think getting the best of the low-hanging fruit would be enough to put us over the top. To me Aaron Afflalo is like an uber Keith Bogans. We're 12-0 when he scores more than 6 points. What would our record be if he averaged 14ppg on 65% TS%? My rule for acquiring low-hanging fruit is that anything given up should not impede our ability to acquire a marquee player at the 2011 trade deadline, which is what we really ought to be aiming for. In all these discussions, an important issue is whether or not Reinsdorf is willing to pay the luxury tax to keep this team together. Based on their performance so far, I think the team deserves it. We have a 22 year old superstar with a 4 year window where our core is signed and in their prime. If that's the case, I think our best shot is in FA this offseason. Afflalo and Jason Richardson can both be signed, and it's reasonable to think both are attainable. If Denver trades Carmelo and drops a match into the gas tank, I'm not sure it'd be worth it to them to match an aggressive contract for AA. He's a nice player, but he looks like he'll always be middle of the road, and they might decide they're better off gambling their cap space on a better player. Orlando's payroll is catastrophic, and it's mostly filled with overpaid veterans who are past their prime. If the owner gets gun-shy about adding more salary, or are unable to extend offers to some players due to the CBA, then I think Jason Richardson can be had for an MLE type contract (if it still exists). He's probably worth a little more than that, but he's on the wrong side of 30, and I'm not sure how much he's worth to a rebuilding team with cap space.
Another name I'd float is Shane Battier, Houston's other swing man who is rumored to be on the block. My problem with both Lee and Battier is what it would take to acquire them. I agree that it wouldn't take a lot in terms of talent, picks or friendly contracts, but the thing is, all of the Bulls' tradeable assets are also at the swing positions, sans Taj Gibson. And it's hard to work a trade just for Taj Gibson because he's still on a rookie-scale contract. The Bulls could move CJ Watson, Korver, or Brewer but they would just have another gap to fill. I think, to an extent, the discussion of the Bulls' search for a two guard is too narrow, and driven by Thibodeau's use of Bogans in the starting lineup. I think many people here, as I've found myself doing, are just looking for a way to get Bogans out of the starting lineup. But trading one of the swings for another swing isn't going to do that. For that matter, the Bulls could also acquire a backup point guard and it would have the same effect. C.J. Watson would probably play better as a hybrid guard with more time spent at shooting guard. A good D-League point guard pickup, who could displace C.J. as the backup point guard, would allow Thibodeau to allocate more of Bogans' minutes to Watson. This all goes back to Thibodeau though and his decision to start Bogans.
Random thoughts: - loved rosenthall's comment that the "low-hanging fruit" guys are no better than Brewer/Korver, so we're really talking about replacing Bogans as the #2 SG (forget that he's a starter...he's #2). - Lee is better than Bogans, but that's a pretty low bar. He'd be nice to have, but the price would pretty much need to be spare parts (note: the only spare parts the Bulls have as I see it are JJ, Bogans, Scals and future 2nd-round picks ). I think this is in line with rosenthall's point that you shouldn't give up any asset whose absence might "impede our ability to acquire a marquee player at the 2011 trade deadline." - The Bulls' FO is traditionally conservative in terms of balancing the long-term and short-term good of the team. I don't see them trading a Gibson or Asik for anything that could be considered only marginal improvement. As a result, I think they'll look to be opportunistic on the trade market, and if nothing representing either solid value or leading to front-runner status this year is there, they won't feel compelled to make a deal.
A 34-14 record with one or more of your top three missing tends to insulate you from criticism. Maybe it's just Thib's way of saying to the FO, hey, get busy picking some of that fruit, and get a ladder if you need one! For the most part, though, I'm enjoying this. And I like the fact that the Bulls are dealing from a position of considerable strength.
I think it depends on what tier of player you are looking to upgrade. If you're in the 'Low Hanging Fruit' area, then you have to be narrow because a comparable player at another position would not make it into the rotation. If you're targeting a marquee player you can be flexible with fit because.......they're just really good.
Yeah, it's like for the Anthony proposed trades: Who cares if they make the Bulls an unbalanced roster this year? It's a talent upgrade which is a good thing in and of itself. Going back to Shane Battier, am I the only one who thinks he would be the perfect starting shooting guard for the Bulls (of the non-elite players)?
Remains to be seen whether you're the only one SST, but I'm not with you on this one. I know he's played some SG and he played it fairly well, but we're talking about a 6-8 32 year old here who's never been considered a particularly good athlete. I'm sure that there are still some SG matchups he could handle, but that number's gotta be dwindling. Seems to me that he's more a SF-PF now.
Unless we are getting a significant high fruit guy in the deal, I'll take Bogans for his defensive contributions and leave the scoring for others. This squad, if healthy, is a legit EC contender even with Bogans and his lack of glory stat numbers but he is a solid, no nonsense defensive interrupter with plenty of other scorers on the floor. Would I rather have MJ in his prime back at the 2? Abso-****-ing-lutely. But we don't need some sort of off guard fire sale to be serious in the mix of contenders. I think that Bogans gets dumped on far more than he deserves to get. He's a plenty solid player who's 3 is dropping more and more and is an in your face defender and there are plenty of scoring options on this squad to make his ppg less an overall factor. I mean Courtney Lee? Really? No thanks. The Krause faux pas aside, Rosenthal speakum heap big wisdom.
I agree with you to an extent. This is essentially my problem with starting Bogans. Bogans does just fine starting against the smaller quicker guards in the league. He gets outplayed by the longer-stronger-slower guards. If you look at playoff match ups, the Bulls are probably going to encounter some combination of Ray Allen, Joe Johnson, Mike Dunleavy, Landry Fields, Dwyane Wade and J.J. Redick (and if they were to make it to the finals, you're probably looking at Ginobili or Bryant). I think Battier would be a relatively big upgrade against all of those players except Redick, and Battier is shooting 40% on high volume from the three-point line. Edit: Somehow forgot J. Rich for Orlando. If Bogans is somewhat an ill-fit during the regular season, it's only going to get worse in the playoffs.
I always have liked Shane and would love to have him on the Bulls if The Price is Right. That is the quandary.
He's more effective at the 3, but he can play the 2-3-4. We need someone with that versatility as the 6th man. Just put Korver at the 2 (ugh, or Bogans).
Pietrus is another guy who might be available. He isn't having a great year, but he fits the mold of defender/3pt shooter. Looking around the league for possibilities kind of highlights the dearth of talent in today's nba. Bogans isn't likely to even be on the team next year, but it's a struggle to find somebody who would be a big improvement. Anthony Parker might be the best they could do. Here's the scouting report from ESPN on Courtney Lee: "Otherwise, we pretty much know the story with Lee after just two seasons. He's a good defender but not a dominating one. He'll hit open shots but won't create that many. In short, he's a near-perfect role-playing wing, but he has very little chance of moving up in the world. Regardless, he'll last a decade and make tens of millions of dollars if he keeps sticking Js. " Sounds like a young Bogans. Not sure why you'd want to give up Asik for him. Sounds like a 2nd round pick at most.
I haven't seen Bogans particularly struggle against the bigger guards, but I'll watch more closely. He's 6-5+ and physical so it's not like he's some munchkin out there. This said, nice breakdown of the likely SG playoff matchups...some big, long guys there.
SST made a pretty good point a while back about how opponents SGs go right at Bogans from the start of games and score big early points. Not sure the "he plays defense" bit actually fits. http://www.82games.com/1011/10CHI5.HTM 82games.com has opponent SG's at 15.2 PER against him, which is slightly worse than average. bullshooter's response was that of course shooting guards score. Except ours, I guess.
