I still think he'd benefit our offense tremendously, and he's NEVER played with good bigs before on defense. The suns best year was with Kurt Thomas and Boris Diaw playing heavy minutes after Amare went down, with LMA, Oden, and Pryz this wouldn't be such a problem. I still think he'd benefit our team tremendously and help our bigs get a ton more easy buckets. As for Nate going to the finals, fair enough, but I do think Nash's teams were better for a longer period than the sonics were.
Nash isn't much of an improvement over Blake defensively but the offensive ability and experience Nash would bring would offset his defensive liabilities IMO. We need another player that can break down the defense and Nash is good at creating chaos and finding people. It would also take a lot of pressure off Roy as the primary playmaker. Nash's outside shooting is pretty close to Blakes so we aren't losing anything there. Really more than anything I like his experience. He might be on the downside of his career, but so was Chauncey Billups.
Well according to ESPN the Blazers are one of 5 teams looking at making a run at him. It was just listed on hoopshype. Is that where this call got started?
Hoopshype also said we are signing Andre Miller, personally, I'd take either (if Nash opts out, I wouldnt trade squat for him when we have cap space to sign someone)
I'd love to add Nash if we can get him for cheep. If the suns feel they have zero playoff hopes they might decide to start rebuilding and save $$$. We can use our cap space to offset a major part of Nash's contract giving their cheap owner major salary relief in a very tight economy. Outlaw or Bayless + cap relief would be great for us. But if phoenix starts asking for more we can definitely walk away.
Hoopshype doesn't technically "say" anything. They just aggregate rumors from other sources. Within the span of about 3 paragraphs, they listed us trading some of our young players for Steve Nash, signing Andre Miller and signing Jason Kidd. BNM
Why would they want Nash - he plays NO defense and is a turnover machine? Is that not the two things that Nate hates the most? Besides, this past season, Blake pretty much owned Nash, scoring at will. Nash is still the better scorer, but his 4th qtr TOs and poor defense is not going to solve the upgrade priority for PG that this team is looking for. Kidd or Miller would be the better option, IMO.
Some of you make me laugh. You talk about Nash like he is a scrub and not a recently removed two time MVP winner. Holy crap, why would we want someone like that? Is he perfect, no. However, he is still light years better at this age than any PG on our roster.
There's a lot of people who think he was a poor choice for MVP too. And there's a lot of people who fall for the "quick run exciting" brand of basketball that he plays. His defense is really bad now (never was that good to begin with). And while he might be "light years better" than any PG on the team, that doesn't mean he'd be a sure thing. If they can get him for nothing, great. Why would we want someone who's teams under perform when it counts and plays pathetic defense?
Because during the regular season, the Blazers had one of the top 5 offenses in the entire NBA. (Offensive Rating 1st of 30 teams) Bringing in a Nash, is fixing a part that IS NOT BROKEN. Then, you get to the playoffs, and assuming Nash has survived healthy - which is not a high probability - his all O, no D, push the pace style of basketball, loses much of its effectiveness. Because 3 years removed from an MVP season is ancient history. Because Steve Nash had 7.6 Win Shares last season. Offensive Rating 119. Defensive Rating 115. Those aren't great numbers anymore. What will he do another year older? Are you banking on Nash IMPROVING? Blake Win Shares 5.5; Offensive Rating 118; Defensive Rating 110. Yes, Nash is a much better PG than Blake. But this past season it wasn't much reflected in stats, production and effectiveness.
I'd have no problem with Nash if I hadn't seen his body breaking down in the last couple of years. My main issue with him isn't his talent, it's the increasing probability that he'll be even less healthy as more mileage is added to his legs (and back) and be less likely to be an impact player. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/basketball/nba/12/30/Nash.injury.ap/index.html Do you think this is less or more likely to get better with age?
Tall men often have back spasms. He seems to manage his relatively well. I'm more worried about his defense than I am about his back spasms.
His production and effectiveness has been in steady decline since he won the last MVP. This year, statistically was his worse since 1999-2000. As has been mentioned several times in this thread - his defense is HORRIBLE - one of the worst in the league. Allen Iverson is also a former MVP, who led the NBA in games played, total minutes played, MPG, and averaged 26.4 PPG in 2007-08. Ask Piston fans how that trade worked out for them. Would Nash be an upgrade - at this point, barely. He'd improve the flow of the offense, but would make our perimeter defense even worse. For what it would cost to get him it wouldn't be worth it. BNM
