You can't help but just love how Gordon maintains himself. The guy loves the game and always remains professional. We've had trouble in the past getting guys to practice at our practice facility while they were under contract, and Gordon is still out there, practicing with his contract up in the air, and while he is not getting his contract demands. Although I'm sure this is how his daily workout routine. 8:05 PM - Walks into John Paxson's office. 8:06 PM - Ben Gordon: How is the contract offer coming along? 8:07 PM - John Paxson: Well I got Jerry to concede another $20 today. I really think we will get you your fair money, Jerry's really coming around on offering you more money. 8:08 PM - Walks out of Paxson's office, goes down onto the court for his basketball workout with his man-slaves.
About that, be prepared for a long year. The Bulls will have a much more obvious incentive to fuck around with his minutes at odds with everyone’s supposed mutual interest (winning games) than he has to do something untoward. If he acts like a douche, Gordon gets labeled a douche. If he just keeps his mouth shut and the Bulls have the iffy season we mostly expect them to, and it’s clear he’s going to leave, he gets benched for a variety of lesser players. In fact, even if he doesn’t act like a douche, his every glance, every nick, and every shot will be hyper-analyzed for evidence of “selfishness”, and a he'll be labeled a douche anyway.
This is great and all, but unfortuantely I think you've just lost Gordon for nothing. While next year you'll have to negotiate against market value from him, you'll now have to negotiate against his pride, and the emotional context in which he perceives any sort of communication to him. Business Psychology is a funny thing.
Just wanted to know your opinion cause you would know most about Gordon, but where do you see Ben going if he does take the Qualifying Offer and leaves the team next year? I like speculating You think he'd go to a team like Charlotte? Where he can be the star.
Ben Gordon will be playing with Dwyane Wade and Michael Beasley next year. I think he will give the Bulls first grab at him next summer, but I think the Bulls will bungle it, and then when he signs with the Heat, they will throw their arms in the air, and say, "Well we thought it was a really fair offer!"
He'll be on his way to Miami if the two offers are the same. But Bulls can offer more generally speaking. The max with the Bulls is greater than the max with the Heat. Heat are also limited in what they can offer Gordon, because they won't have max cap room next summer (they will in 2010). They can still offer him quite a bit more than the Bulls are offering this summer. OKC of course could be in the hunt too, as a Gordon/Durant duo would be a great offensive duo.
If it were purely a matter of dollar amount though, he would have just signed the Bulls offer. If I were Gordon I'd feel pretty jerked around at this point and I'd be willing to take a bit less to leave. * The Bulls got S&T offers from two different teams. The “fact” that it was Gordon who turned them down doesn’t make sense in the context of a restricted free agent who’s surely been in contact with the offering teams. Said fact was also, as best I can tell, mainly promulgated by the Bulls’ in-house rumor monger. * Even putting aside the various benchings prior to it, the Bulls spent the last couple months of the season running down his value. Pax ran his mouth on Gordon’s size making him a sixth man. They played him fewer minutes over the last two months of the season that all the other guards. * Then they turned around and offered a contract that was scaled down from the one they offered previously (which, of course, they said was below market to begin with and was based on the expectation that Gordon give something up for “security” purposes). I mean, if you think that doesn’t matter, I think you’ve never been in a normal work environment. And the Bulls did come back (and never sway from) a salary cut. They offered him $10M last year and less than $10M this year. In my experience (and I do have some in figuring out how to compensate people) that’s a guaranteed way to lose an employee in short order. Even if they still work for you for a while, they’re guaranteed to mentally check out and have both eyes on the exit. It’s just human nature to take that as an insult. * So Gordon goes into the off-season with every reason to think they’ve screwed with him, and he sees a variety of guys who (be honest now!) you spent the last several years you wouldn’t trade Gordon for. Maggette gets 5/$50M. Monta Ellis gets 6/$66M. Iggy gets $80M. “We can’t possibly trade Gordon for Pau Gaol! No freaking way!” Maybe some of you guys would quibble on a particular guy, but you know perfectly well that was the general sentiment, and probably John Paxson’s too. So why on earth would Gordon turn around and accept a deal that pays him less per season than he was offered before, and than was offered to a variety of guys he’s heard (in practice from the team itself up until it was time to negotiate!) that he’s better than? I suspect he looks at those guys and thinks, OK, even if I don’t make back quite what I would have made with the Bulls, I can go somewhere where the GM isn’t saying I’m too short to start and isn’t allowing my minutes to plummit for the sake of Chris Duhon and Larry Hughes.
