Reilly
01-30-2005, 08:16 PM
Thursday, January 27, 2005
Ainge should go all the way
By Chad Ford
ESPN Insider
The trade rumors out of Boston are coming fast and furious. We're not talking about the overblown Walter McCarty-to-the Suns rumor.
What we are talking about is a growing rumbling around the league, including inside the Celtics, that changes ranging from small to radical could happen before the Feb. 24 trade deadline.
It's no secret the Celtics are taking offers for Gary Payton and Mark Blount. Payton has been telling people he'll be wearing another uniform by the All-Star break, and team president Danny Ainge has never been a huge fan of Blount (which makes it tough to explain the six-year deal he gave Blount this summer).
But trading Blount and Payton for cap space and an obscure prospect or two are Band-Aids.
Shouldn't Ainge, who already has gone halfway with his extreme makeover of the Celtics, go the rest of the way?
The team is 20-22 and has as good a chance as any team to win the Atlantic Division and get a posh No. 3 seed in the playoffs. But what good does that do? The Celtics won't advance deep into the playoffs, and there are growing signs the pieces they have assembled, while talented, don't mesh well.
It is clear the Celtics are very high on Al Jefferson and Tony Allen, two of their first-round picks last June. They also remain supportive of Jiri Welsch, despite his struggles this season. Those three appear to form a solid nucleus for the future.
The Celtics have stated publicly that they have no intention of trading Paul Pierce, their only star and their most valuable trading chip.
But maybe they should trade him.
As ESPN The Magazine's Ric Bucher pointed out Wednesday, Pierce is not a great fit for the style of play Ainge and Rivers endorse. He has been miserable since Ainge started dismantling the team. And he's the one guy with enough trade value to bring a couple of young prospects in return.
What if Ainge decided to go all the way with the rebuilding effort, to rid the team of all vestiges of the past and build like an expansion team with talented young prospects and tons of cap room?
It's more possible than you might think. The seeds of two deals that could make it happen are already in place. Insider takes what's already out there and connects the dots the rest of the way for Ainge and the Celtics.
Move One: Pierce and Blount for Dalembert and Iguodala
Sixers head coach Jim O'Brien would love to get his hands on Blount, whom he coached in Boston and whom Philly pursued in free agency. But Blount is a base-year compensation player, meaning the Celtics can take back only half of what he makes in a trade. To get around complicated trade rules that say the contracts swapped must be within 15 percent and $100,000 of each other, the trade would have to be much, much larger.
How large? What if the Celtics offered Pierce and Blount and the expiring contract of Tom Gugliotta. Adding those players would give the Sixers immediate credibility and a leg up on every other team in the East. A backcourt of Allen Iverson and Pierce might be a tad combustible, but the Sixers always would have the option of moving Iverson for a more traditional point guard.
The Celtics wouldn't just give Pierce and Blount away. To make a deal work for the team and fit under the salary cap, they would demand Samuel Dalembert and Andre Iguodala, along with cap relief in the form of the expiring contracts of Glenn Robinson and Kedrick Brown.
The move would clear roughly $14 million in cap space for the Celtics and give them two players with very bright futures. The Celtics are among a dozen teams enamored with Dalembert. He's an athletic, young 7-footer who can block shots and rebound. Offensively he's raw, but he's coming around. He's a perfect fit in the Celtics' offense, however, because of how well he runs the floor.
Paired in the frontcourt with Al Jefferson, the Celtics would have the makings of a young, dominant front line. Jefferson provides the toughness and low-post scoring. Dalembert provides the defense and athleticism. While Dalembert is not a proven commodity, scouts around the league insist he has a chance to become a special player.
The downside for the Celtics is that they're going to have to fork over some serious cash for Dalembert in the summer. He's a restricted free agent, and the Atlanta Hawks, in particular, have him in their sights. However, how often do young, athletic, talented centers come along?
Iguodala is also a perfect fit. He's an athletic point-forward with excellent court vision and defensive instincts. Like Dalembert, his offensive skills are raw (especially his perimeter shot), but he'll rack up points and assists in Rivers' fast-break offense.
The Celtics would waive Robinson. He's only in the deal to for cap relief in the summer.
While the Sixers likely will choke over giving up two young prospects, getting a star player like Pierce and a center who better fits O'Brien's offensive and defensive schemes would soften the blow.
Sixers GM Billy King loves Dalembert and Iguodala, but when he hired O'Brien, he did it with an understanding he had to field a team O'Brien could coach. Dalembert has been a bad fit, because O'Brien likes his big men to move out of the paint to defend and trap on the perimeter.
Pierce and, to a lesser extent, Blount are proven performers in O'Brien's system. Dalembert and Iguodala aren't.
Move Two: Payton, Davis and LaFrentz for cap room
If the Celtics could make the above deal happen, they'd be halfway there.
The other half of our hypothetical makeover starts with Payton, who wants two things: to play for a contender and to play for a Western Conference team. He has played well enough this year to garner interest, and though the Celtics like Payton, they'd prefer to get something in return for him now as opposed to losing him in free agency this summer without compensation.
The Timberwolves have shown interest in Payton. They have also have coveted Ricky Davis since signing him to an offer sheet two summers ago. So, again, the seeds of a deal already are in place.
This time, the Celtics have to be less greedy. What they should want in this deal is to clear more cap room for the summer.
If the Celtics offered Payton, Davis and Raef LaFrentz to the Wolves for the expiring contracts of Latrell Sprewell, Ervin Johnson and a young prospect like Ndudi Ebi, the Wolves would have to consider.
Owner Glen Taylor spent a lot of money two summers ago trying to build a contender. Last year things went great, but this year things have fallen apart as Spree and Sam Cassell have complained about contract extensions. It's no secret the Wolves want to rid themselves of Spree, but they'd like to replace him with a younger player who can do many of the same things.
Davis is that guy. Trading Davis would be tough for the Celtics. He has been on his best behavior in Boston – a minor flareup in practice recently notwithstanding– and is a good fit in the team's offense. However, there are enough internal questions about his character and attitude that the Celtics have reservations about building a young team around him.
Giving up Payton wouldn't be a major concern. They're going to lose him next summer anyway. LaFrentz has been productive, but he has another four years and $45 million left on his contract. He's not worth that to the Celtics, but he might be to the Wolves. They need a big man who can block shots and spread the defense on the offensive end. In Minnesota, LaFrentz wouldn't have to be a star – just a complement to Kevin Garnett.
Landing Payton, Davis and LaFrentz would catapult the Wolves immediately back into the upper stratosphere of the West. They would be right there with the Spurs and Suns for a shot at the Western Conference title.
The downside is that they would be inheriting $70 million worth of contracts while shipping out just $22 million. If Taylor has the stomach for the luxury-tax bills, it's a good deal for Minnesota.
For Boston, the trade is all about the $20 million in cap room they'd clear this summer. They lose three good players in Payton, LaFrentz and Davis, but it's unclear how well any of them fit in Boston's long-term plans.
Ebi is the one prize, a highly-coveted prep-to-pros kid who has been buried at the end of the Wolves' bench. The other two Wolves, Spree and Johnson, would likely be waived before they caused a ruckus.
Move Three: The reconstruction
Radically pulling the plug on the season would provide the Celtics a number of benefits.
First, with the veterans gone, Ainge and Rivers would get a much better look at young players like Jefferson, Dalembert, Iguodala, Allen, Welsch, Delonte West and Kendrick Perkins.
Second, the team would take a nosedive in the standings, likely giving them a high lottery pick in the upcoming draft. This is one of the best point guard drafts in recent years, and if the Celtics could get their hands on a top prospect like Chris Paul of Wake Forest, they'd be in great shape.
Third, the team would head into the summer roughly $25 million under the cap.
Here's how their roster would look entering the summer:
PG: Delonte West, Marcus Banks
SG: Andre Iguodala, Tony Allen
SF: Jiri Welsch, Ndubi Ebi
PF: Al Jefferson, Kendrick Perkins
C: Samuel Dalembert
Some of the cap space would go to re-signing Dalembert. Ainge could use the rest of the space to fill holes with veterans or add a superstar via free agency or trade. With guys like Ray Allen, Michael Redd, Joe Johnson and Larry Hughes available via free agency and other top players on the trade market, the Celtics have the room to add a face to the franchise.
The makeover molds the roster to Ainge's liking – young, athletic players who can play in an up-tempo system – while giving him maximum flexibility to add whatever pieces he thinks are missing.
Up to this point, the changes Ainge has made in Boston have been largely cosmetic. His hands have been tied by a bloated payroll, low draft picks and a few unmovable contracts.
That could all change if Ainge made these moves. They're radical and controversial, but they might be what's needed to put the Celtics in position again to be more than a .500 team.
Given the reckless abandon with which Ainge has already remade the roster, why not go all the way?
Ainge should go all the way
By Chad Ford
ESPN Insider
The trade rumors out of Boston are coming fast and furious. We're not talking about the overblown Walter McCarty-to-the Suns rumor.
What we are talking about is a growing rumbling around the league, including inside the Celtics, that changes ranging from small to radical could happen before the Feb. 24 trade deadline.
It's no secret the Celtics are taking offers for Gary Payton and Mark Blount. Payton has been telling people he'll be wearing another uniform by the All-Star break, and team president Danny Ainge has never been a huge fan of Blount (which makes it tough to explain the six-year deal he gave Blount this summer).
But trading Blount and Payton for cap space and an obscure prospect or two are Band-Aids.
Shouldn't Ainge, who already has gone halfway with his extreme makeover of the Celtics, go the rest of the way?
The team is 20-22 and has as good a chance as any team to win the Atlantic Division and get a posh No. 3 seed in the playoffs. But what good does that do? The Celtics won't advance deep into the playoffs, and there are growing signs the pieces they have assembled, while talented, don't mesh well.
It is clear the Celtics are very high on Al Jefferson and Tony Allen, two of their first-round picks last June. They also remain supportive of Jiri Welsch, despite his struggles this season. Those three appear to form a solid nucleus for the future.
The Celtics have stated publicly that they have no intention of trading Paul Pierce, their only star and their most valuable trading chip.
But maybe they should trade him.
As ESPN The Magazine's Ric Bucher pointed out Wednesday, Pierce is not a great fit for the style of play Ainge and Rivers endorse. He has been miserable since Ainge started dismantling the team. And he's the one guy with enough trade value to bring a couple of young prospects in return.
What if Ainge decided to go all the way with the rebuilding effort, to rid the team of all vestiges of the past and build like an expansion team with talented young prospects and tons of cap room?
It's more possible than you might think. The seeds of two deals that could make it happen are already in place. Insider takes what's already out there and connects the dots the rest of the way for Ainge and the Celtics.
Move One: Pierce and Blount for Dalembert and Iguodala
Sixers head coach Jim O'Brien would love to get his hands on Blount, whom he coached in Boston and whom Philly pursued in free agency. But Blount is a base-year compensation player, meaning the Celtics can take back only half of what he makes in a trade. To get around complicated trade rules that say the contracts swapped must be within 15 percent and $100,000 of each other, the trade would have to be much, much larger.
How large? What if the Celtics offered Pierce and Blount and the expiring contract of Tom Gugliotta. Adding those players would give the Sixers immediate credibility and a leg up on every other team in the East. A backcourt of Allen Iverson and Pierce might be a tad combustible, but the Sixers always would have the option of moving Iverson for a more traditional point guard.
The Celtics wouldn't just give Pierce and Blount away. To make a deal work for the team and fit under the salary cap, they would demand Samuel Dalembert and Andre Iguodala, along with cap relief in the form of the expiring contracts of Glenn Robinson and Kedrick Brown.
The move would clear roughly $14 million in cap space for the Celtics and give them two players with very bright futures. The Celtics are among a dozen teams enamored with Dalembert. He's an athletic, young 7-footer who can block shots and rebound. Offensively he's raw, but he's coming around. He's a perfect fit in the Celtics' offense, however, because of how well he runs the floor.
Paired in the frontcourt with Al Jefferson, the Celtics would have the makings of a young, dominant front line. Jefferson provides the toughness and low-post scoring. Dalembert provides the defense and athleticism. While Dalembert is not a proven commodity, scouts around the league insist he has a chance to become a special player.
The downside for the Celtics is that they're going to have to fork over some serious cash for Dalembert in the summer. He's a restricted free agent, and the Atlanta Hawks, in particular, have him in their sights. However, how often do young, athletic, talented centers come along?
Iguodala is also a perfect fit. He's an athletic point-forward with excellent court vision and defensive instincts. Like Dalembert, his offensive skills are raw (especially his perimeter shot), but he'll rack up points and assists in Rivers' fast-break offense.
The Celtics would waive Robinson. He's only in the deal to for cap relief in the summer.
While the Sixers likely will choke over giving up two young prospects, getting a star player like Pierce and a center who better fits O'Brien's offensive and defensive schemes would soften the blow.
Sixers GM Billy King loves Dalembert and Iguodala, but when he hired O'Brien, he did it with an understanding he had to field a team O'Brien could coach. Dalembert has been a bad fit, because O'Brien likes his big men to move out of the paint to defend and trap on the perimeter.
Pierce and, to a lesser extent, Blount are proven performers in O'Brien's system. Dalembert and Iguodala aren't.
Move Two: Payton, Davis and LaFrentz for cap room
If the Celtics could make the above deal happen, they'd be halfway there.
The other half of our hypothetical makeover starts with Payton, who wants two things: to play for a contender and to play for a Western Conference team. He has played well enough this year to garner interest, and though the Celtics like Payton, they'd prefer to get something in return for him now as opposed to losing him in free agency this summer without compensation.
The Timberwolves have shown interest in Payton. They have also have coveted Ricky Davis since signing him to an offer sheet two summers ago. So, again, the seeds of a deal already are in place.
This time, the Celtics have to be less greedy. What they should want in this deal is to clear more cap room for the summer.
If the Celtics offered Payton, Davis and Raef LaFrentz to the Wolves for the expiring contracts of Latrell Sprewell, Ervin Johnson and a young prospect like Ndudi Ebi, the Wolves would have to consider.
Owner Glen Taylor spent a lot of money two summers ago trying to build a contender. Last year things went great, but this year things have fallen apart as Spree and Sam Cassell have complained about contract extensions. It's no secret the Wolves want to rid themselves of Spree, but they'd like to replace him with a younger player who can do many of the same things.
Davis is that guy. Trading Davis would be tough for the Celtics. He has been on his best behavior in Boston – a minor flareup in practice recently notwithstanding– and is a good fit in the team's offense. However, there are enough internal questions about his character and attitude that the Celtics have reservations about building a young team around him.
Giving up Payton wouldn't be a major concern. They're going to lose him next summer anyway. LaFrentz has been productive, but he has another four years and $45 million left on his contract. He's not worth that to the Celtics, but he might be to the Wolves. They need a big man who can block shots and spread the defense on the offensive end. In Minnesota, LaFrentz wouldn't have to be a star – just a complement to Kevin Garnett.
Landing Payton, Davis and LaFrentz would catapult the Wolves immediately back into the upper stratosphere of the West. They would be right there with the Spurs and Suns for a shot at the Western Conference title.
The downside is that they would be inheriting $70 million worth of contracts while shipping out just $22 million. If Taylor has the stomach for the luxury-tax bills, it's a good deal for Minnesota.
For Boston, the trade is all about the $20 million in cap room they'd clear this summer. They lose three good players in Payton, LaFrentz and Davis, but it's unclear how well any of them fit in Boston's long-term plans.
Ebi is the one prize, a highly-coveted prep-to-pros kid who has been buried at the end of the Wolves' bench. The other two Wolves, Spree and Johnson, would likely be waived before they caused a ruckus.
Move Three: The reconstruction
Radically pulling the plug on the season would provide the Celtics a number of benefits.
First, with the veterans gone, Ainge and Rivers would get a much better look at young players like Jefferson, Dalembert, Iguodala, Allen, Welsch, Delonte West and Kendrick Perkins.
Second, the team would take a nosedive in the standings, likely giving them a high lottery pick in the upcoming draft. This is one of the best point guard drafts in recent years, and if the Celtics could get their hands on a top prospect like Chris Paul of Wake Forest, they'd be in great shape.
Third, the team would head into the summer roughly $25 million under the cap.
Here's how their roster would look entering the summer:
PG: Delonte West, Marcus Banks
SG: Andre Iguodala, Tony Allen
SF: Jiri Welsch, Ndubi Ebi
PF: Al Jefferson, Kendrick Perkins
C: Samuel Dalembert
Some of the cap space would go to re-signing Dalembert. Ainge could use the rest of the space to fill holes with veterans or add a superstar via free agency or trade. With guys like Ray Allen, Michael Redd, Joe Johnson and Larry Hughes available via free agency and other top players on the trade market, the Celtics have the room to add a face to the franchise.
The makeover molds the roster to Ainge's liking – young, athletic players who can play in an up-tempo system – while giving him maximum flexibility to add whatever pieces he thinks are missing.
Up to this point, the changes Ainge has made in Boston have been largely cosmetic. His hands have been tied by a bloated payroll, low draft picks and a few unmovable contracts.
That could all change if Ainge made these moves. They're radical and controversial, but they might be what's needed to put the Celtics in position again to be more than a .500 team.
Given the reckless abandon with which Ainge has already remade the roster, why not go all the way?