2011 NBA Free Agency

[pmoehrin]

Warriors will offer DeAndre Jordan a four year deal, starting at $10 million annually. The Clippers previously offered $40 million over 5 years

WTH has DeAndre Jordan done to deserve so much money?

He's a decent rebounder and defender with no post game.

[DarkJourney]

Then get rid of the goddamn small market teams if players don't want to be there

I know contraction won't happen but I really don't give a

[LeGooo]

Marcus Thompson says sources told him Warriors would take CP3 as a rental if they would take Monta instead of Curry

[Lights Out]

WTH has DeAndre Jordan done to deserve so much money?

He's a decent rebounder and defender with no post game.

His upside is ridiculous, he's very athletic, and he's young. I'm not surprised that other teams are vying so hard for his services.

Marcus Thompson says sources told him Warriors would take CP3 as a rental if they would take Monta instead of Curry

LOL, good luck with that. I think the Warriors should be targeting bigs anyway - going after DeAndre Jordan is a smart move, but since he's an RFA, they'd better have a plan B.

[LeGooo]

Before I spent $50M on Jordan, I'd offer Marc Gasol wayyy more than that

[LeGooo]

Magic have used their amnesty on Gilbery Arenas

[pmoehrin]

WTH has DeAndre Jordan done to deserve so much money?

He's a decent rebounder and defender with no post game.

His upside is ridiculous, he's very athletic, and he's young. I'm not surprised that other teams are vying so hard for his services.

Very athletic but from everything I've seen from him he has two left feet, and while he's young 23 isn't that young. So if he's still pretty much totally lost when it comes to playing with his back to the basket at this point when is he ever going to figure it out?

I'll agree with the upside but he's a high risk player as well. Had he stayed in college another year or two I think he would be in much better shape then he is now.

Maybe he will figure it out but in that time it takes him to do so, I could see a team getting burned by him. Right now he is good enough to be a starter, but he's a role player at best and you don't pay that kind of money for role players. Those are the types of contracts that wind up burning teams.

[B-Rich]

Plus, if you really think about it... Paul is about the only reason anyone gives a damn anymore about the New Orleans Hornets. He's a good player. Sending him to the Lakers may make them better in the short term (Losing Gasol and Bynum would hurt far more then they think), but the real loser would be New Orleans. There wouldn't be a reason for anyone to give a damn about the Hornets... as if anyone did to begin with.

Also, is that bulljive in New Orleans really better than a team in KeyArena?

Not at all. People talk about how keeping the Hornets in New Orleans after Katrina was The Right Thing To Do. I submit that the right thing to do would have been to save Louisiana from itself by preventing them from having to subsidize a failing basketball team. Give them a generous settlement to be used toward charity and relief efforts, throw them the 2008 All-Star Game, and keep the Hornets in Oklahoma City.

Instead, their hand was forced by the NFL pushing the Saints down America's throats as God's Team Saving New Orleans But In Football Form. This idea, to me, was just as offensive and absurd as the idea that God was punishing New Orleans for gay people, and just as blithely unchallenged by really really stupid people. With the nation's leading sports behemoth (and its media arms) not just asserting its commitment to the city but aggressively pushing them as something bigger than not just football but all worldly things, even notwithstanding the world of difference between an established NFL team and a decidedly non-established NBA team, how could the NBA do anything but make this the hill they die on?

And that's what they've done now, more or less, with this Chris Paul clusterf-ck immediately squandering and eroding a great deal of the goodwill the league has gotten by finally getting its season underway. Behold the Swamp Coyotes.

Once again, Admiral's anti-New Orleans diatribe comes up. And I'm not letting it go unchallenged.

You can harp on the whole Saints post-Katrina thing all you want if it makes you feel better; all that "the NFL pushing the Saints down America's throats as God's Team Saving New Orleans" baloney. But no one here thinks "the Saints saved New Orleans", no one hear believes that line. But people here would have been damned pissed if the hurricane was used as an excuse to take this city's team away, especially after haters and naysayers like you have posted on these and other boards with statements like, "New Orleans in and of itself doesn't have the population or the money to support pro sports. It was dicey before the flood and impossible after". After Katrina, you and many others smugly posted that they'd never play another down in New Orleans. Well, hate to burst your bubble but the last blackout of a Saints game was YEARS before Katrina (sometime maybe in the Ditka era or late Mora era) and post-Katrina the Saints have been been sold out via season tickets. New Orleans is in waiting list territory, like Green Bay, Denver, & Washington. The Superdome has been upgraded, and the Super Bowl is here after next season. The state and Saints have a new lease through 2025, with no cash subsidies to the Saints franchise. So chew on that, jack.

Re: the Hornets. Again, you have no clue, just an open disdain and disrespect for this area. In a year when (1)everyone here knew the team has no owner, (2)everyone here knew that a lockout was coming and there might not be a season, (3) everyone here knew that this was the last year on Chris Paul's contract, and by all indications he had no intention of staying past this year-- this year, how many season tickets did this poor backwater burg that can't support the NBA sell? We just broke the 10,000 barrier; a solid number that big-city Atlanta had been TRYING to hit a year ago, 3,000 more than "burgeoning metropolis" Charlotte sold.

The biggest problem right now with the Chris Paul trade has nothing to do with the city or its support. It has to do with the fact that the league has (1) given themselves less than a month to move from a lockout to a regular season, while (2) they happen to own the franchise with the most sought-after last-year-of-contract player. With 10,000 season ticket holders and new multiple corporate sponsors, new owners for the team are lined up to take this team off the NBA's hands while keeping the team here. If the new owner(s) were in place and this deal was made, no one could complain. No one here in New Orleans is complaining: while sad to see Chris Paul go, just about all local fans know that it's better to get something for him now than watch him for one more year and get nothing.

The NBA is showing that despite "winning" the lockout, they still aren't united. On one hand you've got the small market Cavs' owner saying the rich get richer while the poor get gypped (25 Washington Generals); on the other hand you have a rich , major market owner like Mark Cuban mad because a League-owned team is involved in a deal which could improve a division rival (Hornets) AND a playoff rival (Lakers).

Bulljive in New Orleans? Please.

[The_Admiral]

What are you talking about? I don't have a "bias against New Orleans," you convoluted martyr. I think that for all the good things about the area, it's not a good place to be in the pro basketball business. Get the red-hot poker out of your ass.

[NJTank]

Howard to Nets close to a done deal

Brooklyn, we go hard.

Eat a bag of d**ks Lakers and Knicks fans. Would've liked to see the Celtics get him, but it prob wasn't going to happen anyway.

Might want to hold that bag for a little while longer. If these tampering charges stick, your big Russian bazillionaire may have just screwed the franchise out of Howard, and their chances of keeping Deron Williams when he opts out (assuming Howard is no longer in play) and may have to give up draft picks or something a la the Joe Smith debacle.

...and even if Dwight does become a Net, Chandler-Stat-Melo is the best front line in the league (even Magic Johnson admits it, via a recent tweet), and is more than capable of handling Dwight and whatever role player personnel they fill the front line with. Kris Humphries isn't scaring anyone. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if he were too heartbroken over his divorce to play.

If that happens than the Russian needs to go to Siberia and stay, this team has been poorly run forever and this will be the biggest slap in the face.

[B-Rich]

What are you talking about? I don't have a "bias against New Orleans," you convoluted martyr. I think that for all the good things about the area, it's not a good place to be in the pro basketball business. Get the red-hot poker out of your ass.

Feb.1, 2009:

"New Orleans is not long for this world as a major league sports town and in all reality it probably shouldn't be one anymore."

Feb.1, 2009:

"Hardly anyone remembers the New Orleans Jazz because they failed."

Feb. 27, 2010:

"...if I weren't so opposed to New Orleans being force-fed its government-subsidized NBA team back."

December 4, 2010:

"It would be taken from a failing city like new Orleans,..."

"Antediluvian New Orleans wasn't particularly impressive as an NBA town, and there's even less there now."

"what's basically Neworleansland The Theme Park"

"No, really, the NBA should have bought the Hornets when they were in Oklahoma City. It would've taken creepy sex offender George Shinn out of the league, at which point Stern could flip the team to his life partner Clay Bennett and permanently get a good thing going in OKC. Then, old Schultzie never finds himself selling the Sonics to a cadre of beefy idiots in cowboy hats whose promises to keep the team ring a little less than sincere, and Seattle is then much less likely to leave the league. Under this scenario, everybody wins. Well, except the handful of people who passionately cared about the Hornets. But the Saints eventually saved New Orleans by being good at football, so nobody would've noticed anyway."

March 5, 2011:

"... they should've kept those Hornets because putting them back in New Orleans has been an unmitigated disaster"

March 10, 2011:

"Been over this before: New Orleans in and of itself doesn't have the population or the money to support pro sports."

June 8, 2011:

"Of course a multitude of cities could do better than New Orleans, because going back to New Orleans after the flood was a terrible mistake that's resulted in receivership and a failed market..."

Oct. 4, 2011

"I'm glad Mercedes-Benz is getting their name out there in the cash-flush economy of New Orleans."

And of course, today's zingers.

Call it bias, call it an anti-New Orleans stance; whatever. In regard to New Orleans and its pro sport teams, you've shown a history of smart-ass comments filled with condescension (and lack of regard for key facts). These are your opinions, and you're entitled to them-- you're entitled to say all the things in your posts. But if I retort on the basis of civic pride-- with facts that dispute your pronouncements or opinions-- don't call me "a convoluted martyr" or tell me to "get that red-hot poker out of my ass".

[pmoehrin]

If small market owners are in fact bringing down the hammer on big market teams making legal trades, I can only imagine what they'll want to do with a big market team engaging in illegal activity.

Just ask TWolves fans how bad tampering can be for a franchise. Its pretty much only just now that they're starting to get over it.

Net fans better hope that evidence doesn't stick.

[YessSir32]

The Pistons bought out my favorite player of all time, Rip Hamilton. Sad day for me.

[CS85]

What are you talking about? I don't have a "bias against New Orleans," you convoluted martyr. I think that for all the good things about the area, it's not a good place to be in the pro basketball business. Get the red-hot poker out of your ass.

Feb.1, 2009:

"New Orleans is not long for this world as a major league sports town and in all reality it probably shouldn't be one anymore."

Feb.1, 2009:

"Hardly anyone remembers the New Orleans Jazz because they failed."

Feb. 27, 2010:

"...if I weren't so opposed to New Orleans being force-fed its government-subsidized NBA team back."

December 4, 2010:

"It would be taken from a failing city like new Orleans,..."

"Antediluvian New Orleans wasn't particularly impressive as an NBA town, and there's even less there now."

"what's basically Neworleansland The Theme Park"

"No, really, the NBA should have bought the Hornets when they were in Oklahoma City. It would've taken creepy sex offender George Shinn out of the league, at which point Stern could flip the team to his life partner Clay Bennett and permanently get a good thing going in OKC. Then, old Schultzie never finds himself selling the Sonics to a cadre of beefy idiots in cowboy hats whose promises to keep the team ring a little less than sincere, and Seattle is then much less likely to leave the league. Under this scenario, everybody wins. Well, except the handful of people who passionately cared about the Hornets. But the Saints eventually saved New Orleans by being good at football, so nobody would've noticed anyway."

March 5, 2011:

"... they should've kept those Hornets because putting them back in New Orleans has been an unmitigated disaster"

March 10, 2011:

"Been over this before: New Orleans in and of itself doesn't have the population or the money to support pro sports."

June 8, 2011:

"Of course a multitude of cities could do better than New Orleans, because going back to New Orleans after the flood was a terrible mistake that's resulted in receivership and a failed market..."

Oct. 4, 2011

"I'm glad Mercedes-Benz is getting their name out there in the cash-flush economy of New Orleans."

And of course, today's zingers.

Call it bias, call it an anti-New Orleans stance; whatever. In regard to New Orleans and its pro sport teams, you've shown a history of smart-ass comments filled with condescension (and lack of regard for key facts). These are your opinions, and you're entitled to them-- you're entitled to say all the things in your posts. But if I retort on the basis of civic pride-- with facts that dispute your pronouncements or opinions-- don't call me "a convoluted martyr" or tell me to "get that red-hot poker out of my ass".

[RedSox44]

Fantastic day for the Celtics they trade Big Baby for Bass, are close to signing David West, acquired Keyon Dooling and signed Chris Wilcox.

There seems to be a PF logjam, though.

Kevin Garnett

Brandon Bass

David West

Chris Wilcox

JuJuan Johnson.

Either Ainge and Doc are hoping one of these guys can play center or there's a few more tricks up Ainge's sleeve.

[CS85]

I'm a bit out of the loop here, but why is Greg Oden getting paid $8 million and has almost never played?

[BigMac12]

I'm a bit out of the loop here, but why is Greg Oden getting paid $8 million and has almost never played?

He was a lottery pick? :shrug:

[highlanders08]

I'm a bit out of the loop here, but why is Greg Oden getting paid $8 million and has almost never played?

He was a lottery pick? :shrug:

Cause when he did play he was an extremely efficient player and ranked up there with some of the better centers in the league and he is still young (amazingly). If his body is finally healed this year then it's a low risk/high reward contract since it is only for one year.

[CS85]

How does $8 million translate into low-risk? Good lord.

[pmoehrin]

I'm a bit out of the loop here, but why is Greg Oden getting paid $8 million and has almost never played?

When he's been healthy he's shown he has the talent to be worthy of a number one pick. The problem is he's missed three full seasons already.

The Blazers must really be confident his knees are healthy that's all I can say. They fired Kevin Pritchard the man who drafted him so its not like the Blazers would be admitting failure by not resigning him. I don't know I see alot of money being thrown around at high risk high reward type players this offseason. The last time I checked though basketball is still a team sport. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. The Miami Heat were not the first team to put three superstar players together and fail to win a title. There's other ways of winning the Larry O'Brien Trophy. And just because you spend alot of money on signing a player doesn't automatically turn him into a superstar.