Free Ballin’

At first glance this trade kind of got me down. I don’t care about Denver, so I’m not down because they made a dumb trade and hurt themselves; it’s just that this sort of trade is almost insulting to me. It’s like, “I’m supposed to accept this product? This is the NBA I’m supposed to embrace?” They got nothing for Camby, and it’s just business as usual for a league that too often just doesn’t deserve the passion of its fan base.

This trade is actually mostly about AI. This is his last year in Denver; I don’t think they’ll re-sign him. The trade to Denver was always mind-boggling to me. AI’s an awful fit. When Hollinger wrote about it, he disagreed, saying that AI and Carmelo got their points in different ways and would compliment each other. AI was essentially a starter, a guy who created his own offense from the beginning of the play, while Carmelo is more of a closer, working wonderfully without the ball and finishing plays quickly and efficiently. I felt that Hollinger sort of missed the point: AI is much more efficient when he’s coming off those screens, cutting, moving without the ball. That’s why Larry Brown did it so much. Brown knew that unless he ran AI around screens and cuts, Iverson would just set up for isolations at the top of the key. His isolations are often spectacular and can be a valuable weapon, to get the other team in foul trouble, but for the most part, Iverson is most efficient when he catches the ball in motion, and can use his speed to find space to drive or pull-up. But that off-ball role is still largely Carmelo’s, and AI is either scoring in isolations or fastbreaks. Essentially, Denver has encouraged AI’s worst habbits and wasted another few years of his remarkably durrable peak.

I understand them making the trade, even if it was a poor fit. They had to give up so little I can just imagine them reasoning, “how can we not do this trade?” It would take real cajones to decide it wasn’t for them. I don’t know, is getting a huge talent for nickles on the dollar a must-do at all times, regardless of fit? I really don’t know. I just know it’s a hell of a time findng a good fit for AI, without matching him with a player who makes Iverson skills kind of redundant.

Oh yeah, the trade…

Denver is utterly directionless. Kenyon Martin’s and Nene Hillario’s (this isn’t soccer, goddamnit!) contracts are so bad that Denver isn’t even in a position to start rebuiding for another three or four years. They’re like the Knicks with twice the talent.

Trading Camby makes perfect sense. He’s coming off a productive and healthy year, a good time to trade a 34 year old with career-long injury problems. But that’s the point; his value is up. Oh, it’s not gold. They’re not going to get a good first-rounder or anything. But he has two years on his contract for $8 million per, a very reasonable sum and a good short-term risk for a contender that could use an excellent defender. Are you telling me they couldn’t have picked up two second rounders and maybe a $3 million expiring contract or something? To whatever degree, Camby is an asset, and they got nothing.

Hollinger says they’re doing this largely to create cap room to sign J.R. Smith. Yeah? Well that’ll be an interesting signing. You just know they’re going to fuck that one up—money in the bag. I really like Smith’s game, and his value is hard to estbalish since he’s (apparently) such a jerk that I don’t see teams getting in line for him. Combine that with him being a restricted free agent, and it being a strong buyer’s market, argh. They’re going to give him a “we totally expect he’ll be a star” contract, just wait. What’s particularly stupid is that they could pull the Camby deal at any time, so why not wait to see how much other teams offer Smith and seeing what kind of space they’d need? Eh, whatever, I just don’t expect teams to be savvy. And I don’t worry about AI too much, since he’ll be playing for the vet’s minimum next year, on a contender.

I’m just getting tired of watching NHL-stupid management in the NBA.