Going Commando

Forgot about Terrence Jones. He could be a great pick too and would definitely bring another excellent rebounder into the fold. This is probably the top 8 if the draft were held today: - Perry Jones - Terrence Jones - Jared Sullinger - Harrison Barnes - Enes Kanter - Kyrie Irving - Derrick Williams - Foreign big (Valanciunas/Montiejunas) The only ones from that group that I don't really like for us are Irving and Valanciunas/Montiejunas. Therefore, I think we should try very hard to get two picks in this year's top 8 and try and come away with the best combo of those six players we can. It'd be awesome to get Sullinger/Kanter with our first choice and then take the best SF left of that four man group (Jones/Jones/Barnes/Williams) that drops with the second choice.

I like his game. I think he's your second or third best player on a championship caliber team. He's not a franchise guy that can carry a bad team by himself. But he's a key cog. I really hope we get a top three/four pick. I want Sullinger, Barnes, or Perry Jones (probably in that order). I think Kanter could also be a hugely successful pick but I'd be scared to take him. I'd want those knees completely scrutinized. If they checked out alright, then put him at #2 on my wishlist. Sullinger and Kanter could do more to help McGee than anyone else. They're tenacious rebounders and tough, scrappy players who'd allow McGee to just go and play the ball without having to worry about rebounding. They've also got the kind of offensive skills where they can create for themselves in the paint. They'd each be substantial upgrades over Andre Blatche. Barnes will be good no matter where he ends up and he'd be nice as a secondary perimeter scoring option to Young and our top perimeter stopper. He and Booker could be a nice rotation at the SF spot as he's got the athleticism and finesse and Booker as the toughness and strength. Perry Jones has the potential to be an absolute beast of a perimeter defender with his athleticism but something isn't quite there with him. He's the athletic cream of the crop but I want to know why his teams haven't won as much as they should. Then again, I could see him being the type of player that would benefit tremendously from playing with a top playmaking PG who could crush a pick and roll. I really hope we can trade Andre Blatche for a decent draft pick in the first. We already have two picks, and one will hopefully be a top four selection. I hope we'd be able to take Kanter or Sullinger with that one and then move up to around 8-10 for someone like Harrison Barnes.

Westbrook was a homerun like Durant, and Ibaka has been good, but I actually think Harden was a massive missed opportunity. I think the Thunder would be so much better if they'd drafted Stephen Curry, Tyreke Evans, or DeMar DeRozan instead. I don't think Harden was an example of good drafting. Presti was also fortunate to end up with four top 5 picks in three years. That makes team building a lot easier.

That's sad news. There's also been a lot of losing recently. This is kind of the nadir of the season for us. Time for a distracting hypothetical: If you all could go back to 2009 and un-trade the 5th overall pick, what would you all do with it? Use the benefit of hindsight as well as the knowledge that we get John Wall in 2010. I'd spend it on either DeMar DeRozan or Stephen Curry. I can't decide which right now. I can see a compelling case made for either.

It'll be hard to find someone better though. It would also suck to have a minimal return on McGee after having spent all that time developing him. I'd rather stay the course with him than start over at the position and go from it being a position of minor strength to one of huge need. That could damage our ability to keep Wall. Plus I still think there is a lot of upside left to McGee's game. ---------- Post added February-26th-2011 at 02:20 PM ---------- When are we going to change the team name? Wizards just leaves me feeling unattached. It'd be like if the Redskins changed their name to the Accountants or something. I want us to go back to the Bullets now so we can hear an endless stream of puns every time Wall runs coast to coast.

I don't really know enough about coaching candidates to have an opinion. I don't think Flip is the man for this job though. He needs a veteran team to work with, not a bunch of knuckleheaded 22 and 23 year olds. I just don't think he's got the patience to manage this group with an even hand like they need. But I also don't think Flip is a disaster either. This season was ****ed from the beginning and we knew that going in. So the team losing shouldn't decide whether he stays or goes after this season. What will be my barometer of success is if he continues to effectively develop Wall/McGee/Seraphin/Booker/Young. That's really all that matters at this point. Even if McGee never gets any better than he is right now, he's still a good starting center. He's efficient and has unique above the rim ability and has a PER in the 16s, which is better than what a lot of teams get at the position. But McGee is also 23 and came into the game notoriously raw. He's already made big strides in his first season as a starter and will certainly continue to do so. Josh Smith was another super athletic but super raw big that didn't start to thrive until he had about 150-200 starts under his belt. The Hawks would be short a really good player if they had given up on him too early. Once McGee gets consistent enough to start commanding 30 minutes or more per game, his performances will shine. He'll put up bigger numbers and assert himself as one of the better centers in the East.

This is the second time this season we've played the Heat tough. The first game we didn't have Wall, so that was kind of a forgettable one. We haven't seemed to gain any ground on the Magic, but when you look at the landscape in the East, when Wall has been healthy, we've beaten the Celtics and played the Heat really hard twice. Wall hasn't really been healthy versus the Bulls yet, and clearly we don't have a chance when he's not in top form. But you have to be encouraged by the early returns of this team against the conference's best teams. We seem to match up well against the Heat and Javale can dominate them in the paint. They have to commit LeBron and Wade to defending Young and Wall. If we actually get another big scoring forward, I don't know that they'd have the horses to shut everyone down. We could beat them. Likewise, the we can give the Celtics everything they can handle because they have a hard time matching our speed and athleticism. Rondo isn't enough of an offensive threat to truly tax Wall and it takes everything Rondo has to defend him. If Seraphin and Booker continue to develop, in a couple of years we'll be able to match them in saltiness. Those two power teams are going to have trouble with us in a couple of seasons. The only problem is the damned Hawks, Magic, and Bulls. The Bulls can go stride for stride with us at just about every position since they're built almost identically (but with a lot more talent). Get us Sullinger though and we'll have our own Boozer (only much younger). The Magic are just too big and too athletic in the frontcourt for us to handle right now. Howard scores and rebounds at will and Javale will probably always struggle with him. Maybe one day Seraphin can develop into an effective defensive presence down low, I don't know what we're going to do to stop Howard. The Hawks pose all sorts of matchup problems for us too because we don't really have an answer to Josh Howard nor Al Horford. Our best hope is that they never find a PG and eventually decide to dismantle their core to shake things up. The Knicks would be dangerous if they got Dwight Howard. They wouldn't scare me as much if they got Paul because a Wall-Paul matchup will favor us and Javale can actually out-rebound Stoudemire. But if the cap ends up being much higher than we expected and Howard leaves for New York, that would suck. The Nets wouldn't bother me as much. I think Wall can handle Deron Williams and Javale can defend Brook Lopez. If they added a third piece though, they might become problematic. Detroit, Toronto, Cleveland, and Charlotte all look like they're in worse shape than we are. Eventually, we'll be able to beat Milwaukee regularly. Indiana and Philly are tough draws though. We tend to match up poorly against them for some reason. When you look around the conference, our future seems bright if we get another key piece from this year's lottery. The West will still be a bear and probably kick our butts most of the time, but we'll eventually be able to hold our own in this conference and make it to the playoffs. This year has been long and frustrating, but aside from a few brief and isolated moments of despair, I've felt optimistic the whole time. Things are going to get better and we'll start peaking at a point where the other power teams in the East are on the downslope of their window.

This is a team full of 23 year olds though. Young is an elder statesman and he's still a couple years away from his prime. This team still has to grow quite a bit and we as fans have to actually be willing to wait for it to happen.

Here's an interesting tidbit. When you take out Mustafa Shakur's number, McGee, Wall, and Young lead our team in PER according to ESPN. Blatche is fourth, but Trevor Booker is fifth. I think this actually validates the PER stat as a determinant of your teams best players because I think that it correctly placed our 4 best players in the top 5 (discounting Shakur). ---------- Post added February-26th-2011 at 12:13 AM ---------- Is it fair to say that John Wall is in the middle of the best statistical rookie season of any of the pure PGs currently in the league? Nearly the best in the history of the game? His current statistical line (15.2 PTS, 9.0 AST, 4.3 RBD, 1.7 STL, .408% FG) is arguably better overall than the rookie seasons from: - Chris Paul (His closest competitor--better shooting FG % but worse 3PT %, slightly more points and steals and rebounds, but nearly a whole two assists / game lower) - Deron Williams - Rajon Rondo - Steve Nash - Jason Kidd - Russell Westbrook (probably his third closest competitor) - Derrick Rose (probably his second closest competitor) Paul and Oscar Robertson are pretty much the only pure PGs in NBA history who were this good this fast. Isiah Thomas comes close, but his total output doesn't put him in Wall's tier. So basically, when all is said and done, we could be looking at second or third greatest rookie season from a pure PG in NBA history. If you remove remove Robertson from consideration because he played in such a different era, Wall's season so far has arguably been the greatest of the modern era. ****ing Blake Griffin. Any other year and Wall would be the unanimous choice.

What do you mean Vishal? Young is obviously just a guy and only counts as .25 of our 1.25 barely adequate starters. ---------- Post added February-25th-2011 at 11:11 PM ---------- Those are our young studs. They played like it on the road against one of the best teams in the league. They are a really nice set of building blocks along with Booker and Seraphin. We're going to be a good team as we mature and actually become a team. Right now we aren't more than the sum of our parts. But our young guys have talent and energy and I think we'll start to turn it around before they get burned out. I agree that Blatche needs a change of scenery, but we shouldn't give him up for nothing. I think he'll have some trade value for a team looking for some scoring. I would have moved him for the Clippers' lottery pick if we could have gotten our hands on it in time. We probably could have gotten Barnes with that pick. Oh well. Failing that, we should try and get a lottery pick for the 2012 class because it's chock full of good forwards. Or if we're in striking distance of Jared Sullinger, I would gladly trade Blatche as part of a package to move into the top 3 to get him. If the basketball gods have any mercy in them, they'll let us get Sullinger. Move Blatche, Bibby, and at least one of our older forwards. Pray for the third pick so we can get Sullinger. Hope Atlanta's pick is around 20 because take a look at these names in that range on draft express' mock draft: - Alec Burks @ 18 - Josh Selby @ 20 - Brandon Knight @ 22 - Trey Thompkins @ 27 Those are some bit time offensive players. I'd hope for one of them with the second first rounder. Then in the second you can take whoever. I know some like Marshon Brooks, that could be a range. Suddenly this starts to look like a team that could go somewhere: 1 - Wall, Knight 2 - Young, Crawford 3 - Lewis, Thornton 4 - Sullinger, Booker 5 - McGee, Seraphin

Hey! I once saw a guy wearing a wizard's shirt that looked just like a 5'9" version of Nenad Krstic. Clearly this belongs here.

Am I missing something? How could anyone call the Perkins-Green trade a bad one for either side? I thought it was brilliant and both teams came out winners. People seem to think Perkins is a lot better than he really is. He had his purpose, but really he was just a guy when you get down to it and the Celtics have enough muscle in the front court to suffer his loss in the short term. That's indisputable, they never even missed him this year when he was out. The Celtics have an aging core and if they wait to retool after disaster strikes and Garnett/Pierce/Allen all fall off a cliff at the same time, they'll be consigned to mediocrity and lack the resources to improve. Hell, then you risk making Rondo unhappy. Now they've got as bright a future as anyone with a Rondo/Green/Davis/Krstic core and a lot of nice young role players like Avery Bradley. It was textbook retooling on the fly and taking a proactive approach to finding long term roster solutions because you found yourself in a crisis. I don't see their ability to beat the Magic substantially weakened by this deal either. They always beat the Magic and they're still a better team than them. They still won't have problems matching up with the Heat without Perkins. And I think they've still got more horsepower than the Bulls do. Perkins became unnecessary when Big Baby started to flourish. As for the Thunder, Green was superfluous behind Durant. His best position was always SF and he'd always have been soft at the 4. Now with him gone you can start Ibaka at the 4 and Perkins as your center and suddenly you've got a very natural set of starters that fit their positions instead of having to jimmy around your lineups to make things work. Now they've got the muscle in the front court to hang with the Spurs and the Lakers. It also creates an opportunity for James Harden to really step up and thrive as the third banana in their offense. This deal makes sense to me from every facet. The only way I think it goes bad is if Perkins never gets healthy again (in which case it'd only be bad for the Thunder)

Yeah I don't see what the Warriors could offer us to make a McGee deal work. I sure as hell don't want Ekpe Udoh. Stephen Curry and Monta Ellis are the only players they have that I would want and they aren't going to deal either. Likewise what would be the point of them dealing David Lee?

Williams didn't even start though. Also, I doubt Barnes will go as high as second overall in this class and I was thinking of moving up to get him if he were in an 8-12 range. One of the guys at SI talked to some scouts who thought Barnes was less Marvin Williams and more Sean Elliott. That'd be fine in an 8-12 range. He was a fringe All-Star and that's the kind of player that's your third best guy on a good, winning team.

Yeah, but few players in this class are. I wouldn't expect him to come in his rookie season and average 17/8 but a little ways down the road? That's certainly attainable. The things Barnes will do well from the get go are also useful, like playing good defense, passing well, hustling, bringing an upbeat and focused attitude to the locker room and to practices. ---------- Post added February-24th-2011 at 11:28 AM ---------- Agreed, this is a weak class compared to past years. But you can still find value in it as long as you're not desperate for franchise type cornerstones. There are lots of quality role players to be had--high IQ types that either play excellent defense or have well developed offensive skills that translate to scoring in the NBA (Sullinger, Kanter, Thompkins, Terrence Jones). We need these kinds of pieces now that we actually have our franchise player in Wall. We'll have a better idea of how good this class is when the international players are properly evaluated. I don't think we really know how good Valanciunas, Montiejunas, and Vessley are. They could be nothing or one of them could be the next Gasol/Nowitzki. Montiejunas in particular has that kind of boom or bust quality surrounding him. Later in the first round there might be some athletic freaks like Josh Selby available. I'd spend that Atlanta pick on Selby if he were there. The kid can shoot the lights out and it'd be worth it just to watch the kind of crazy crap he and Wall could pull off. He'd be short for a two but you could find a role for him like the Clippers did with Gordon and the Grizzlies did with Mayo.

That's not necessarily true. Remember the Orlando game Nick Young missed last week? John Wall scored 27 points. Then nobody else scored... Blatche had 15 and Hinrich was next with 10. Wall is a stud, but if you take away Blatche and Young we literally have no one else that can score. We'd go from being blown out by 15 and 20 to being blown out by 50. We'd go from being out-rebounded by 10 or 15 to 20 or 25. It's not like we can afford to be so choosy because this is still a roster profoundly lacking in talent. Maybe Rashard Lewis will be able to pick up the slack for losing Blatche by next season. But I'd be anxious about losing either Blatche or Young until we had someone like Jared Sullinger safely in hand. ---------- Post added February-24th-2011 at 12:48 AM ---------- Someone asked about Lucas Noguiera earlier. Here's a scouting report: http://www.nbadraft.net/players/lucas-nogueira It sounds like he's a loooong ways away from being a player. I don't know. Are any of us willing to be patient for an international kid born in 1992? I don't know if I am. We're a young team that's on the up and up. But Noguiera sounds like he'd be better served to end up on a team like the Mavs or Spurs. ---------- Post added February-24th-2011 at 12:50 AM ---------- The kid is also as skinny as a rail. His body is a long ways away from being ready for the NBA. That's a pick you stash away and don't expect to see a decent return on for the next three or four years. ---------- Post added February-24th-2011 at 12:56 AM ---------- Say we're lucky and get a top 3 pick in the lottery and get Sullinger. I wonder what it would take to move back up into the lottery if Harrison Barnes started to slip. Say he made it past 8. Could a move up to get him be done?

Here's my take on Blatche: - Puts up numbers for us. We'd definitely notice if we didn't have him just like we felt it hard when Nick Young missed a game. - He'll always do just enough to make you think we can afford to focus on more pressing concerns for the time being. - He's young. - His contract is very reasonable. - We could do a lot worse than him. However, - We could also do a LOT better. - We need a tough post presence who can pile up rebounds. On this team, someone like Carlos Boozer would average 17 a game. Blatche's average of 8 is very subpar. - We need a guy who can generate offense with his back to the basket. - Javale needs the help of a tough PF and Blatche doesn't give it. - Blatche has a cancerous effect on a young roster where he's supposed to be a leader (gets in fights with teammates, lackadaisical attitude). - Not a winner. Seems like he's the type who's the top scorer on a ****ty team. - Probably needs a change of scenery. Maybe even that won't be enough for him to make the leap.

Depending on how the lottery shakes down, I would definitely start packaging picks together to make sure we end up in the top three. I'm hoping Perry Jones and Kyrie Irving go first and second if we pick third. I really, really want Jared Sullinger. Maybe we'll get lucky and end up in the top three anyway. Lord knows we could use that kind of pick. If that happens and we get our hands on Sullinger, then I'd be willing to let Blatche go for pretty minimal compensation. If we're picking in the early 20's this year, that might be in range for someone like Brandon Knight or Josh Selby. Grab one of those guys plus Crawford and Young gives us a studly young backcourt. Sullinger with our lottery pick gives us a post presence. Booker gives us a scrappy presence at the 3 who can start in a pinch. McGee and Seraphin are an interesting young rotation at the 5. That's a very interesting young core. After getting all that, I'd just sit back and watch what happens.

We can be a lot better than Atlanta. Atlanta could have been like what we're going to be if they'd spent the Marvin Williams pick on Chris Paul.

Holy ****diculous ****! I leave for a few hours and Ernie threatens to get competent on me! Next thing we know Ernie will have flipped Blatche for Cleveland's unprotected 2011 first LOL!

Wigga What? So turns out I was wrong about Deron Williams staying with his team... but so were everyone else who thought he'd end up on the Knicks. Wow. I like the Nets trade a lot better than the Melo deal. The Nets still have some cap flexibility and all they gave up was Devin Harris, an unprotected first round pick, and Derrick Favors. Harris is a good defender and efficient player, but he's not really a franchise building block like Williams. Favors is a mixed bag and seems like he was a long way off. They could have just sold high on him right there. The thing that might hurt is losing that unprotected pick, but that's a risk I'd have taken in this year's class to get one of the three best PGs in the game right now. Suddenly the Nets have a top 3 all around PG and a guy who'se going to be a top 3 center in a year or two. Damn. Also this blows because now the only elite PGs left in the West are Paul and Westbrook. And to hear some tell it, Paul might come East to play for NYN or the Magic? Wall is going to have a bear of a time making All Star teams. ---------- Post added February-23rd-2011 at 02:30 PM ---------- Also, how much worse does that Melo deal look now that it's clear Deron Williams was available via trade? That's the deal New York should have made. If they do that and then Carmelo sees the Knicks suddenly have all of the pieces in place for him to walk on and make them a contender, I doubt he signs that extension. He can get the money he needs and end up on the team he wants this summer.

Hm. I don't know how I feel about that. Do you think he's fast enough or a good enough shooter for that? Sounds to me like the only reason you'd make that move is because he's 6'7". If his height is a problem for us in the frontcourt, why did we draft him in the first place? It's not like he shrunk since he got here.

They have multiple great players right now. Let's throw out the term superstar because it's apparently not very meaningful to you. A franchise caliber player is someone who can singlehandedly put you in the playoffs, and one you can build a championship caliber roster around. He is among the two or three best all around players at his position in the league, (unless he's a PG, where there are many more franchise caliber players than 3). Duncan was a superstar in the past and Ginobli might have been one of the five best SGs in the league at various points in his career, but that's not the case now. They're just great players who fit within the structure of San Antonio's organization and create a synergistic championship caliber team. I agree with Gaitorbait that building a team around 2 or 3 max contract superstars is a bad way to form a contender because you can't beat the Lakers, the Spurs, or the Celtics that way. Those teams are complete and intelligently built. The Bulls are getting there. The Clippers might be there in a couple of years. You need to build a team with a quality perimeter--post combination. And this is a PG league now, you pretty much need to have a good one to drive your offense. I don't know how the Knicks are going to get one now. They're stuck in neutral and have no resources left to improve themselves outside of trading Landry Fields or Chauncey Billups' expiring contract. You can't build a contender with Anthony, Stoudemire, and Corey Brewer. How are they going to get a quality big and PG? Now they're just a poor man's Miami. If this move didn't improve their chances to win in the East by helping them gain ground on the powers of the conference, what was the point in making it? To sell tickets and false hope.I would genuinely rather build around our roster than theirs. We've got an elite facilitator and an extremely efficient scoring two already plus we'll probably have a high lottery pick this season. We've got decent trade pieces like Blatche and a promising young big in McGee plus young glue guys like Booker and Seraphin. The way we're building our roster actually makes sense. We won't need to trade everything for a top 15 player down the line if we nail this lottery pick. Yes I absolutely believe that. If I wanted to build an immediate winner, I would take each of these 14 players over Carmelo:1 - LeBron 2 - Durant 3 - Howard 4 - Kobe 5 - Wade 6 - Rose 7 - Williams 8 - Paul 9 - Rondo 10 - Westbrook 11 - Stoudemire 12 - Nowitzki 13 - Gasol 14 - Love Who would you take Carmelo over from that list if you wanted to build a winner today? If I wanted to build a long term contender, I'd rank Carmelo only slightly better. These are the players I'd rather have to build with over the long term than Carmelo: - Rose - Durant - James - Wall - Howard - Paul - Rondo - Westbrook - Williams - Griffin - Love - Evans And maybe Ellis and Curry (younger, much better contracts) If you're ranking the younger players by their ability to be franchise transforming cornerstones, Carmelo is in the same group as Brook Lopez, Andrew Bogut, Tony Parker and Chris Bosh--excellent players who do a couple of things really well but aren't the all around dominant players that I ranked ahead of them. Most of those guys are either younger and have better contracts than Anthony does, or they've got better all around potential. Carmelo is one of the best scorers in the league, but he's not one of the best players. He's nowhere near as good as LeBron is and that's what you're paying for with him, his extension, and this trade. LeBron's team went from the best team in the regular season last year to one of the worst teams in league history as soon as he left. Or he'll get franchised and have to stay put. Regardless, how is he going to end up on the Knicks? They can't trade for him now. They also can't afford to sign him in free agency. He's not going to settle for ten million a year and that's assuming the cap stays at it's current level. It's expected to be lowered quite a bit.---------- Post added February-22nd-2011 at 07:52 PM ---------- Yeah man. Because it's easier to build a contender around an elite PG than a scoring 3. - Rose - Westbrook - Paul - Rondo - Williams They're all more valuable than Anthony is. Their teams win more than Anthony's have. And Anthony's teams only started winning in the playoffs once they got Chauncey Billups. If the 3 is an elite defender and point forward then maybe you can build a contender without a PG. But the most important parts of building a championship team are: 1.) Offensive facilitator 2.) Post scorer/defender/rebounder You also need perimeter stoppers and shooters too, but those guys are practically a dime a dozen compared to those first two players. Also, what's with all of the hyperbole all of the sudden with Carmelo's scoring ability. He's not better than LeBron or Durant so he's not top two. He's not better than Kobe on a good night either. He's probably not even better than Wade. Top 5? Yeah probably. But not top 3. The kicker is that he's not as good a defender as any of those guys either.

Yes I do in fact follow the NBA. Here's a question for you, do you have to be such an obnoxious moron in the way you post? You just make yourself look childish and stupid. I'm talking about the NBA right now, not what it was three or four years ago. The Celtics might have multiple All Stars on their team, but they only have one true superstar top 15 player at this point and that's Rondo. Pierce, Garnett, and Allen may have been in the top tier several years ago, but they aren't in that tier any more. None of them would crack a list of the top 20-25 individual players. They win because they're a great team. Pierce, Garnett, and Allen got to the All Star game because their team wins. Ditto for the spurs. Duncan is an all time great but he's not one of the 25 best players in the NBA right now either. Neither are Ginobli or Parker. They've got a great team though and leading the league in wins is why they get their players into the All Star game. The Spurs, like the Celtics, are much greater than the sum of their parts. Yes I remember the story about the wedding. I also remember Chris Paul putting the kibosh on the trade talk this season when New Orleans started winning. They probably aren't going to trade him and, once the CBA gets put into effect, he's probably not going anywhere. Certainly not to the Knicks because they can't afford him now. They can't afford anyone any more and they have almost nothing left to trade for a reasonably priced piece. When the two-headed disaster known as James Dolan and Isiah Thomas are the masterminds behind a trade, dollars to donuts it's a bad move. Oh and Carmelo is absolutely, positively, not one of the ten best players in the NBA right now. He might be one of the five best scorers, but so is Monta Ellis. I can think of 15 players off the top of my head that I would rather have than Carmelo right now. I can think of much more than that if we're talking about long term roster building.

Tell that to the Celtics and the Spurs. Also, they aren't going to build a supporting cast if they're hamstrung from giving up the boat for one player. And I'd be shocked if either Paul or Williams leave their current teams. Both seem happy where they are. If Paul is going anywhere, it'll be through a trade. We're probably getting a franchise tag in the new CBA so those two won't walk in FA. Billups isn't going to stick with the Knicks. He only wants to play in Denver. He'll retire if they don't deal or let him opt out of his contract. His contract is the only decent trade piece they have left besides Landry Fields and neither are enough to bring in a true difference maker any more. So what they ended up with is a decent rookie SG, a PG who's most likely in his final year with the team, and a pair of offensively gifted but soft forwards who need to shoot 20-25 times a game in order to remain effective. They have absolutely nothing else after that. They didn't gain any ground on the top five teams in the Eastern Conference, and the only team that's ahead of them that might slip is Boston because they're aging. They should have made that huge trade for Chris Paul or Deron Williams now and waited until Melo hit FA in the summer. Melo wasn't going to sign an extension with Denver and to think that was a possibility is utterly ridiculous. If he were going to he'd have done it this summer and we wouldn't have had a year of trade speculation and bridge burning. No one else was going to trade for Melo because they knew he wouldn't sign an extension with them. There was no competition to up the bid except in Dolan's mind. If they had Paul already on the roster, there wouldn't have been any competition to sign him in the summer. This was a stupid trade because Dolan gave up the farm in order to get a player he could have signed in FA. ---------- Post added February-22nd-2011 at 02:12 PM ---------- Carmelo isn't one of the ten best players in the NBA right now. 1. LeBron 2. Durant 3. Kobe 4. Howard 5. Rose 6. Stoudemire 7. Nowitzki 8. Paul 9. Wade 10. Williams He barely cracks the top 15 IMO: 11. Westbrook 12. Gasol 13. Love 14. Rondo 15. Carmelo Also, notice that the Spurs are the best team in the league without a single top 15 player? The Celtics are the best team in the East with one top 15 player. The Hawks are one of the best teams in the East with no top 15 players. The Magic have only one. The Bulls have only one. Each of those teams are better than the Knicks with Carmelo. I don't think Carmelo is any more a superstar than say, Monta Ellis or any other offensively gifted but one dimensional wing player. He's not a franchise caliber player in the class of LeBron, Kobe, or Durant. - Billups isn't going to stay with the team beyond this year or next, which is before they'll realistically hope to contend - Carmelo wasn't going to sign an extension with Denver and had no desire to continue playing for them - The Knicks would have been the easy favorite to sign Carmelo in the summer (the Nets weren't going to beat them in a bid). Carmelo might make sense for their team in the long run, but this was a stupid trade.