In the NBA, fortunes change quickly. “When Byron Scott went to bed Tuesday night he was convinced he was not going to be the Cavaliers head coach. About 24 hours later he was agreeing to take the job. It will become official today.” [Brian Windhorst on Cavs hiring Byron Scott]
“Scott has coached two possible future Hall of Fame point guards. He had Jason Kidd in New Jersey, developing a relationship that led to the Nets reaching the NBA Finals in 2002 and 2003.” [Terry Pluto on Byron Scott]
“The Cavaliers are giving him one who started on one of the great teams of all-time. It has been a generation since Showtime went dark, but Scott had more credibility as a player than any Cavs coach except Lenny Wilkens, and more visibility, since it was practically “Hollywood and the Stars” in hardwood, than any of them.” [Bill Livingston on Byron Scott Being the kind of Coach LeBron Desires]
“They brought a rack full of luggage and computer equipment for their presentation to James. A little less than two hours later the Nets group left with smiles. “It went well,” Johnson told The Plain Dealer, briefly showing a specially-made folder with James face above a Nets’ logo.” [Brian Windhorst on the FA Circus]
According to ESPN’s panel of experts, LeBron is GONE.
“Of course, LeBron’s view of the hiring doesn’t mean he’ll be back in Cleveland for sure. But it certainly doesn’t hurt that he seems to be agreeable with the Scott hire.” [ESPN Rumors]
“”It would be like ‘Twister,’ that movie where a tornado comes through town and tears everything up,” Scott said. “It will be so drastic there will be nothing left of that team. … If LeBron leaves, Cleveland will become a ghost town. It will be like it used to be. You just go into (Quicken Loans Arena) and play your game and leave.”” [Chris Tomasson on Cleveland Minus LBJ]
“James is in the rare position of having everything to gain but also everything to lose. If this works, he can start collecting title rings. If it doesn’t, he’ll have wasted the chance of a lifetime. You see a guy with choices. I see a guy with perspiration stains.” [Gene Wojciechowski]
According to that same espn panel of experts, Rudy Gay is leaving Memphis, and Joe Johnson is leaving Atlanta.
Rudy Gay = MAX DEAL
Joe Johnson = MAX DEAL
Drew Gooden = 5 years, $32 million
Darko Milicic = 4 years, $20 million
NBA owners are the stupidest people on the planet… and they deserve to lose all this money. I am so pissed this league will be locked out in a year while the owners complain about contracts. Its their OWN DAMN FAULT!
Yea, I mean the panel of experts have completely whiffed on the first two signings so far. Not one said Gay would be in Memphis, and not one said Johnson would be in Atlanta. Also three saying Amare stays in PHX, which is also out the door. Fantastic experts imo.
To be fair to the experts, I don’t think many of them were counting on Memphis’s and Atlanta’s management losing all sense of reality and offering max deals to Gay and Johnson respectively.
I am really starting to lose respect for ESPN. Sure, none of these particular experts picked LeBron to stay, yet when they had another panel of experts over the weekend, both Ric Bucher and Michael Wilbon thought he would stay. Ric Bucher was even on Sportscenter this morning saying it.
it’s almost like they are trying to stir things up. Can you imagine?
ESPN also loves to make snarky comments about all the reporting about LeBron, and all the attention he’s getting.
I really can’t wait for this to be over so that everyone can say he made the wrong decision (whatever it may be) and how he is making a huge mistake. We all know it’s coming…
I agree jonathan. I’m stunned by Memphis. I mean, David Kahn was prime and ready to make a terriibly huge mistake (like he always does) and Memphis one-upped him? Why?
But, this goes to show us one thing. Money talks. For us to see this and then think LBJ, and Bosh are going to walk so easily when the money is in Cleveland and Toronto, well, we’d be ignoring human nature.
i wish i could suck at my job and still get paid millions of dollars a year aka Darko and Gooden….good lord…i had no idea Darko was still in the league…the JJ contract was retarded…atlanta still thinks theyre legit from a boston series years ago and they wont get over it….theyll still rely on a #2/3 guy as their #1….rudy gay isnt cracked up to be any good…he’s just an athletic guy with long arms that can dunk which is majority of nba…
bosh will be only guy who leaves current team…everyone else will stay put and espn and all other talking heads will be backtracking and trying to figure out what to say after so much over hyped reports…
I’d say Amare is gone too. But that seriously might be it. I’m so hoping Boozer to re-sign with Utah so we can mke a run at Millsap.
Has this been discussed? There has been some pretty bad Lebron-related “journalism” recently, but this is incredible. Apologies if someone else posted this, I’ve been away for a couple of days…
http://web.sny.tv/news/article.jsp?ymd=20100629&content_id=11717746&oid=36320&vkey=18
Ok, I understand every team has fans that like to believe their team will be the one to win at everything. Most of us are like that.
But I’m stunned the majority of Knicks fans still think LBJ heading to NYK is still possible. How and with who? Joe Johnson, their best shot at getting someone to go with LeBron, is gone. They have 0 talent on that team (no, i’m not high on Gallinari) and no draft picks whatsoever to build on. I mean, to me, that idea is totally dead. I’m not even considering LeBron to the Knicks at this point, yet the fans are still selling themselves on the idea. Seems delusional to me.
funny..i seem to recall saying something about money talks and BS walks before here…hmmm…now what *was* that in reference too again… ;-)
should read “in reference to.” typos happen when ya gloat! let this be a lesson!
I live in NYC and I think most intelligent basketball fans here know that the Knicks have no shot. Honestly there aren’t a lot of real Knicks fans, just people who would become Knicks fans if Lebron signed. They would also become Nets fans if Lebron signed with the Nets. The people who think Lebron will sign with the Knicks are just these ignorant fools who get all their news from the Post and Daily News who cling to this idea because they can’t imagine that anyone would turn down the opportunity to play in New York City and they think Cleveland is Amish country or something. There is also this bizarre notion that the Knicks have some kind of rich basketball tradition on par with the Celtics and Lakers. It is indeed delusional but the media feeds it. The New York sports media is awful.
the NY media is retarded as is all big city media…even good ole ESPN…the latter doesnt want Lebron in Cleveland so theyll say, write anything that would lead one to believe he is going someplace else…lebron has been in cleveland 7 years and brought a ton of money to the city…was there any issues with a superstar in a small market…no! lebron just proved it for 7 fricken years….no superstar has to be in a big city to make money…lebron has tons of exposure being in cleveland….how much more would he get or does he need….he gets a ton of exposure…and so does the city and the team…i dont get this idea that all superstars have to be in major cities…itll only benefit the media but thats dumb…the media doesnt care about anyone else…good input though from one who lives in NYC and can give the real news from there and hopefully a reality check to the fans….they definitely need one…hahaha
Awesome post, TR.
Aloha Tom! The real question is why are you blogging today?!? Good grief man I’ll text you Cavs news for your addiction if you need.
I still love that the media pushes this notion that the big endorsements only take place in big markets..as if it’s 1958 still or something. Again, is State Farm, Nike, McDonald’s, Powerade somehow bigger in New York? Are there a list of super secret awesome companies that only exist in New York and will pay LeBron more in endorsements than those companies? Such a stupid notion.
windy has reported that LBJ’s endorsement money has been less recently due to the economy. he said both the nike and mcdonalds re-upps were less than the previous deals…
Don’t worry though, there are different and more powerful shoe companies in New York that will pay LeBron more than Nike.
So dumb.
Lebron desperately wants to get a piece of that Hillside Honda and PC Richard & Son money.
I have three teams on my side being from NE Ohio,, living in NYC, and a train ride from Newark. I want LeBron to stay home though even if that only means seeing him once a year.
I’m also definitely surprised by the money getting thrown around to lesser players. Not that you guys should care, but the Rudy Gay signing got me thinking about trade scenarios. If you’re going to sign contracts like that, you might as well go all out and aim for a title.
And sooner or later New Orleans is going to have to trade Chris Paul. Paul’s not gonna be happy if the team continues to pass up talent for savings. And if you’re not going to go all out, better to gut spending and rebuild.
So, if all owners were created equal, this trade would have to happen: http://www.realgm.com/src_checktrade.php?tradeid=5585954 (Memphis could throw some picks in as well, but they might not be worth much anyway.)
It doesn’t look great for NO at first glance. In fact it looks terrifically bad. But given the logic behind trading Chris Paul, it makes perfect sense. They’re not trying to get some big (pricey) star in return. If they cared about that, they’d be keeping Chris Paul. The deal nukes their salary commitments. They get rid of their three biggest multi-year deals, with almost all the return salary expiring. (The franchise can sell that as “flexibility”.)
And they also get a couple young players (Henry and Thabeet) at positions of need who could help them form a core along with Collison, Thornton and future picks. The new team might be horrible, but all the better for rebuilding via the draft. And if they don’t bomb (say they get a good year out of Randolph), then the franchise will be getting great (and much improved) value out of the team. Works financially and is good long-term basketball strategy. And I’m not sure any other team can or would offer this much salary relief and cheap young talent.
The Grizzlies probably never do this deal simply for lack of money (though you wouldn’t know it this week). But it would make them legit title frontrunners. A Paul-Mayo-Gay perimeter? Come on. The best point guard in the game flanked by two young, athletic, versatile scoring wings. It just doesn’t get any better. That’s a well-fitting overflow of talent. Plus a stalwart big rotation. Marc Gasol and David West are all-star caliber, winning players, and Okafor is serious talent to bring off the bench.
And on top of that, they’d be set for a long run as the players’ ages line up exceptionally well. As of now the starting five would be 25, 22, 23, 29, 25, plus Okafor at 27. The only age issue might be West after a few years, but he will always have that midrange jumper.
Not sure why I get so worked up about this, but I just wanted to share the idea.
just curious – for you Cavs fans who know the team better, why does Hickson seem to be mentioned as trade bait a lot? From the regular season games vs. the Lakers that I suffered through, JJ flat-out killed us as much as any one else in a Cav uniform with his hustle and work down low – he was undersized against our bigs but still outworking them badly. And he’s young and only going to get better – I was really surprised to see him buried at the bench in the playoffs.
Well, if you knew Mike Brown, seeing a poor playoff rotation wouldn’t surprise you at all (that’s it for me piling on Mike Brown. It’s like people still piling on Bush..it’s over, it’s done, move on).
Anyway, I guess because Hickson is the only valuable player + contract we have. I mean, everyone else is either overpaid or not that good. Hickson is still on his fairly cheap rookie contract, so I’m guessing if a move is made then w/e the team they are going to want Hickson. Also, Cavs fans have 0 patience whatsoever, so they really aren’t willing to let Hickson actually take time to develop.
@kehnonymous He can’t catch and he can’t play D (which is why Brown benched him). Otherwise he’s a beast. He could get better but when we’re in win now mode we’re looking for a trade.
Anyway, a tweet from Windy: “Here’s what I hear from yesterday: LeBron interested in Nets pitch but not so much NY. NY trying at moment to secure Amare’ to help cause”
Great post, Robin!
Wow Robin you really put a lot of thought into this. I’d hate to play fantasy basketball against you. :-) That trade could actually work and makes a lot of sense, but there are so many teams that would love to have Chris Paul it’s hard to see this being the ‘best’ trade option for the Hornets. Truly a viable idea, none the less.
Leo you must be no older than 12 to say the Knicks don’t have a rich basketball tradition. The Knicks are one of the founding members of the NBA one of only two teams (Boston) that still play in their city of origin. They’ve won two championships. Lost in the finals at least three times that I was alive for. To say they have no rich basketball tradition: Knicks Hall of Famers: Willis Reed, Dave DeBusschere, Walt Frazier, Patrick Ewing, Jerry Lucas, Red Holzman, Dick McGuire, Phil Jackson. What about Bernard King, Earl Monroe, Richie Guerin. Come on..Don’t be so stupid.