This post is a response to an interesting comment posted by mmazzotta in response to my previous post.
I think M misunderstood the point I was trying to make in my original post, so I'm going to approach it from a different perspective: If the Celtics could magically make Wally Szczerbiak--and his contract--disappear from their roster, should they do so? The smart GM says yes, in my book.
I appreciate all of M's analysis as to why Wally slightly upgrades the Celtics' wing positions over the next few years (which is the life of his deal). My question is: why would the Celtics want to do that, if that means they have to take on more salary and lose draft position right now?
Think about it. He uses the Bulls as a comparison in his post. Would the Bulls want to add Wally to their team at his current price? Of course not, even if adding him meant that they'd get 5-10 more wins this season. The time for the Bulls to add overpriced veterans will be when their young nucleus matures, not now. The same is true for the Celtics. They would have been better off trading Davis+Blount to the Knicks for an expiring contract (say, Penny Hardaway) and some picks.
The reason his comparison between the Bulls and the Celtics is not apt is because the Bulls have figured out the analysis above and the Celtics have not. He's right that the teams are roughly in the same spot in the standings--maybe the Celtics will even overtake the Bulls now that they have Wally. I'll be cheering for them to do so.
But look at the two key differences between the Celtics and Bulls. First, the Celtics are capped out for at least the next three years, while the Bulls will be far under the cap in the offseason. The Celtics are paying far more, and losing the flexibility to add talent or resign their young players, yet have a slightly worse record. Second, the key players on the Celtics are already in their prime (Pierce, Wally). The Bulls nucleus (Hinrich, Gordon, Deng, Chandler, Nocioni, etc) are all in their early 20s. That gives the Bulls hope that their players will eventually develop into a championship-caliber squad.
But, M says, the Celtics have that young nucleus too. He lists Perkins, Jefferson, West, Allen, and Green as the young players the Celtics are developing. Personally, I highly doubt that group will ever become a championship-caliber squad. But let's say they will, in 3-5 years. What, then, is the point of winning more games now while they're still developing? All it means is that you get lower draft picks and lose cap flexibility in the short term.
In my mind, the Celtics just don't get it. Last season, they traded for Antoine Walker. This season, they traded for Wally Szczerbiak. Neither move puts them in the position to contend for the Eastern Semifinals, much less the Championship. Yet both of them excite fans who focus on winning now, and can only be defended on the basis of mildly upgrading the team in the short-term. What most fans miss is that upgrading the team in the short-term in that manner hurts the team long-term. The Celtics and their fans would be better off if their GM looked long-term instead.
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Re: What M Doesn't Get.
Please forgive the long post. It took me a couple days to get around to doing this, and once I started, I couldn't stop.
Let me begin by saying that I think there's a fundamental difference here which we've addressed before -- you think the best way to rebuild is to essentially ditch all talent and salary, accumulate high draft picks, and then develop the new players and use whatever cap space is left over to find the additional pieces. I say that's definitely one way to go, but it's not a surefire way to build a contender. It didn't work for the Celtics in the Duncan sweepstakes; it didn't work for the Clippers or Warriors; and it hasn't worked for the Bulls in the 8 years since Jordan retired (so far). There are many models for building a contender. For example, there are plenty of teams, like Detroit, Indiana, and Sacramento, who built contenders on the fly through shrewd mid-round drafting, trades and moderately priced free agents.
That being said, I think your strategy is a perfectly valid option. If you end up with Tim Duncan, you're 80% on the way to winning an NBA title. Or to put it another way, if Tyson Chandler or Eddie Curry had been the next Kevin Garnett, there might be statues of Michael Jordan AND Jerry Krause in Chicago.
Let me also say that given the option of choosing either the Celtics or the Bulls cap/roster, I think many people might pick the Bulls. I think their young talent is better right now, their team is deeper, and obviously they have some intriguing options given their cap flexibility. But at the end of the day, I see one key similarity between the two teams -- they are both mediocre teams betting the future on the development of young players who may or may not pan out.
As to the differences between the teams, we know what the Bulls have to offer: cap room. The Celtics, on the other hand, have three large contracts attached to: one elite player; one near All-Star player; and one serviceable NBA 7 footer. True, the contracts eat up cap space. But the two better players are in their prime and will be in their prime for the duration of their contracts (and in Pierce's case, possibly for much of the next contract as well). The team has many options with them -- keeping them or using them for trade bait, especially as their contracts come to an end. In that respect, even LaFrentz's contract will become useful for trade purposes in a couple of years -- just about the time we'll be resigning our young players.
Meanwhile, the Bulls have none of these chits. They have excellent young players, some of whom project to being All Star level talent. But no big contracts (after this year) to help swing trades. They also don't have many veterans to help develop the young players. And since they're not a contender yet, it's unclear how attractive a destination they would be for an elite or near elite free agent.
Which brings me to money. Cap room is, after all, all about money and how you spend it. Yes, the Bulls will be able to spend whatever they want on resigning their players. But what will they get in free agency? That's the key. As I'm sure you know, there are many tweaks to the new CBA which favor the team that has a player under contract. Without going into all the parameters, in general these teams can give their players higher annual raises; they can give them longer contracts; and they can choose to match any contracts for their restricted free agents. That's why when you do pry someone away from another team, you generally have to overpay them, unless they're desperate to get out. Thus, I'm not convinced that just having cap room is a ticket to getting good free agents. In fact, you may end up with worse options, depending on how much you have to spend and who is on the market.
Now, getting to some of the specifics of your post: you ask if the Celtics could magically make Wally and his ginormous contract disappear, should they? Your answer is yes, because you feel he detracts from them getting a high draft position and eats up cap space. Any GM whose strategy matched yours would agree. But if the goal is accumulating talented players to build around or trade down the road, I don't think you'd do that. Wally was a #6 pick. He's turned out pretty well for a #6 pick. Check it out. There's no guarantee that by dropping down into the lottery that you'd get someone as good. And there's no guarantee that you could use the money you would save get someone as good as Wally. Furthermore, down the line, Wally may actually be a key player on your team, or you can trade him and his contract for something concretely valuable. So other smart GMs might actually have wanted Wally, and might keep him even if he and his contract could be wiped off the books. (Now, Raef, that's another question. I think we can all agree he'd be cut tomorrow if his contract wasn't guaranteed.)
You also point out that the Celtics had to take on additional salary to get Wally. Unless you're counting the 15% trade kicker or the #1 pick, I thought we'd established that the dollar figures are the same, except for one year where they take on an extra $6m in return for taking $8m off the books the next year. As I've pointed out several times on this blog, I don't think the Celtics cap/luxury situation is as dire as others do. I think B's estimates of projected player salaries are high. And assuming Wally's production stays reasonably high, his contract becomes more and more attractive the further along it goes -- it gets shorter, so it will be easier to trade it for either young, mid-priced talent or expiring contracts. (The same goes for Raef LaFrentz, by the way).
As to your contention that the trade makes the Celtics better in the short term, I'm not sure about that, and I don't believe I ever made that argument here on this blog. While I do think Wally/Pierce is an upgrade over Ricky/Pierce, I don't think that automatically translates into a better record for the C's. In fact, trading the most consistent big man on the Celtics roster (yes Ben, I agree with you on that point) and deciding to play two very young PF/Cs significant minutes may well translate into a worse record in the short run. I liked this deal for the long term upside -- I think Szczerbiak is a better player (than either Blount or Davis) and that his game compliments Pierce's better than Davis's game, and that playing Perkins and Jefferson more (careful, careful) will accelerate their development. For the record, I also think that playing with All-Star quality, hardworking, team-oriented veterans like Szczerbiak and Pierce can't hurt the youngsters' development either.
In your post, you also say the Bulls wouldn't want to take on Szczerbiak and his contract, and that the Celtics would have been better off trading Blount and Davis for an expiring contract like Penny Hardaway (which of course presumes that they could find an offer like that). But again, both of those statements are predicated upon the "ditch salary and talent, take the cap room and lottery picks". Giving up Blount and Davis for Hardaway is trading legitimate NBA players for cap room, with no guarantees that the team would get a better player. It's a gamble, like any other move. And as for the Bulls and Szczerbiak, I can think of many reasons why they might not want him or his contract, but I wouldn't dismiss it out of hand until I had an idea of exactly what I projected all of my signings would cost, what the big needs for the team would likely be in the next few years, and who I was likely to be able to get either in free agency or other trades. Since I haven't done any of that work for any team, much less the Bulls, I'm not comfortable dismissing the trade out of hand.
In any event, RM, I hope I made myself clear in this long and rambling post. I admire you for sticking to your guns and defending your "lottery and cap room" strategy. I think it's a legitimate option, and if the Bulls had had a little better luck or drafted a little better, they'd be in much better shape talent-wise than they are now. As is, they've got a nice bunch of developing young players, and a bunch of cap room. As for the C's, my take is they have a smaller bunch of nice young players, plus two established stars who can help shape the future of the team in a variety of ways depending on what management decides to do.
Finally, I think comparing the two teams, and their strategies, is a little like apples to oranges. Both are reasonable strategies that have proved fruitful, but they suit different tastes. And for the record, my prediction is that neither team wins a title any time soon.
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