It's been nearly a full day since the trade deadline; in that time, I've devoured the CB forums, reading nearly every post of every thread on the matter, all while holding off on commenting as I tried to stay cool and look at things with a clear head.
As you may have guessed, my initial reaction was unpleasant; I simply was stunned that the Cs did zilch, particularly as I watched our sworn enemies out West quietly get better. I was underwhelmed when I first heard the J.J. Hickson rumor, but in hindsight I thought it would be nice to get him, in light of losing JO and Wilcox, if he could be had for something cheap like Daniels and Dooling. I don't know what happened with that rumor—were the Kings asking for too much?—but I was surprised that we didn't turn some of our nothings into something.
At any rate, I think I'm seeing things at least a little more objectively 24 hours later, hard though it's been to work through my disappointment, and I do like some things about Danny's strategy. I like that he preserved our cap space, even though the upcoming field of free agents is wafer-thin on top talent—it seems that the cap space could be highly valuable in a trade, so that's cool. I also respect Danny's decision (thus far, at least) to not take on any terrible contracts that would weigh us down. I like that we didn't give up any of our young talent (again—not yet, at least); I like keeping Bradley, Moore, Stiemsma and JJ around to see how much they develop.
I still, however, have some issues, or maybe not issues but questions or concerns. I'm happy that Danny kept the core intact, but I believe that if we're going to give the Big 4 one last rodeo together—which is what Danny's doing—that we should give them as much help as possible; it seems that Danny wants to do that, but with no trades made, any help will have to come via buyouts, free agents, or D-Leaguers, and I'm skeptical that we can find any value in any of those places. Danny's buyout finds in recent years have been terrible, and the so-called "best big man in the D-League," Jeff Foote, was scooped up by another team last week. And of course, if anyone is currently a free agent, it's because they're borderline NBA talent. I realize we may not need a stud, but I would rather have had Hickson, I think, than Dan Gadzuric or D-League Player X. But maybe I'm wrong; maybe such a player would work out great and fill the need nicely. I guess I remain slightly hopeful for that.
It still boggles my mind that Danny couldn't find a cheap, serviceable big without hurting our cap space next season. I also wonder if he's a bit overprotective of that cap space; I agree that it's valuable, but if Danny had been able to land a decent big who had a year or two left on his contract at, say, 6-8 million per, would that have been such a bad thing? Would that really have "ruined" our cap situation and prevented us from rebuilding next season? Especially in light of Dwight Howard's removal from the free-agent scene?
I realize, though, that I'm not a GM, and that Danny knows a lot more about this stuff than I do, and that he probably investigated virtually every possible trade scenario. I also realize that he may truly have not been presented with a good deal, and that he could still pull a rabbit out of the hat somehow. I'm sentimental, so I understand and appreciate keeping the core together, and I realize that the team has been playing better lately (though "better" is a relative term; it would be hard to NOT be better than we were at the beginning of the season). Anyway, there's hope; they're only 1 1/2 games behind Philly for the division, and Philly is currently the fourth seed (though I'm not sure why, since they're a division leader; shouldn't they be third?), and KG's reemergence is a good sign. I'm still leery of Doc overplaying the Big 4, and our lack of size is a big concern for me, but on the whole, I guess I'm cautiously, pessimistically optimistic.
Topic: Cautiously, pessimistically optimistic (Read 1307 times)