Celtics were close to signing David West

[BballTim]

David West will be a nice addition for Indiana.

PG - D.Collison, G.Hill
SG - P.George, D.Jones
SF - D.Granger, B.Rush
PF - D.West, T.Hansbrough
C  - R.Hibbert, J.Foster

They have a nice squad there. Not enough top tier talent to do anything unless Paul George makes a huge leap but I like their balance and depth. The mix of talent.

Its the type of team that gets you close to 50 hard wins, is a threat to beat any team on any night, and will likely drive a team nuts before going down in the 1st or 2nd round.

sounds like the celtics without david west.

Really?  Barring a Paul George sophomore surge, we're better at every position except the 5, and Hibbert isn't really much better than JO.

The teams are not comparable.

Roy Hibbert on the Celtics would put us back into the talk for the top 2 or 3 in the East. He is way better than Jermaine O'Neal, unless you think better health, better scoring, better rebounding, and being only 24 yrs old are irrelevant.

  Back into the talk for the top 2 or 3 in the East? Did we suddenly become the Hawks? It's a bummer we didn't get West, but this is fairly ridiculous.

Without an actual center, with likely decreases in production from Pierce, Garnett, and Allen, its hardly ridiculous.

You're telling me that:

Rondo
Allen
Pierce
Garnett
?

Plus a bench of Bass, Jeff Green, Daniels, Johnson and Moore is a top 2 team in the East? I'm just not seeing it. Not with more condensed games.

  How many game are we getting from O'Neal? How much of a dropoff in production from the big three will we have? How will Rondo look compared to his start last year? How will the offense look with a decent shooter (Bass) taking Baby's minutes? How will Green do this year? There are a number of  questions with the team. I doubt they'll all all go south. The starting unit could easily be better than last year, the bench (we still need another player or two) could be as well.

[Inside-Out]

any chance his hearing that he would likely be competing for minutes with Jeff Green and Brandon Bass might have affected his decision to not come to Boston for a discount to win?

[tenn_smoothie]

and here we sit - still without a legitimate starting center.

i'm just so glad that Danny unloaded that young, top 3 defensive-center-in-the-league while he could for that "stud" swing player that will be coming off our bench (you know the guy we just signed for one season and wanted to trade recently)

[greg_kite]

We can look at the bright side of this, at least he's going to Larry Bird's team.  I'm happy for Larry, he's built a solid young team over there.

[rocknrollforyoursoul]

So much for West being determined to take less money "to go to a contender." Pacers have a bright future, but they won't contend this year.

[indeedproceed]

 How many game are we getting from O'Neal? How much of a dropoff in production from the big three will we have? How will Rondo look compared to his start last year? How will the offense look with a decent shooter (Bass) taking Baby's minutes? How will Green do this year? There are a number of  questions with the team. I doubt they'll all all go south. The starting unit could easily be better than last year, the bench (we still need another player or two) could be as well.

These questions are all valid ones. The biggest 2 questions (which were also your first ones) of how many games will O'Neal give us, and how big of a dropoff in production will we get from the big 3 are the ones that are most rationally headed south.

Condensed games, age, and the fact that O'Neal is already battling injury (the wrist injury that hampered him last season, that still pains him and requires season-ending surgery to fix) don't bode well for either problem, and that's what I'm getting at here.

If we had a legitimate starting 80 game center, I think we could manage the rest of them.

[PosImpos]

and here we sit - still without a legitimate starting center.

i'm just so glad that Danny unloaded that young, top 3 defensive-center-in-the-league while he could for that "stud" swing player that will be coming off our bench (you know the guy we just signed for one season and wanted to trade recently)

let's get this straight.  perkins would have not been re-signed this off-season.  he'd be gone.  best we could have gotten for him would have been a sign and trade.  unlikely we would have gotten as much in return for him as we did.  so let's stop talking as if we could have had perkins here instead of jeff green.

[rocknrollforyoursoul]

I understand that there may have been no teams that wanted JO, but what I don't understand is why he HAD to be included in this deal. Why couldn't Danny have offered (or why wouldn't the Hornets have taken), say, Bradley and Moore and a couple picks?

[Sketch5]

and here we sit - still without a legitimate starting center.

i'm just so glad that Danny unloaded that young, top 3 defensive-center-in-the-league while he could for that "stud" swing player that will be coming off our bench (you know the guy we just signed for one season and wanted to trade recently)

Dany Just did what NO and Orlando are doing right now. No way they get "ture" value for the players they are trying to trade.

Perk didn't want to sign a extention. He wanted to see more money was out there. And yes maybe the option of maybe being able to get CP3 or Howard made that trade a bit easier.

We might be surprised with Green. He was good with the Thunder,and came into a hard situation last year. He might feel a bit more at home this year.

[PosImpos]

I understand that there may have been no teams that wanted JO, but what I don't understand is why he HAD to be included in this deal. Why couldn't Danny have offered (or why wouldn't the Hornets have taken), say, Bradley and Moore and a couple picks?

we're over the cap so we had to include a player in the trade that would be close to west's starting salary.

[BballTim]

 How many game are we getting from O'Neal? How much of a dropoff in production from the big three will we have? How will Rondo look compared to his start last year? How will the offense look with a decent shooter (Bass) taking Baby's minutes? How will Green do this year? There are a number of  questions with the team. I doubt they'll all all go south. The starting unit could easily be better than last year, the bench (we still need another player or two) could be as well.

These questions are all valid ones. The biggest 2 questions (which were also your first ones) of how many games will O'Neal give us, and how big of a dropoff in production will we get from the big 3 are the ones that are most rationally headed south.

Condensed games, age, and the fact that O'Neal is already battling injury (the wrist injury that hampered him last season, that still pains him and requires season-ending surgery to fix) don't bode well for either problem, and that's what I'm getting at here.

If we had a legitimate starting 80 game center, I think we could manage the rest of them.

  Do we even know the lineup yet? They could go RR/RA/PP/Bass/KG with a bench of JO/Wilcox/Green/Daniels/Dooling, plus they'll still sign a player or two.

  Edit: two things will help the production of the big three: not being on the court with Baby and a healthy Rondo. They could be more productive as easily as less productive.

[Moreover]

any chance his hearing that he would likely be competing for minutes with Jeff Green and Brandon Bass might have affected his decision to not come to Boston for a discount to win?

No.

He signed a better contract. That's what players do. They're professionals.

[kozlodoev]

I understand that there may have been no teams that wanted JO, but what I don't understand is why he HAD to be included in this deal. Why couldn't Danny have offered (or why wouldn't the Hornets have taken), say, Bradley and Moore and a couple picks?

Because the salaries have to match.

[indeedproceed]

 How many game are we getting from O'Neal? How much of a dropoff in production from the big three will we have? How will Rondo look compared to his start last year? How will the offense look with a decent shooter (Bass) taking Baby's minutes? How will Green do this year? There are a number of  questions with the team. I doubt they'll all all go south. The starting unit could easily be better than last year, the bench (we still need another player or two) could be as well.

These questions are all valid ones. The biggest 2 questions (which were also your first ones) of how many games will O'Neal give us, and how big of a dropoff in production will we get from the big 3 are the ones that are most rationally headed south.

Condensed games, age, and the fact that O'Neal is already battling injury (the wrist injury that hampered him last season, that still pains him and requires season-ending surgery to fix) don't bode well for either problem, and that's what I'm getting at here.

If we had a legitimate starting 80 game center, I think we could manage the rest of them.

  Do we even know the lineup yet? They could go RR/RA/PP/Bass/KG with a bench of JO/Wilcox/Green/Daniels/Dooling, plus they'll still sign a player or two.

I'm sure that'll happen, but that doesn't contest for the top spot in the East, and it likely doesn't make the Celtics within the top 3 or even 4 teams record-wise coming into the playoffs.

And that's assuming no major injuries.

Sure there's a shot, but ask yourself if a frontcourt rotation of Bass/KG/JO/Wilcox will give the team what it needs defensively?

Compare that to other frontcourt rotations in the East. Noah/Boozer/Gibson/Asik, Amare/Chandler, BBD/Anderson/Howard, Smith/Horford/Pachulla...

Then factor in that the only likely top 5 seed that will have a worse FC rotation features 2 of the top 5 players in the NBA.

And that's not even factoring in Rondo, Allen, and Pierce's health, not to mention KG's.

There's a shot, but without a steady presence in the paint next to KG, it is a heck of a lot longer.

[BballTim]

 How many game are we getting from O'Neal? How much of a dropoff in production from the big three will we have? How will Rondo look compared to his start last year? How will the offense look with a decent shooter (Bass) taking Baby's minutes? How will Green do this year? There are a number of  questions with the team. I doubt they'll all all go south. The starting unit could easily be better than last year, the bench (we still need another player or two) could be as well.

These questions are all valid ones. The biggest 2 questions (which were also your first ones) of how many games will O'Neal give us, and how big of a dropoff in production will we get from the big 3 are the ones that are most rationally headed south.

Condensed games, age, and the fact that O'Neal is already battling injury (the wrist injury that hampered him last season, that still pains him and requires season-ending surgery to fix) don't bode well for either problem, and that's what I'm getting at here.

If we had a legitimate starting 80 game center, I think we could manage the rest of them.

  Do we even know the lineup yet? They could go RR/RA/PP/Bass/KG with a bench of JO/Wilcox/Green/Daniels/Dooling, plus they'll still sign a player or two.

I'm sure that'll happen, but that doesn't contest for the top spot in the East, and it likely doesn't make the Celtics within the top 3 or even 4 teams record-wise coming into the playoffs.

  Not the top spot, probably 3rd seed or so. Agree to disagree, I guess.