Let's Say We: Traded Pierce to Chicago Before this Season
Earlier in the season, I was fully supporting the deal to send Raef and Pierce to Chicago for Andres Nocioni, Chris Duhon, Tim Thomas, and both Knicks picks. Say we made that deal, where would we be now?
Our lineup would have been this:
We get something from the Antoine deal: Since add Nocioni and lose Raef, we'd likely dump Justin Reed and keep the big man that we got in the Antoine deal. Curtis Borchardt is no prize but I would have liked to give him a shot at some emergency minutes.
Does Gomes get a shot earlier? Odds are no he doesn't. Tony Allen can't really handle the SF spot so perhaps Gomes gets minutes with Tim Thomas as the forwards. Since Timmy is more of a perimeter forward, Gomes might have gotten to show his interior presence earlier. Still it's a stretch. Most likely, it would still take both Perkins and Jefferson going down to get him in, unless Doc decides to use him to backup Blount. Either way, the trade doesn't open up playing time for Gomes until said injuries.
West moves to combo-guard : I would have Duhon start and have West eat up the minutes backing up both Chris and Ricky. We also could go smaller and move Ricky to the three and have Duhon and Delonte in the backcourt. I've always felt Delonte would be best suited coming off the pine and this would allow us to do so.
The Celtics are terrible: Goodbye 6th pick! We'd be a pretty god-awful team but we'd have two top five lottery picks for our trouble. Not to mention that we'd also likely have top top picks in the 2007 draft because we wouldn't rush to use up our cap space in this weak free agent crop.
The League is our Oyster: We would have freed up cap space by getting rid of both of our max contracts, we'd have Nocioni, Davis, and Blount along with two top five picks to offer in deals. We could move Nocino, Davis, Blount, and a pick for a big name and STILL have a top 5 pick to use. So What Say I?
A mixed bag. While I like the thought of rebuilding, I didn't realize Nocioni was 26 at the time I was floating this deal. I love his game but this team is a ways away so we'd have been better off holding out for Gordon or Deng. Also, with the Bulls retaining Gordon, they have a pierce that they could easily combine with Raef to make him easier to move. Portland, Utah, or Denver might move their problematic power forwards to Chicago for, say, Raef, Gordon, and Sweetney. As much as I'm not sold on any of those guys for the C's, adding Boozer/Zach/K-Mart to a lineup of Hinrich, Pierce, Deng, and Chandler could be frightening.
But I can't say enough about the picks and cap space and our ability to start fresh. The biggest issue is that this draft is a crapshoot. How good will Ty Thomas and Adam Morrison turn out to be? Is Bargnani and Gay the new Dirk and Finley or Tskitishvilli and Rodney White? I don't know where we'd be. A lot of people might argue that we'd be back where we were in 1997, but then again, how many people would turn down a shot at Billups and T-Mac if they had another chance at it?
In the end, this is one of the few moves/non-moves that doesn't bother me at all. I'd love to see Pierce retire in Celtic green. Then again, if dealing him will get us closer to NBA gold, then we have to put our sentiment behind us and make the move. Was this that move? Only time will tell.
- C: Perkins, Blount, Borchardt
- PF: Jefferson, T. Thomas, Gomes
- SF: Nocioni, Allen, Scalabrine
- SG: R. Davis, West, G. Green.
- PG: Duhon, Banks, Dickau
We get something from the Antoine deal: Since add Nocioni and lose Raef, we'd likely dump Justin Reed and keep the big man that we got in the Antoine deal. Curtis Borchardt is no prize but I would have liked to give him a shot at some emergency minutes.
Does Gomes get a shot earlier? Odds are no he doesn't. Tony Allen can't really handle the SF spot so perhaps Gomes gets minutes with Tim Thomas as the forwards. Since Timmy is more of a perimeter forward, Gomes might have gotten to show his interior presence earlier. Still it's a stretch. Most likely, it would still take both Perkins and Jefferson going down to get him in, unless Doc decides to use him to backup Blount. Either way, the trade doesn't open up playing time for Gomes until said injuries.
West moves to combo-guard : I would have Duhon start and have West eat up the minutes backing up both Chris and Ricky. We also could go smaller and move Ricky to the three and have Duhon and Delonte in the backcourt. I've always felt Delonte would be best suited coming off the pine and this would allow us to do so.
The Celtics are terrible: Goodbye 6th pick! We'd be a pretty god-awful team but we'd have two top five lottery picks for our trouble. Not to mention that we'd also likely have top top picks in the 2007 draft because we wouldn't rush to use up our cap space in this weak free agent crop.
The League is our Oyster: We would have freed up cap space by getting rid of both of our max contracts, we'd have Nocioni, Davis, and Blount along with two top five picks to offer in deals. We could move Nocino, Davis, Blount, and a pick for a big name and STILL have a top 5 pick to use. So What Say I?
A mixed bag. While I like the thought of rebuilding, I didn't realize Nocioni was 26 at the time I was floating this deal. I love his game but this team is a ways away so we'd have been better off holding out for Gordon or Deng. Also, with the Bulls retaining Gordon, they have a pierce that they could easily combine with Raef to make him easier to move. Portland, Utah, or Denver might move their problematic power forwards to Chicago for, say, Raef, Gordon, and Sweetney. As much as I'm not sold on any of those guys for the C's, adding Boozer/Zach/K-Mart to a lineup of Hinrich, Pierce, Deng, and Chandler could be frightening.
But I can't say enough about the picks and cap space and our ability to start fresh. The biggest issue is that this draft is a crapshoot. How good will Ty Thomas and Adam Morrison turn out to be? Is Bargnani and Gay the new Dirk and Finley or Tskitishvilli and Rodney White? I don't know where we'd be. A lot of people might argue that we'd be back where we were in 1997, but then again, how many people would turn down a shot at Billups and T-Mac if they had another chance at it?
In the end, this is one of the few moves/non-moves that doesn't bother me at all. I'd love to see Pierce retire in Celtic green. Then again, if dealing him will get us closer to NBA gold, then we have to put our sentiment behind us and make the move. Was this that move? Only time will tell.
