NBA Blog

I must admit, I was furious when I heard about the Spurs-Rockets trade.  Jackie Butler and Luis Scola for a European player that does not want to return to the U.S. and a future 2nd round pick?  That is terrible.  Today, the real reason for the deal will become evident.  Spanoulis does not want to return to the U.S. and the Spurs expect him to make a formal request to have his contract removed from the books.  He is in the final year of his rookie contract, and because the Spurs are over the luxury tax threshold, this would save them close to $4 million.  Butler was not going to get minutes this year for the Spurs, because he is too big, too out of shape and too weak defensively.  However, I am still not a fan of this trade.  I really like Luis Scola’s toughness, rebounding, and ability to do the little things on both ends of the floor.  He is also a better scorer than Fabulous Fabrico Oberto. 

Butler for Spanoulis is something of a wash because it saved the Spurs money and Butler may not even get much time for the Rockets this season.  But, I still do not like the deal.  The Rockets needed some help in the post, specifically at power forward, and the Spurs gave two post players away for a 2nd round pick.  They should have held out for more.  There is speculation that several other teams showed plenty of interest in Scola.  If that were the case, I am sure the Spurs could have at least pried one or two more 2nd round selections from some teams.  Many teams just throw their 2nd round picks around freely without ever considering the possibility of landing a talented player. 

For those of you that want to do a little more learning about front-loaded or back-loaded player contracts, and why they are used, take a look at this article from realgm.com

If you are like me, you are in full NBA mode right now.  The NFL season (and fantasy football is too far away), the MLB All Star rosters have already been set, and there is still some dead time until the game.  However, the NBA is in full off-season mode.  The Finals just ended.  I realize some of you probably did not know that, judging from the ratings.  The NBA Draft just happened, and the first rookie contract has been signed (Oden).  Free agency has kicked off, and the first major free agent has switched teams.  It has been released that Rashard Lewis has agreed to join the Orlando Magic this season for an estimated 5-year, $75 million deal.  To get this deal done, the Magic have renounced their rights to Darko Millicic, making him an unrestricted free agent.  I am intrigued to see who goes after him now.

For those of you still yearning to watch some hoops games, the NBA Vegas Summer League is set to tip off in a few days, and the Summer League rosters are beginning to trickle in.  For more information, and updates throughout the day, go here.  As usual, the Spurs are dragging their feet to post their roster.  You can already assume that Marcus Williams, James White, and Jackie Butler will be there.  The rest of the active roster will not, after all, they are the oldest team in the NBA.   Yet, I can’t help but wonder if the Spurs don’t make a push for Beno to play in order to increase his trade value.  He is in the final year of a contract, and there are too many teams in dire need for some point guard help, for Beno not to move on.  Luis Scola and Tiago Splitter have no reason to come over and play, because they continue to show what they can do against top competition in the Euroleagues.  I just wish Mahinmi had not gotten hurt.  I was really looking forward to seeing his development.  He’s a tremendous athlete for his size.

I scoured the rosters of the other teams and found a NBA HOOPS Blog favorite, Justin Williams.  You may remember some of my previous posts discussing the former Wyoming shot blocker.  Williams finally started to get minutes at the end of the season last year, and in the final 10 games of the season, he averaged a pretty impressive 9.4 points per game, 7.1 rebounds per game, and 1.0 blocks per game.  He was only getting about 20-24 minutes at that point as well.  Those figures would cause ESPN.com’s John Hollinger to jump out of his skin when getting into per-48 minute averages.  For the season, Williams only played 12.8 minutes per night, but still shot 61% from the field and put up 5.0 points per game and 4.4 rebounds per game.  The kid only played at Wyoming for three seasons, and I am not sure if he even played in high school.  At 6′9″, 211 lbs., the Kings may have something very special if they can be patient.  Hopefully, they won’t be patient enough to allow Williams to develop some more, and will let him walk away.  If you want to check out more on Williams, go to his realgm.com page here.

I will be back with more news later.