J.R. Smith has literally been shanghaied away for the foreshortened 2011-2012 NBA season: rolling ILH sandbox thread

you mean lebron for the ENTIRE BULLS TEAM? seems fair.

yeah, just saw that line from billups. he might just force his way to a contender (i assume miami, to stick it to the NYK).

lol c'mon dawg

WojYahooNBA Adrian Wojnarowski
Billups: "People take my kindness and professionalism for weakness. They think I’ll be OK with (getting claimed). I won’t be OK with this."

lmao some shit team should claim him just cause

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhZTNgAs4Fc&ob=av3n

I hope one of the teams that need to make salary floor claim him and park him on the bench as he rots away his last good year.

good being relative, as he's been crazy overrated for years.

billups has done enough of the right things at the right times and been a pro forever. I want to cut him some slack on this. No fun being kicked down the road.

lol. yeah, be the team that -- in one swift move -- ENDS CHAUNCEY BILLUPS' CAREER.

agree with aimless, btw (in all seriousness). and i do now see him landing with the heat. the possible complication is that billups rants are the next phase in the post-CBA war of attrition between players and owners over player movement, and maybe some owner will claim billups just to frustrate him.

johnhollinger John Hollinger
Blatantly obvious Billups strategy likely to be copied by other amnesty players. If nobody picks him, can double dip and get more $$
2 minutes ago

works for me. He's getting $14 million wherever he plays (or doesn't). Being a professional is about fulfilling a contract. Next year he can dictate where he plays for the vet's minimum.

xposts, obv.

lol all so irrelevant chauncey is beyond cooked, hang it up mr big shot

c'mon, he averaged 14 points and about 6 assists last year.

and if he's looking for a lot of money, then no, he won't be headed to miami.

He put up average offensive stats on high pace teams where he had free reign to chuck it and not play a lick of defense. Impressive.

Knicks think big with Chandler deal
New York throws more money around, but cap creativity opens up more possibilities

By John Hollinger

If I would characterize the New York Knicks organization in one word, it would be "impatient."

Over the past two decades, the Knicks have looked for every shortcut and thrown money at every problem. The ultimate result is that they've spent twice as much as everybody else, but the results haven't been much different.

So it was when they gave a fully guaranteed $95 million to an uninsurable (and thus untradeable) player in Amare Stoudemire who has had two microfractures, and so it was when they threw in pretty much every useful asset they had in order to get Carmelo Anthony from Denver.

But here's the thing: Given those parameters, what they did with Tyson Chandler made a lot of sense. If you start from the assumption that there's no such thing as a bad contract with the Knicks because they don't care if they pay luxury tax and they'll never be under the cap again in the next half decade, then paying $58 million to Chandler over four years isn't that big a problem.

Make no mistake, this deal will be untradeable the second it's signed. But given the decisions New York has already made and its unique immunity to fiscal sanity, it still made sense.

The Knicks will have this cap space once and only once. It behooved them to use it on the best player who would take their money. Moreover, using it on a center -- the most expensive position -- made all kinds of sense. Guards are dramatically less expensive; you can get good ones using the midlevel exception. So the Knicks will more than happily use that exception each of the next three years. ...

... And this one! Because in a nice bit of cap management, the Knicks set this up as a sign-and-trade, meaning they never signed a free agent using cap space and thus retain all of their exceptions.

In the meantime, New York can add two backcourt pieces with the newly generated exceptions -- if you're wondering, they can't sign Chauncey Billups, whom they intend to amnesty the rest of this season -- and plenty of good guards are still available. And while we're at it, I'll just throw this out there now: In the summer of 2012, Steve Nash and Grant Hill can be had as a combo deal with the midlevel and biannual exceptions, respectively.

The Knicks did one other cute little piece of cap management: They've set themselves up for a four-year run with the Melo-Amare-Chandler group, and then they can bust out the TNT and try again. All three players have deals that expire after the 2014-15 season, as will whomever the Knicks pick up with this year's midlevel and, if he signs a three-year deal, Nash (and yes, I am getting ahead of myself. Thanks for asking.)

Again, it's the Knicks, so they're taking every shortcut, overpaying every free agent and ultimately aren't going to win a ring this way. For goodness sakes, they set $10 million on fire by guaranteeing Billups' final year and then using the amnesty on him months later. (Again, with feeling: TEN MILLION DOLLARS. Burnt to a crisp. The New York Knicks, everyone!)

But the more you look at this deal with respect to decisions New York has already made, the more sense it makes, and the more you have to tip your cap to Glen Grunwald and Mark Warkentien for thinking outside the box.

Additionally, the fit for New York is impeccable. With two forwards that are somewhere between agnostic and allergic to defense, Chandler can protect the rim for New York and provide some modicum of resistance for what was previously a lineup full of DHs. Stoudemire will also be saved from the banging of playing the center position, which he did much of the time last season. If Chandler (with a little help from Toney Douglas) can just make the Knicks average on defense, the two forwards will take care of the rest.

As for Dallas, this isn't quite in Florida Marlins territory (when they were still representing more than just Miami), but it has to be a little deflating for the locals to see a defending champion talking about things like "preserving cap flexibility." It has become very apparent that while the draconian luxury tax penalties that start in 2013-14 may not sway the Knicks much, it's going to have a big impact on the way Dallas does business. The Mavericks, like the Knicks, threw money at every problem, only they were smarter with how they did it. Now they have to completely change their philosophy.

Chandler was the first domino in that, but there will be others -- J.J. Barea is as good as gone, they'll amnesty Brendan Haywood in a season or two when it becomes more advantageous, and Jason Terry may not be long for this roster either.

But the Mavs aren't done with this offseason either. Dallas gets an enormous trade exception in the deal (oh, and Andy Rautins, who will be cut on arrival), and can use that to sign-and-trade for another free agent now or in a future trade. Losing Chandler takes the Mavs off the A-list of contenders, but if they can get a halfway decent starting center (Sam Dalembert?), they'll win a bunch of games again.

As for Dwight Howard, that has no chance of happening unless he becomes a full-fledged free agent after the season. Sorry Mavs fans, you're not getting the best center in the game for Rudy Fernandez. Try again.

Meanwhile, Washington also scored a nice little coup by getting Ronny Turiaf more or less for free. Turiaf is owed $4.3 million this year, but that pro-rates to $3.46 million over a 66-game season. With New York throwing in the league-maximum $3 million (hey, it's only money), the Wizards get a useful center for virtually nothing. He doesn't help with the rebuilding plan much, but Washington should be able to flip him at the trade deadline for a more useful asset.

Nonetheless, the big story here is New York. With a Melo-Amare-Chandler skyline and two exceptions remaining, they're going to be a force for as long as Stoudemire and Chandler can stay in the lineup. They're throwing money at their problems again, yes, but this time you have to admire the creativity with which they've done so.

hey guys, it's eddy curry!

https://twitter.com/#!/WindhorstESPN/status/145599121556901888/photo/1

yeah. apparently he lost 70 pounds.

Ethan Skolnick @EthanJSkolnick -- Curry says he never gave up hope he would play again. Won't reveal weight but says he lost 70 pounds.

only a b-cup now!

He looks pretty good! Can't see how much junk is in the trunk, but doesn't look bloated for a change.

chauncey irl

http://gifsoup.com/imager.php?id=3217398&t=o

guys why are the specifics of this new paul trade being withheld from us, its v unfair

ESPNSteinLine Marc Stein
Source close to process tells ESPN that, as long as Kings have enough cap room, they can sign and trade Dalembert even after renouncing him
15 seconds ago

i dont understand what this means, and other things, nba is driving me insane right now

IT MEANS WE WILL BE TRADING JAMES JONES FOR SAMUEL DALBERT.

or dalembert, or whatever his name is.

daniel r u aware that u r in no way affiliated w/the miami heat

billups is still a very solid player btw, if the heat got him it would be absolutely game over why even play the season

It was v. v. weird to hear Cuban on the radio yesterday talking about having to completely change his relationship to spending money/contracts. Doesn't really inspire confidence in me because there's not much evidence that Cuban or his front office people are great at evaluating talent.

daniel r u aware that u r in no way affiliated w/the miami heat

ha! i know. curiously enough, a law school friend of mine has become the team's general-counsel, which sounds like a dream job.

ask him for a job bro

her

i should!

lol girls cant be lawyers

btw dalembert is garbage, scores like 4pts a game for his opponents via goal tends, ive never seen anything like it, of course he is immediately by far the heats best center should he end up there

lol girls cant be lawyers

hahaha

ESPNSteinLine Marc Stein
Source close to process tells ESPN that, as long as Kings have enough cap room, they can sign and trade Dalembert even after renouncing him
15 seconds ago

i dont understand what this means, and other things, nba is driving me insane right now

He is technically a free agent, but until he signs elsewhere he is still "theirs" so I believe they can sign and trade him and not fall under the "can't be traded for x days" rule any other team would be restricted by.

If they have enough space to sign him and trade him to someone like Dallas they could get back something in return, possibly freeing up some space for Dallas and getting a pick or something for their trouble.

can't see what heat would offer, realistically, for dalembert, that would be of interest to kings. not giving them haslem or even miller for dalembert, i suspect.

if the heat get billups they could play me at center and win 60 games

Stein goofed by saying they "renounced him" because I'm pretty sure he was an unrestricted free agent. You only renounce RFAs.

got to think theres no way the heat get billups, another team will take him just to block the acquisition if necessary, one would think this scenario would hold for any other dude they desire

For $1 million he's a fair chip to have, even if he doesn't play for your team.

the thing no one wants to talk about is that it doesn't matter what auxiliary players the heat pick up -- they win the finals if lebron doesn't turn into a zombie in the playoffs

Sadly true.

eh imho both the celtics and the bulls had sufficient defensive schemes to stop the heat last year bron just hit a bunch of bad three pointers and then returned to earth v dallas, having yr best three players not being able to shoot the three is nagl, which is not to say the heat cant win it, but their big weakness was to some extent exposed last year

srsly like fall away threes in the fourth quater of tight games, he swung like 4 games in two rounds

i'm more interested in the billups story for its connection to the broader war that's been waged (beginning the second the CBA was ratified) between players and owners over player's ability to choose their employers.

dirk didnt even play that well in the finals, dallas just dared the bulls to hit threes and they did not

which btw i predicted B-)

eh, heat will be a better three-point shooting team this year. and i think they may get better at the center position, too.