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Yeah, the best thing for a cash strapped owner is to trade his main attraction and money maker.
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With trade speculation swirling around him, Chris Paul said Wednesday that he's open to a trade if the New Orleans Hornets aren't committed to winning championships.
"My first choice is to be in New Orleans,'' Paul said in a telephone interview from London. "I just want to make sure we're committed to winning. If we're not committed to winning and trying to get better so we can contend with the Lakers, the Celtics and all these other top teams, then I'm open to being traded.''
"If George Shinn can't sell the team, I think Chris Paul will be traded," an executive from an Eastern Conference team said. "Shinn's strapped for money. He's going to have to move him."
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=5317801
Yeah, the best thing for a cash strapped owner is to trade his main attraction and money maker.
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And let him walk in the summer of 2012 without compensation. They either put a team around him or watch him leave.
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Fish has this loser beat.
And that's just the way it is.
Oh yeah, we can really use another point guard like Devin Harris.
Or we could get Paul Pierce. That rumor is going around as well.
But I heard that Jameer Nelson and Vince Carter are also on the table!
AW , , WHERE DO I SIGN UP?
Clearly, Derrick Fisher is the best point guard in the NBA.
5 rings > no rings
You sure told him.
Hornets ownership discounts chances of Paul trade
By Brett Martel
With the 11th overall pick in the NBA draft and Chris Paul on their roster, the New Orleans Hornets are in a prime position to make a blockbuster trade.
For now, though, the franchise’s owners are having a hard time even pondering a deal that would send Paul out of the Big Easy.
“Chris Paul is the cornerstone of our franchise and brings us unequaled support on and off the court,” Hornets majority owner George Shinn said Wednesday in a statement released on both his and partner Gary Chouest’s behalf. “We will continue to build around Chris Paul, and we want to see him in a Hornets uniform for the remainder of his career.
“We have an exciting future,” the statement continued. “With the leadership of our new head coach and players like Chris Paul, we know the best is yet to come.”
Hornets general manager Jeff Bower said he has been fielding a number of calls about possible trades from teams around the league, but has declined to specify which teams, or how many, have made offers for Paul.
Bower said only that he’s obliged to listen to offers for every player in order to gauge the value of the players on his roster.
Bower added that the Hornets appreciate Paul’s role both on the court and in the community, and place a high value on that.
New head coach Monty Williams took it a step further, saying Paul was “the main thing” that excited him about taking over in New Orleans and that he could not envision opening next season without him.
“Chris is a Hornet and I think he’s going to be here for a long time,” Williams said.
If Paul is to remain in New Orleans—and win—he’ll need more help, and fast.
When they were healthy, the Hornets were barely good enough last season to contend for one of the final playoff spots in the Western Conference. When Paul was injured for much of the second half of the season, not even the promising play of rookie guards Darren Collison and Marcus Thornton could prevent New Orleans from plummeting out of the playoff picture.
Bower said he is considering a wide range of options in Thursday’s draft, including trading the pick to move up or down in the draft order. If the Hornets hold on to their pick, there should be players available at No. 11 who can improve the club right away, Bower said.
If New Orleans decides against packaging Collison in a trade, the Hornets are unlikely to draft another point guard. Only three of the 14 prospects invited for workouts at the Hornets training center were smaller than 6-foot-6.
The rest were swing players, power forwards or centers including Kentucky forward Patrick Patterson, Baylor forward Ekpe Udoh, Nevada forward Luke Babbitt, Texas swingman Damion James, LSU forward Tasmin Mitc , Kansas center Cole Aldrich and Butler swingman Gordon Hayward.
“When we look at this class and look at our team, we feel there’s the space for us to continue to add depth to not only the wing position but the front line position,” Bower said. “We feel we have room for another quality player at either spot.”
Also working out for New Orleans were Iowa State forward Craig Brackins, Xavier forward/center Jason Love, Kansas swingman Xavier Henry, Oklahoma state guard James Anderson, Southern California guard Dwight Lewis, South Florida guard Dominique Jones and Houston guard Aubrey Coleman.
Although New Orleans allowed 102.7 points per game last season, which ranked 20th in the league defensively, Williams said he would still favor drafting a gifted scorer to compliment the offense provided by Paul and power forward David West, even if such a prospect had perceived weaknesses defensively.
“We obviously need shooting to go with Chris and David,” Williams said.
The Hornets thought they had a wing player of the future in 2007 when they drafted Julian Wright out of Kansas in the first round, but his progress has been slower than expected as he enters the fourth and final year of his contract.
Wright has remained in New Orleans to work on his game this summer, hoping he can turn the corner in time to save his career. If he fails, he’ll represent the type of mistake the Hornets must avoid repeating this year.
Williams was quick to point out some of the pitfalls of picking in the top half of the draft.
On one hand, he said, an 11th pick can be attractive in that it provides teams the versatility to trade up or down or stay put and still get a good player.
“But it’s also a position where you can make a mistake because somebody will drop and you jump on them because they dropped, but they may have dropped for a reason,” Williams said. “You just never know.”
they need to move Collison while his stock is where it is. if he has a bad year and/or doesn't play a lot next year w/ Paul as a starter then it's going to hurt his value. problem is if they're looking to cut costs then a trade for someone who is good and makes a decent salary might not happen. sucks for Paul.
I threw this idea out in the Spurs forum, and im obviously biased towards the Spurs, but what about a 3-way with SA and NY? Not entirely certain of all my numbers, but something like this might work:
-NY trades Eddie Curry, Wilson Chandler, and their 2011 first round pick (or Houston's) to NO
-Spurs trade Richard Jefferson, pick #20, and their 2011 first round pick to NO, trade Tony Parker to NY
-NO trades Chris Paul, Morris Peterson, and James Posey to San Antonio
In a scenario like this, NY gets Parker for basically table scraps. They give up a bloated contract in Curry, a decent but not spectacular young forward, and a questionable first round pick next year since Houston can exchange it for theirs.
For the Spurs, they get much deeper at the wing positions by adding some vets (Pop would love it) with not too long contracts, and get Chris Paul to be the point guard for the next decade. They lose Parker, sure, and their #20 pick, but I'm not certain Pop would play as much youth as we have anyway. Posey and Morrison are decent shooters and not a bad 3-man rotation with Hairston at the 3 spot.
As for the Hornets, with this deal they now would have three expiring deals that total over $38 million in salaries (Jefferson, Curry, and Peja), plus Songaila who is at something like $4.5 million. Thats almost $43 million off the cap come next summer. They also get a good young forward to groom as a replacement for posey/morrison. With our first round pick this year, and our first and Houston/NY's next year, they will have the money and draft picks to start a real rebuilding effort if that's what they want to do.
Just an idea.
Chris Paul ain't ing going anywhere the dude is banished to the hole known as New Orleans....won't ever win ....poor dude...
son we heard the same about the Saints as well ... the bottom line is that Shinn is a cheap skate owner. The Hornets only hope of being a legit, compe ive team is if and when Chouest takes over. Shinn is being his usual cheap self and holding out on selling the team because he wants more money than the team is actually worth.
I didn't say the Hornets WANT to get rid of Paul, or that they are seriously entertaining offers right now. The people buying season ticket packages aren't doing so to watch David West and James Posey. If I were the Hornets, I wouldn't be looking to deal Paul until the summer before his free agency if he won't commit to an extension.
But the fact is that this is the situation they face: improve his supporting cast or be prepared for him to walk without compensation when his contract is up. If they conclude that they can't improve the roster substantially, the logical alternative is to move him now while you can get something of substantial value back for him.
lame ing lame ass excuse...that little pygmy mutha er is banished to life where people ing wrestle alligators and eat rats and and mix frogs in gumbo....I feel sorry for the dude...
What place is that? I've never seen it before.
no team w/ cp3 and west as core players will ever be taken seriously.
Yeah, the Hornets should do a sign and trade with the Mavs for Dirk and Kidd.
That's guaranteed at least 50 wins and a playoffs appearance.
better than 36-46, IMO
And way more rings, trophies, and MVPs to go in the display case, too.
Damn, you took it there
Ghazi talks so much about Paul being a loser, I'm just dying to find out what his team ever won.Damn, you took it there
the western conference finals in 06
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