Sam Smith: Spurs are looking to deal Francisco Elson.

[Holt's Cat]

Tell me something I don't know about Mike Miller.

Well then someone needed to remind you.

I'd rather the "mental patient" that plays exception on both sides of the court than another injury-prone swingman with barely any playoffs experience from the Clippers.

The Spurs don't win by taking on mental cases and hoping they can turn themselves around. The closest they've come to that during the Duncan era are a few guys who were known as malcontents because they were in losing situations or because they had done a couple dumb things early on in their careers. Artest is not that guy. Artest isn't even as sane as Rodman.

[Man of Steel]

Elson, Brent and Bonner for Dirk

[Ghost Writer]

I disagree wholeheartedly.

You are passing up on a star-quality player who even you would admit has the cache of talent to be perfect for Spurs Basketball... if he doesn't snap.

Artest has been fine so far this year.

I think he's worth the risk, given our team's makeup and how Pop is such a disciplinarian.

[texasqb2]

How weird that the Spurs could have had Artest a while back, Steve Smith for Rons Mercer and Artest.

Steve Smith?-I thought it was Derek Anderson

[Ghost Writer]

Yeah. That chapped my @ss.

[timmy21_4rings]

Elson is not going anywhere except for a big man...We need bigs to collect fouls against West's bigs

[coopdogg3]

Would the Warriors want Elson or Barry or a Spurs draft pick? What do you think of trading for Pietrus?

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/features/rumors

Waiving His Rights
Mickael Pietrus | Warriors
Golden State's Mickael Pietrus is saying he would waive his Bird rights, with which Devean George is holding up the Kidd deal, to get away from the Warriors. -- The Chicago Tribune

Here is Hollinger's take on him? Anybody think he can be salvaged?

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/playe...?playerId=2173

2006-07 season: While Pietrus' numbers recovered from the 2005-06 horror show, they went in a surprising direction. He became a low-volume, high percentage guy who boasted a 59.0 TS% that ranked third among small forwards. He did it mainly by hitting 38.8 percent of his 3-pointers -- almost entirely from the corners -- and also cashed in 42.7 percent of his long 2s.

As I mentioned, he loves the corners -- a whopping 82.6 percent of his 3-point attempts came from there. Over the past three years he's at 37.4 percent on corner 3s but just 32.0 percent from the other spots. That may not seem like much, but it's the difference between the attempt being a good idea and a bad one, and so he's wise to focus on the ones he's better at.

Pietrus also got to the foul line quite a bit when he wasn't bombing away, ranking 17th among small forwards in free-throw attempts per field-goal attempt. In fact, had he hit better than 64.8 percent from the stripe he would have ranked even higher in TS%, and his two misses at the end of Game 2 in the Utah series proved particularly damaging.

However, he didn't create many shots, primarily because he remains a poor ballhandler. Pietrus ranked 58th out of 63 small forwards in Assist Ratio and 52nd in Turnover Ratio; how somebody could turn it over so much while taking such a high proportion of shots from beyond the arc is beyond me.

Scouting report: Pietrus is a long, athletic forward who can shoot from outside and finish in transition or on the drive. But his offensive game is limited by his very poor dribbling skills, which prevent him from taking slower players off the dribble, and he also has trouble with traveling violations when he tries to fake a shot and drive.

Defensively, Pietrus has the potential to be a stopper due to his length and quickness, but hasn?t quite put the whole package together yet. He still makes mental errors and gambles too much, and had the ninth-worst rate of fouls per minute at his position.

2007-08 outlook: Pietrus signed the Warriors' one-year qualifying offer for $3.47 million and will attempt to earn more as an unrestricted free agent next summer. While Jason Richardson's departure should theoretically open up more minutes for him along the wings, he's going to have a lot of compe ion from players of roughly equal quality -- Matt Barnes, Kelenna Azubuike, and possibly rookie Marco Belinelli -- so there's no guarantee he'll seen an uptick in minutes.

Of course, the easiest way to increase his playing time would be to increase his performance, but Pietrus seems stuck at his current level of halfway-decentness. At 25, there's still some hope that he can unlock more of his potential and become a bona fide starter, but if he can't do it in a contract year in his fifth pro seasons, then we can probably shut the door on that possibility for good.


Most similar at age: Todd Day

[MoSpur]

I wouldn't mind making a run at him in the summer, but for now the Spurs should focus on a big if they're gonna make a trade.

[ss1986v2]

thats an analysis of pietrus before the season started. hes regressed a bit since last season, or at least hasnt shown any improvement over his first 4 seasons (still makes the bone-headed plays, fouls way to much, shooting percentages are down from his big year last season). and of coarse, hes as dumb as a shoe. think elson as a wing.

ive actually hoped that pietrus gets traded to a team that actually plays both ends of the floor where he can get solid minutes. id want to see what he could do then before id take a chance on him.

[Mr.Bottomtooth]

Spurs receive
Wally Szczerbiak
Johan Petro

Sonics receive
Brent Barry
Francisco Elson
Matt Bonner

to the no.

[ApolloCreed]

There should be a forum rule to never post rumors from Sam Smith, Peter Vescey or anything from HoopsWorld.