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I think it was the piss off comment
I didn't tell anyone to drink bleach, so no.
I think it was the piss off comment
Actually, you said "I'm done talking to you" . . . yet here you are, still talking to me all these posts later.I didn't talk basketball in any of those posts, yet here you are, still being just as much of a dumbass as ever.
I win!
Key to this trade is Presti not signing a max contract.
Yep; overall this is a good move for the Thunder. Does it hurt them now? Yes; Harden is currently better than Martin. Still, he wanted big money, and the Thunder weren't going to be able to give it to him. Instead, they got back a talented player, a good rookie prospect, and some draft picks to improve the team down the line. That's a pretty good haul to take now in lieu of giving up one possible year of competing (I'm not convinced they are totally out of mix) and watching Harden walk for nothing.
Still, as a Spurs fan, this excites me. Spurs didn't have an answer for Harden right now, and by the time those future prospects pan out for OKC, it probably won't affect the Spurs much anyways.
Presti isn't stupid to get back Manu(old- on the decline) and Splitter for harden. He got a better deal from Houston(young talent and draft picks).
thats what I said. In the short term, there is no doubt Manu/Tiago is better than Martin/Lamb. Spurs simply didn't have the draft pick assets that a HOU did to work a deal.
Agree. Martin and Lamb gives them more productive minutes during the course of the game overall than just Harden. I am not sold on harden as a star player. Sure he hit some big shots against the spurs but disappeared in the finals. Lamb hit some big clutch shots for UCONN during their le run a couple of years ago. He has upside potential to improve as a player .
Even with the draft picks I doubt OK City would want that deal. Why would they want Manu when he is on the rapid decline? Manu just did not play very well in the WCF, surely did not look like any type of difference maker. Splitter was a no show in the WCF and is not regarded as highly across the league as he is to spur fans on this board.
Says who? Where have you heard other GM's or coaches talk down Tiago and his level of play/production? We will just have to disagree on whether or not someone looking for a one year rental would rather have Kevin Martin/Lamb or Manu/Tiago from a personnel perspective. Obviously when you include other assets such as draft picks, it becomes a much different convo.
Manu can't even log starters minutes anymore and no where near the minutes Harden can log. Tiago is overrated on Spurstalk. Pop doesn't even think he is as good as this board does.
Lamb was probably a deal breaker. Had the Rockets not included Lamb the deal is off.
James Harden, the NBA and the Myth of Small Markets
In a trade that shocked the most snark-encrusted NBA observers, the Oklahoma City Thunder shipped its aciously talented, hirsute guard James Harden to the Houston Rockets for an assemblage of spare parts. Harden, the reigning sixth-man of the year, made up along with teammates Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, the core of the defending Western conference champions. The Oklahoma City Thunder was the only legitimate team standing between the restocked Los Angeles Lakers and the NBA Finals. Perhaps age and chemistry will knock the Lakers aside, but absent that, their greatest threat just waved the white flag before opening day. This electric young team with le hopes just unilaterally disarmed because it claimed to be a poor small-market club unable to meet the contract demands of the 23-year-old star.
Immediately the cry went out across all media, old and new: small-market teams like Oklahoma City just can’t compete. As USA Today wrote, “The deal cuts to the heart of the plight of small- and mid-market teams such as the Thunder. Can they return all of their top players? Are they willing to have a payroll that surpasses the luxury tax and are they willing to pay the tax when they go over?”
Thunder management played the part of damaged small market suitor, with General Manager Sam Presti saying, “We wanted to sign James to an extension, but at the end of the day, these situations have to work for all those involved. Our ownership group again showed their commitment to the organization with several significant offers.” He also spoke mournfully of their need to have a “sustainable” model for developing the team. As Howard Beck wrote in the New York Times, “A system that forces a small-market wonder to give up a star player—to a team in a much larger market, no less—seems cruel and counterproductive.”
This is all nonsense. If we want to understand why the hideous Harden trade took place, we need to understand the politics and priorities of today’s NBA. We need to understand that the Thunder are small-market by choice because small-markets can mean big profits. It’s a business model, not a tragic geographical handicap.
First, we need to remember how the Thunder came into existence in 2008 because in this case, past has certainly proven to be prologue. In full collusion with David Stern, Clay Bennett bought the Seattle Supersonics in 2006 and moved them to his hometown of Oklahoma City. Stern recruited Bennett, a former member of the NBA’s Board of Governors, to make this move. Why would David Stern, the man they call “Money.” choose to move a team from the fourteenth-largest television market to the forty-fifth? Why would he move a team to a place with one-twelfth the per capita income? Simply, put, it’s because Oklahoma City offered hundreds of millions in corporate welfare and public revenue while Seattle did not. Using Seattle as an object lesson for any other fan base that would dare tell Stern not to feed at the public trough, was a bonus. As Bennett gushed to Stern in a private e-mail, “You are just one of my favorite people on earth.” It’s a love built on a passion for corporate welfare, a love so great that the NBA chose to think small.
The move to a “small market” has meant the best of both worlds for the swelling pockets of Clay Bennett. It has provided him with a publicly subsidized money-making machine—$35 million in profits last year according to ESPN—while also creating the illusion of scarcity. Pressure to spend can be deflected, as Presti did, onto the need for “sustainability” while prying eyes are dissuaded by anti-trust protections: protections that outrageously exist even with the infusion of public money. The blame then gets deflected onto Harden for not taking less money to stay in Oklahoma City. I have never understood how sportswriters can turn so much bile on players for trying to maximize their incredibly narrow earning windows while owners, who have inherited—or in Bennett’s case, married—generational wealth, are exempt from the same criticisms. Last year’s Stern engineered lockout, it should now be clear, wasn’t about small-market compe ive balance but extracting wealth from the players and redistibuting it into the bank accounts of ownership.
While Harden is slammed and Presti cries the tears of the crocodile, Bennett gets to be the Bain Capital of owners: harvesting teams for profits and then throwing away their dried husks when profit margins are under any kind of threat. David Stern will retire in February 2014, but his legacy will be felt for decades to come, and it’s a legacy that has cultivated a coterie of owners that put fans and communities last. The Harden trade is just a symptom of the disease.
http://www.thenation.com/blog/170889...small-markets#
NBA is a business, and business' basic objective is to sell the tiest possible product for the highest possible price.
eg: the over-expanded, ty NBA with many teams devoid of talent, 2000+ games/season of no interest whatsoever, while the owners rake in $100Ms in profits.
I don't think this move helped the Spurs at all. I love the Spurs but they just keep getting older and older. It's getting sad.
I guess the whole thing will backfire on OKC...
Not that they might really be that worse with Martin/Lamb instead of Harden and maybe they get something of value out of the picks too(making them a top4 team for several years nonetheless), but a team that was really respected for its loyality now has lost that tag...Players will remember that and there is no way Presti wanted it...
...B-Diddy-Sonic-Killer did it again!
Older and older? I guess a core of Leonard, Green, Splitter, Neal, Mills, De Colo and Blair is older than a core of Bowen, Horry, Barry, Finley, and Oberto.
I'm surprised at the number of people that see this as a positive move for OKC. Especially those that criticized the Spurs for being "cheap".
The more I think about this deal the l look at it as a big gamble by OKC. First, they have to think that Westbrook will make a move forward and correct his shortcomings.
Second they have to hope that they will get lucky and end up with a couple of real Keepers in the picks. It's not a given- look at the players picked mid lottery- a lot stinkers and not a lot at Hardens level. The picks are great, but they are not proven talent.
Sam Prestigiacomo just knows the Thunder won't get any FT out of a technical given to an opponent for staring at the bench in a G6 of a WCF, this year.
And Kobe won't be charged with an offensive foul while Artest drains a 3.
He is a smart man, and just knows how the world spins.
harden wanted a max deal
what did durant and westbrick got when they sign on? underneath max ?
Chiming in late here, but from my perspective (call it wishful thinking if you want) OKC is a better team after this trade. Sure, we all liked Harden. He is a great player. However, he's not THAT good - at least not in the sense that he was worth a max contract to OKC. I always said that Ibaka was more irreplaceable than Harden was. I was happy that we wrapped up Ibaka first. Martin goes about his offense differently than Harden, but Martin can flat SCORE. People forget that. After all, he has played for loser teams his whole career. Lamb will be a work in progress, but Martin in addition to Jones, plus a healthy Maynor back and what I believe we are seeing as a noticeably improved Ibaka on offense makes OKC a better team, I think.
Westbrook and Ibaka both left money on the table. I can't say for sure with KD. It's known that both Westbrook and Ibaka could have demanded more money in the open market though. They wanted to stay in OKC. Harden twittled his thumbs after Presti specifically told him he was trading him in 1 HOUR - so now he can be the man in Houston I guess.
Check your facts.
Westbrook didn't leave a dime on the table and Harden didn't twiddle his thumbs. He turned down a lowball offer and now will get a deal from Houston for about 25 million more guaranteed dollars than the offer from OKC.
Chris Mannix of SI.com tweeted: “Westbrook agreed to the regular max, which guarantees him 25 percent of Thunder cap next season. He could have held out for the supermax.” Which would mean that Westbrook wouldn’t be hogging that extra five percent potentially, meaning he left some money on the table. Which means all that noise about Russell Westbrook being selfish and whatnot is totally bogus. He’s a team guy who wants to win and he proved it with this contract.
Sam Amick of SI.com says that Westbrook’s extension is locked at the 25 percent, meaning he won’t get the Rose bump regardless of his season. Which is absolutely huge. And does indeed mean Westbrook took less money to help the Thunder keep things together. Also, like Durant, he didn’t have an opt-out clause put in, meaning he’s in OKC as long as possible.
I suppose I can't say Harden twiddled his thumbs. He got more money. I don't blame the guy. It's his career, not mine, but he simply wasn't worth to OKC what he's going to get in Houston.
Westbrook had no leverage to get the extension that Rose got from Chicago. He (Westbrook) got a max 5yr/80M extension. If he played out his contract, there was not a single team in the NBA that could offer him a comparable deal to extension that he signed, let alone the deal that Rose received. He didn't leave a dime on the table.
OTOH, Harden was asking for a 4yr/60M extension. If he played out the season, there would be multiple teams that could offer him a comparable deal. Now that he's been traded to Houston, he can get a 5yr/78M extension from them.
Like I said, check your facts. OKC didn't trade Harden because of a 25M gap, they traded him over a gap of 1.75M/yr over a 4 year contract. If Harden wanted to insist on a 5yr deal from OKC, he would have had to play out his contract. He was willing to take the 4 yr deal to stay with the team.
OKC can't sign another 5 year max contract. They used it on Westbrook. A team is only allowed one 5 year max contract per CBA. KD is a 5 year max contract, but he was signed under the old CBA. I realize he isn't actually getting $25M more from Houston because that's a 5 year deal vs 4 he would get from OKC. I'm just saying the Presti has to draw a line in the sand somewhere and he did. Presti, as I've heard, does what he says he's going to do. When the guy tells you this is my final offer and you have an hour to accept, he means it. Harden isn't a max contract player to OKC. He's not worth the max in the context of who OKC has on their roster and who they've already extended. Harden was NOT willing to take a 4 year deal to stay with the team. If h was, he would've stopped eating his damn dinner and returned Presti's phone call. By Harden's admission, he was eating dinner when Presti called him to say he was traded. I think if my boss offered me $55M over 4 years and gave me an hour to take it and I really wanted to stay with that organization, I'd return his call.
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