Spurs are being cheap plain and simple

[IcemanCometh]

Many of you are gearing yourselves up to hate SJax already, claiming hes being evil and making unreasonable demands. This is having eerie similarity to another episode a few years back with Derek Anderson. Again the Spurs refuse to commit to a long term contract, why? Well fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.

The Spurs claim they want him back, sure they would love him back at his original minimum price. Why do you think we just traded for more contracts that expire in a year. We just got a huge windfall for being under the luxury tax , you don't think maybe the shareholders wouldn't like to repeat that next year.

Indiana giving up Brad Miller was cheap,but San Antonio giving up SJax was smart cause Manu was gonna start anyways?

2 mantras to live by

Never trust an agent.
Never trust ownership.

[Marcus Bryant]

I'd like Jack back but you have to be Fing kidding me if you are going off on the Spurs for being "too cheap".

Next summer they will have to offer up a long term deal for Ginobili and then by the summer after that they will have to pay Parker and Turkoglu.

That's on top of Duncan's max deal, Rose, and Nesterovic.

So the Spurs will have 6 long term contracts for:

Duncan ($13 mil+ starting, 7 years)
Parker ($9 mil+ starting, 7 years)
Ginobili ($6 mil+ starting, 7 years)
Turkoglu ($6 mil+ starting, 7 years)
Nesterovic ($5.5 mil starting, 6 years)
Rose ($4 mil starting, 6 years)
Jack???

How many teams in the league carry that many long term guaranteed deals? Lay off that sauce, Ice.

[Marcus Bryant]

Here Ice, see for yourself:

www.nationwide.net/~patricia/contracts

[IcemanCometh]

yeah boohooo

poor multi-millionaires having to pay salary after getting a new arena

why if they added sjax their profits might go down .02%


no team in the nba, no team in baseball, no team in football loses money

[Marcus Bryant]

Yeah well apparently the Spurs aren't the only front office to think that way, Ice. This is Holt Cat not friggin' Microsoft or Broadcast.com.

Look at the Lakers how many long term deals have they carried in that market?

[IcemanCometh]

like i said

never trust ownership

with very few exceptions, they are all cheap worthless bas s who care nothing for the fans

[Marcus Bryant]

Like I said, get some perspective.

Duncan
Parker
Ginobili
Turkoglu
Nesterovic
Rose

Those 6 by themselves would account for $350 mil+ in guaranteed salary. How many NBA teams do that ? Name them.

[IcemanCometh]

the mavs
the kings
the pistons
the sixers
the nets
the knicks
the blazers
the twolves
the celtics
the heat

[Marcus Bryant]

Um, no.

[IcemanCometh]

uhm yes

[Marcus Bryant]

the Heat had 3 long term contracts: Jones, Grant, and Mourning.

Mavs & Blazers have ownership who doesn't mind blowing $$$. NY is the largest media market in the Fing world. The rest of those teams aren't carrying anywhere near what you think the "cheap" Spurs should carry. F that, Ghost.

[Temple Of The Dog]

i think the spurs could have worked something out with sjax at one time... but they didn't see him as a priority. they tried to go after spree... who would have taken the starters spot... and most of the cap space. (they would have backed him up with manu not jax)

after that fell through, they pulled another trade for 2 shooting guards... and if that doesn't tell you that they really didn't see sjax as a priority... than what will?

contracts start out high... you try to bring them down. (its called negotiation) but whatever comes out of this... you can bet the spurs organization is going to paint themselves in a better light than they will sjax.

just witness tony parker... when he came out and complained that pop wasn't returning his calls after he expressed concern over them going after jason kidd... the front office and pop came out with the company line that said "he's getting advice from others" (meaning his agent)

now... they're doing the same with sjax. they're coming out with little leaks about contract info... "sjax wants so and so money... his agent is ruining his career..." blah blah blah.

and yet still... some in here want to defend those actions? thats a little blind.

look... sjax was great for a year... but he wouldn't have been a starter in any other western conference team last year if he was on any other team but the spurs. tony parker was drafted late in the first round and just so happened to work out better than anyone ever expected.

these players were on our team and starting because management chose to take a very conservative approach... one that left us with those players as our only options (as far as talent) and we haven't had a good talent base on this team for years.

jason kidd would have been a second star for this team... and hedo and mercer can more than fill the void that sjax has left... the reason we went after kidd... and wound up with hedo and mercer... are the direct result of a management plan that hadn't included winning a championship in the process of planning for david robinson's retirement.

[Marcus Bryant]

Cassell and Sprewell's deals end in 2005 and 2006.

[exstatic]

If you give everyone the MCE, you become the Knicks, lottery bound, and unable to change your roster in any meaningful way. Pop and RC do a great job of continuously scouting, signing, and reloading. Since they will only be marginally over the cap this year, assuming Jack bolts, look for 1-3 players on IR this year to develop.

Everyone can't get paid. Fact of life.

[SequSpur]

we haven't had a good talent base on this team for years.

LMMFAO!!!!!!!!!!!!

2 Championships in the last 5 years and Temple of the Dog thinks we don't have talent on this team...

, if it wouldn't had been due to an injury and 2 shutdown modes in the 4th quarter, we may have had more championships...

This coming season is no different than others.. Big ing Question marks... SPAM! This team will have to learn each other again and then peak later on.

Yeah the Spurs are different. They have remained compe ive... Without Duncan this team would barely win 10 games. REMEMBER THAT! All of these players look great and get paid because of TIM DUNCAN!..

SJAX had 68 turnovers in the playoffs. We would have swept damn near every team if he would have only had 60 turnovers.. lol... Unbelievable...

Yeah.. Bring his azz back at a guaranteed 4 year deal.. Yeah.. go ahead... Jax is a Silver Dancer.

[KoriEllis]

Iceman, get your facts straight before you make grand assumptions.

The Spurs had re-signing Stephen Jackson as a priority.

The day after Kidd left town (July 7th) the Spurs started discussing trading certain current players -- Bowen, Malik and Tony. Trading Jack wasn't an option. Pop talked to Jack and expressed his desire to keep him in a Spurs uni. Jack reciprocated the desire.

It was understood Jack would be signed last because of the fact the Spurs can over the cap to sign him. The Spurs went out fishing for more talent and continued to want Jackson here.

They started to negotiate with his agent (who doesn't talk to Pop) and his agent began making unreasonable demands. The Spurs starting offer was 3year/$12M -- the agent wanted FIVE YEARS/$28M, plus conditional clauses to keep Jackson a starter. That's in' ridiculous by anyone's standards.

After a productive, yet erratic season, no team should be extorted into giving a player a five year contract with promises to keep him in the starting lineup, especially with a player like Manu Ginobili on the team.

The starting job was initially going to be Jack's to lose in training camp.

So you can blame Jackson's agent. You can blame Jackson for listening to his agent. But I'm sorry, you cannot blame the Spurs organization in this situation. They aren't idiots and they aren't going to get played by a 25-year old kid with a clutch jump shot and erratic, undisciplined tendencies. This isn't about being cheap.

[MI21]

Good to see that the starting position was Jack's to lose, and he wasn't going to be benched after his nice season, despite what alot of people here were saying about Manu starting etc.

I really wanted to keep Jack, and the offer the Spurs gave him is exactly what i would have given him, not one cent more or one year more. It's hard for me to say that for anymore I dont want him back as one of his huge fans, but it's the truth. His agent is a real head by the sounds of things

Thanks for Info Kori.

[Marcus Bryant]

Jack starting had a lot to do with Ginobili's F'ed up ankle more than anything else last season. Ginobili is by far the more polished and skilled player. I like Jack a lot and wanted him in SA before most of you realized who he was but I have no problem telling it like it is.

[bugramps]

SJax has ONE decent year, and now you guys believe he deserves a long term deal? Need I mention Jaren Jackson? Had a GREAT year in 1999 and won the le and contributed with his clutch shooting. Sound familiar?

And, correct me if I'm wrong, but the reason the Spurs gave up on Derek Anderson was because he got y and too big for his britches demanding the Spurs deal with him before dealing with Robinson's contract. In fact, I remember vividly him telling the local media that he understood Robinson had done a lot for the franchise, but that he had done A LOT for the organization too ... give me a break. At that point, everyone said F*CK him! So, he goes to Portland for less money just despite us, and now they're falling apart. GREAT MOVE DA!

I like Jackson, but he also caused me a lot of near fatal heartattacks with his careless and erratic ballhandling and ill decisions. He may be clutch, but he makes up for that in a HUGE way by throwing the ball away.

Again, he had ONE good year ... you don't overpay because someone had ONE good year. Remember everyone said the real test for Tony Parker was this year ... to see if he just had a fluke year or if he was legit?

Same here ... to demand a $28mil over 5 years contract, you have to produce more than one decent year. Sure they wanted to keep him, but once the Spurs found out what he wanted, then they realized they had to make some moves to prepare for his departure.

Anyone who pays near what he wants is an IDIOT!:gun

[Marcus Bryant]

Another thing to consider is that the Spurs could have Derek Anderson taking up $7.8 million of their cap next season and then even more over the next 3 seasons. Were the Spurs being cheap....or smart? Of course homer fans are going to when players leave a team but that's life in the NBA.

[T Park Num 9]

Kind of like the fans that are whining about getting Ron Mercer and Turkoglu for nothing, because,

"we couldve done it the last two years?"

[IcemanCometh]

Well all I'm saying is it looks mighty su ious. So if the Spurs let Hedo and Manu walk next year and take on yet more ending contracts, don't come crying to me.

[Temple Of The Dog]

Another thing to consider is that the Spurs could have Derek Anderson taking up $7.8 million of their cap next season and then even more over the next 3 seasons. Were the Spurs being cheap....or smart? Of course homer fans are going to when players leave a team but that's life in the NBA.

marcus... you dumb ****... a "homer" is fan that defends every ing move the front office makes... even if that includes peter holt going on the air (on nbc) and making comments about signing david for less and what to do about derek anderson... while you're getting your ass handed to you by the lakers.

2 Championships in the last 5 years and Temple of the Dog thinks we don't have talent on this team...

, if it wouldn't had been due to an injury and 2 shutdown modes in the 4th quarter, we may have had more championships...

i said "talent base" meaning more than tim duncan. honestly... before manu and parker we had guys on the roster that no other teams would even touch... not worth it.

we had tim duncan during those 2 championships sequa. and some for brains still think that AD could start at point... and that you win with elderly people who are on their way out. (just because they like to spin front office moves)

aj wouldn't have started for any other team in the western conference during the time we had him... and we could never make any trades during the robinson era because we hardly had anyone with any trade value... we had to trade sean elliott for rodman... if that doesn't tell you something... (cause we got sean back for a guy named curly)

... god, you leave for a second...

[Marcus Bryant]

Suck a . A homer never wants to see their favorite players leave. Now you're telling me that the Spurs can simply afford to carry a roster full of multi-year deals? Get real. 'Dumb s' like you must think that this isn't a business. Excuse me for actually thinking instead of whining like a little baby.

[bugramps]

The Spurs did that to make room to solidify their future ... giving them the freedom to sign Manu and Parker up long term in the next two year. I don't really see where you are upset about all this. It's brilliant actually.

Which is smarter? Caving in and giving an unproven guy like Jax a long term deal, or let him go and sign a couple of one year deals that allow you freedom to evaluate and decide.

I just don't understand where you think offering Jax a huge contract is smart. I ask it again, do you remember Jaren Jackson? The same stuff was said about him, and we signed him, and he was never anywhere near what he was in that amazing playoff run he had in 1999.

The Spurs and their fans learned the hard way not to throw money at someone who had ONE good year.

Getting Hedo and Mercer and Horry was smart ... you get talented players that you are not committed to beyond this year. That gives the SPURS, not the players, the power to determine their path and course of action. IF Hedo and/or Mercer work out, then they'll sign extensions, if not, the Spurs can let them go and have money to burn.

It's a win-win situation for the Spurs ... you should be happy about it. , they were offering Kidd and O'Neal max deals ... how is that being cheap? , many think they overpaid Rasho. I think they're being extremely smart ... there's a reason the Spurs front office gets a lot of praise around the league these days (granted outside SA ... bc Spurs fans can't see how lucky we are to have such a smart office ... look at the east for easy examples about how bad management can be).