Thoughts about the NBA Lottery, LeBron James, and the New York Yankees





So earlier this week, the most relevant NBA lottery in this decade took place, solely because of the presence of potential superstars Greg Oden and Kevin Durant. And it certainly seems as though these two players will play big roles in attempting to turn around two once proud franchises in Portland and Seattle. But there are two other things that jumped out at me in the time before, during, and after the lottery.

The Chicago Bulls and the Phoenix Suns are two playoff teams who are both close to being title contenders next season. Yet, when we looked up last Tuesday night at 8:3o, there they both were in the mix for lottery picks. The Bulls even had a small chance at Oden or Durant. How does this happen you ask? In the words of Forrest Gump, " Stupid is as stupid does."

The Suns procured their potential lottery pick through the trade of Joe Johnson to the Atlanta Hawks. Joe Johnson is a very good NBA player who is extremely hard to defend at three positions. It certainly would not be a stretch to consider him an All-Star. And since the Hawks had cap space ansd the Suns were up against the luxury tax, a deal made sense. So the Hawks, who were bidding against no one, give up Boris Diaw and 1st round draft pick. Not only did Diaw fit on the Suns much better than Johnson, now the Suns would have an opportunity to add a young impact player. The only good news is that Hawks GM Billy Knight made the pick top 3 protected, which took the Suns out of the mix for Oden or Durant. And since the Hawks got the 3rd pick in the lottery, the Suns have to wait unitl next year's draft to reload. This deal was so bad that one of part owners of the Hawks took the other part owners to court to have it overturned. But the again, this is the same general manager who passed on two of the best 5 point guards in the NBA in Deron Williams and Chris Paul, to select Marvin Williams when he drafted two guys the year before who play the same small forward position in Josh Childress and Josh Smith. And then to bring us full circle, Joe Johnson's strongest position??? Small forward. Billy Knight has established himself as the NBA's version of Matt Millen. A lucky version at that, with 2 lottery picks whne he only deserved 1.

The Bulls unprotected lottery pick came about through a slightly different route. Their young center Eddy Curry was diagnosed with a heart issue. The Bulls felt he wasn't fit to play professional basketball. Curry and his agent felt differently. So the stage was set for Curry to be dealt. Enter the Basketball Czar of the New York Knicks, Isiah Thomas. Thomas was able to acquire Curry and Antonio Davis for Michael Sweetney, Tim Thomas and two #1 draft picks after the Knicks had already invested 30 million over 5 years in Jerome James after he had one good playoff series in a creere spanning 4 seasons. At the time, Isiah vitually broke his arm patting himself on the back lauding the trade as a steal. He felt like it was the type of deal that would turn around the franchise. The main reason is that Isiah never figured the two first rounders would be lottery picks. His oversized ego got the best of him on this one and the New York Knicks organization paid a dear price.

Now don't get me wrong. Curry is a nice big player. He has a very good post game and is a decent rebounder when he wants to be. But he has lead feet and generally doesn't miss a meal. And defensively, referring to him as a liability is probably being a bit kind. What compounds this is that the year before Thomas makes the trade, he drafts Channing Frye, a polished offensive player with slow feet who needs to double up on a couple of meals, And defensively, Rerun from Whats Happening would be a tough matchup. Does any of this sound familiar? The closest thing to chemistry that Curry and Frye have with one another in the frontcourt is their physical resemblance to the number 10. Common sense in building a basketball team generally dictates the if the power forward or center needs the ball to be effective, the other one shouldn't. So the Knicks lose a chance at Tyrus Thomas last year and the chance at Joakim Noah or Jeff Green this year for an overweight one dimensional center with a heart condition. Maybe Knick fans will get lucky and Dolan will hijack Billy Knight from the Hawks.

LeBron James has received a lot of heat this week for his failure to generate game winning shots for his team with the game on the line twice this week in the Eastern Conference finals versus the Detroit Pistons. In Game 1, LeBron committed the cardinal sin of actually passing to an open teammate as oppossed to taking a shot closer to the rim with a defender breathing down on him. And then in Game 2, LeBron got into the paint, and missed a leaner as he unsuccessfully tried to draw a foul on Rip Hamilton.

Every national radio or TV sports show that covers the NBA has had a talking head of some sort has had some so called expert criticize LeBron for not making the right decisions. Jeff Van Gundy has it right when he says that critics look at the result and work back from there. If Donyell Marshall hits the jump shot in Game 1, LeBron is an unselfish winner. But because Marshall misses the wide open 3, LeBron is a guy who can't win in the playoffs. Here's the thing. He's only a 22 year old kid. Watch in the huddle late in games. He's chomping his fingernails like a 16 year old taking the SATs. And on top of that, he's surrounded with over the hill veterans like Eric Snow, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, and Damon Jones. Larry Hughes plays like he's jealous of LeBron. Its almost like the two of them are playing parralel basketball. Drew Gooden is useless in a big spot. In these first two games, Rasheed Wallace absolutley dominated Gooden in crunch time. The only guys on this team he's capable of leading are Daniel Gibson, Anderson Varejao, and Sasha Pavlovic. And I have to believe the primary reason for the latter two is probably the language barrier. With all this said, maybe someone should give the kid a little credit for carrying this motley team into the Eastern Conference finals.

Anyone who has been exposed to New York talk radio the last couple of weeks has had overexposure to the ridiculous media created issue, " Are the Yankees finished this year?"

Now I completely understand that it is quite uncommon to see the Yankees 3 games below .500 towards the end of May. And 9 1/2 games out of first place is a whole lot. But someone please find me a team that is more capable of winning 20 games a month for the next 3 months. Last time I checked, they still had a pitching staff with Cy Young runner up Chien-Mien Wang, Andy Pettite and his 2.66 ERA, with the imminent return of Roger Clemens.

Don't get me wrong, there still are problems. But some will be solved. The odds are in favor of Mussina turning it around. Abreu is not going to hit like this all season. Rivera may not go back to being dominant, but he will find his way towards effective. Cano will hit. He's got too much talent. The only real long term problems are Damon and the bullpen. Damon's best asset is his legs, and they're starting to break down on him. And the Yankees are commintted to two more years at 13 million per year AFTER this year. The bullpen mess will be solved the way the Yankees solve all of their problems. Steinbrenner will throw some money at it.

Now if Giambi will just shut his big fat piehole...........

Giddyap!