Tiago Splitter's potential

a backseat kind of player

 

a child seat kind of player

 

A taller Scola with less offensive skills but better defensively.

 

He's the brazilian Anderson Varejao

 

We could've taken him in the 07 draft but didn't because the Spurs wouldn't have traded Scola to us. Hope he doesn't turn out too well; else, we can't look at the Scola trade being one of the best ever anymore.

 

um, considering the neck-haired loser we traded for him I'm pretty sure we can.

That's like saying acquiring Clyde Drexler in 1995 wasn't such a great move, since the Rox drafted Rodney McCray in 1983 instead of Drexler.

 

Well, they preferred Splitter over Scola. That's what they got.

 

I was willing to trade scola for tiago at the deadline. It would have been like when fritz peterson wife swapped with his best friend.

Been liking tiago for a while, he's like a lighter Nene only less muscular and hair that makes rick perry jealous.

 

That analogy doesn't make sense.

The Rockets didn't just trade Spanoulis for Scola. They also effectively traded the right to draft Splitter. So, if Splitter turns out really well, the Scola trade wasn't as one-sided as it's normally considered.

 

Link? Proof?

IIRC, Scola was traded after the draft.

 

It's something I heard way back, I think from here in the forums.

Scola was traded after the draft but the trade was already in place before it. The Spurs wanted Splitter and so did the Rockets. So, to keep the Rockets from drafting Splitter, they threatened to back out of the trade. This could've been a bluff, of course, since the Spurs made the Scola trade to save money but they managed to use it to keep the Rockets from drafting Splitter, anyway. This also means Brooks was, for all the org's support of his drafting back then, their selection after Splitter.

So, if Splitter turns out well, the Scola trade wasn't as one-sided as most people think it is.

 

Doubtful. All the rumors pointed towards the Spurs trading Scola to the Cavs.

 

Maybe that was the deal before Houston's?

 

I would love to see Splitter as the Spurs future starter. That would mean they suck.

 

Your analogy is the one that didn't make sense; the Spurs drafted Splitter because they had to- reluctantly -get rid of Scola.

Why did they have to get rid of Scola? Because they had Jackie Butler's crap contract on the roster that was going to cost them $10 mm in luxury tax for a guy who wasn't contributing anything.

Scola was a sweetener to get the Rockets to take their trash in exchange for Spanoulis' contract - but make no mistake, from the Spurs perspective it was all about moving Butler. Had the Rockets (or any of 27 other teams) wanted SPlitter, they coudl have drafted him two months prior to the Scola trade.

 

Those fleeting few months when people claimed Spanoulis would come back to haunt us as a Spur were pretty awesome.

 

By "people" you mean DaDakota and Rockets Dynasty's 14 alter egos.

 

IMO this was only partly right. The Scola trade was indeed a salary dump, however one reason the Spurs' brain trust felt it was ok to do it was because they had Splitter coming over the next year. IIRC Splitter instead pulled a Vasquez and signed with a Euro team for a couple more years, making the Spurs a bit of a laughingstock (at least in Rox eyes).

Honestly the Spurs have been cutting corners here and there, however they have also been known to pony up money for talent. Scola was the Euro MVP, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't have traded him straight up for $$$ if they didn't have Splitter as a fall back option, esp. when their Mahinmi Project was looking like a bust.