DAntoni can thank Nash for making him relevant...bc without a prime Nash and Athletic bigs, he is in the wrong place...Lol at Laker mgmt for not seeing the obvious...
I'm sure the Rockets would love to get him, as in if there was an amnesty bid situation they would probably put in a strong bid -- but how do you give up assets and all your cap room for an aging Gasol? Probably need BimaThug's expertise, but I don't see it being a fit anymore.
The 20 million plus losing assets is too much. Maybe if Lin was looking better and we were like a 5th sed and Pau was the final piece.
Dear God man. How does D'antoni have the balls to make a move like this in front of millions of people? How is he not embarrassed?! If I put together a team that included Howard & Gasol and some idiot told me they can't figure out a way to make it work so they were going to bench Gasol in favor of Clark I'd fire him on the spot. Figure it out. What a joke. I didn't hate D'antoni 3 months ago but now... I honestly don't think he's an NBA caliber coach.
It's ridiculous. Gasol may be struggling, but he is at bare minimum a top 15 big man. Clark's barely a top 250 man in this league.
Get ready for Pau Gasol to mail it in as long as he's coming off the bench just like he sulked when he was unhappy in Memphis toward the end of his tenure there until he was traded. Just look at his play tonight so far. Prove me wrong Pau! Edit: Just for the record, I disagree with the decision to bring Pau off the bench for today's game. Howard and Gasol match up well with Boozer and Noah.
If Gasol is a bad fit in D'Antoni's system , the Rockets up and down system would seem a bad fit too. Unless they have ways to incorporate Gasol's low post game, I say pass.
I just want to say that Pau Gasol is a versatile PF/C and has logged many minutes/seasons as a PF. Just last season he spent most of his time at the 4, forming a deadly frontline with Bynum. It's sad that Dantoni is essentially blaming this on Pau to try to mask his own incompetence and stubborn love for his small ball lineups. How arrogant can you be? 'My team is losing. Should I make adjustments? alter my system? run more halfcourt sets?.....Nah, I'll just bench one of the best bigs in the league for Earl Clark
Some teams could bite the bullet and absorb salaries for a year...I'd be willing to consider a move that sent PPat plus Aldrich for Pau...but the Lakers have to eat a majority of this years salary...just imo
I tried to make it slightly more attractive for Toronto now. They do it because they won't re-sign Calderon. It doesn't make sense for them to have that kind of money tied up in the PG position when they have Kyle Lowry at a much more affordable contract. This way, they get a young prospect (Patterson) out of it and save half of Calderon's salary for the year (5 mio.). Plus, they get a draft pick and cash. Douglas is an adequate backup PG for Lowry.
I've said it since before the first trade got shot down by Stern... I want no piece of Pau's poison contract! With the impeding salary cap tax coming up the last thing you want is to be sinking 20M into an aging Gasol! We can get somebody younger, better and cheaper for virtually nothing more than cap space and fillers... wait til deadline or offseason... Meanwhile LA is gonna be paying HUGE luxury taxes and goin nowhere! LOL
The thing I am thinking about is that next year's free agent class is not very strong. Isn't the one the year after that much better?
i don't understand how you can mismanage a player such as Pau. Sure he has declined, perhaps alot, and many members of this board would loathe to trade for him, but he is still a good player. He pushed the lakers team over the edge in winning two championships, but everybody wants to ***** on him, all because Mike 'Antoni refuses to utilize his best attributes..