This looks like a great summer for PF free agents. The top names: 1. K-Mart (restricted) 2. Rasheed 3. Etan Thomas (restricted) 4. Memo Okur 5. Keon Clark My predictions: 1. K-Mart will look for a max contract and New Jersey cannot afford it. Too much dough spent on Mutombo, Morning, Rodney Rogers. Their best hope is that Eddie Griffin works out great for them. Expect Denver and Utah to offer max contracts that NJ won't match. Sign and Trade possibilities include the Rockets (Mo Taylor or Cato plus the trade exception) and New York 2. Rasheed will likely not get a max offer but expect Denver to offer high $$$. S&T with Rockets a possibility... 3. ET will get some decent offers but expect the Wizards to match. 4. Memo stays in Detroit. Milicic is still years away to gamble on letting Memo go. 5. MLE anywhere.
Hell NO. People are bashing Francis's contract. I wonder what happens when KMARTs 14 pts 8 boards come into town for that much money
Kmart, provided that he doesn't go Karl Malone for the rest of the season, won't get a max contract and will either have to accept a decent one from NJ (that's if they even offer him one) or some eastern team will. I doubt Kiki will give Martin the max...Kiki's too smart for that.
KMart seems like a Zeke-type player. Marbury was still in Jersey his rookie year. The question is does Zeke want him, and how much is he willing to offer? KMart's reputation doesn't endear him to me, but he's a talented power forward in the mold that we need. It would be interesting if the Rockets were to go after him.
Kurt Thomas can opt out of his contract this summer and is expected to. Isaiah will probably resign him, but he'd probably part with him to get a star PF like Rasheed or maybe even KMart.
Bids on K-Mart start at $6.6m. Only a handful of teams have more than MLE money. Does he want to play in Utah? If he did, would he call the other Collins twin by the wrong name? What do the Jazz do with Kirilenko? No one on Utah makes enough for a SnT unless the Nets want Ostertag. DEN has Nene. Mutombo's contract was bought out but even with a full Mutombo hit the Nets would only be around $60m with the LTax appearing to go away. IMO, K-Mart's a Net unless they totally crater and he forces an SnT.
Just for the record, KMart's averaging 17ppg, 10rpg, 1.25spg, and 1.5bpg. I still think he may end up in Portland before the end of the year
I'm not sure if I even want Okur. Someone mentioned he's like Mo Taylor, but younger and a better rebounder. While that's nice, we need a defensive-minded PF to play along Yao, just one that's not an offensive liability on the floor.
I believe I read a quote from Rasheed's agent that re-signing Rasheed would cost between $10m-$15m. An SnT for that amount is easily handled by Mo + the TE. But why does POR want Taylor?
Someone else to consider is Chris Mihm. It's unlikely that he'd be available without overpaying since he's a restricted free agent, but would anyone be interested in getting him at a reasonable contract if it were possible? Why or why not? There's a tiny chance the Celtics would be willing to sign-and-trade him away for a pick if they can buy out Baker and want to maximize cap space to go after big-name free agents this year.
btw, it sounds like Etan Thomas could be had for the MLE. Wizards fans seem to feel he's all hustle and no skill. But if the Wizards are willing to let him go for the MLE, I don't see why we would want him.
What do they do? They keep him. They're not dummies. He is terrific, and if he played in a major media city he'd be OTT heard about.
Good call. It's hard to imagine him or Etan Thomas not getting lots of attention this summer. Boozer is a fantastic complementary player who would really help a border-line playoff team (cough)Houston(cough).
Due to cap issues he would have to be offered a deal probably starting at 6 mil, and for Rox that means a 'creative' deal with the TE and taking someone back from Cleveland (Newbie?) and giving Cavs something worthwhile (Nachbar?).
