I was looking forward to seeing him roast the Rox with a bunch of snappy references to "Real World" and "The Warriors" -- instead he loves it, apparently he's a gay basher:
The celtics shouldn't talk! They fielded a lineup of Orien Green, Gerald Greene, Perkins instead of Pierce, West, Szebiack, Lafrentz to tank away.
Simmons is a funny guy but that's what his value is. Gay is not going to be the first Uconn lottery pick to flop
Ric Bucher liked it too. They asked him who he thought his winners were at the end of the draft last night... we were one of the two he mentioned. Said he thought it made a lot of sense and really fit with this team. I can't wait until some of you actually watch Rudy Gay play and not a few highlight clips.
Hey Guys, first post here, whoopee. (longtime reader - since 2001, first time poster) I wouldn't put too much stock in what Simmons says. Remember, this was the guy who predicted Yao to be a major bust. May 2002 "Years from now, we will remember ‘Yao Ming over Jay Williams’ the same way we remember ‘Bowie over Jordan,’ ‘Traylor for Nowitzki,’ ‘Carroll for McHale and Parish,’ ‘Aguirre over Thomas’ and every other great draft day blunder in NBA history. I’m not just predicting it, I’m guaranteeing it." But for now, I hope that he is 100% right about Rudy's lack of killer instinct and doesn't make him eat crow like Yao did. The hurt of this trade is beginning to fade for me - Battier's a good player and will undoubtedly contribute to the Rockets next year, but then again, I just remembered how Nowitzki torched the Grizz in the playoffs. In the series, Nowitzki scored at least 30 points in three games and averaged 31.2 points overall. If Battier's defense is really as good as Bruce Bowen's, there's NO WAY Dallas sweeps Memphis. Ugh...urge to kill rising.
Umm, yes there is. The Spurs, outside of Bowen, have Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker. The Grizzlies, outside of Battier, had Gasol and a lot of mediocre players at best. Also, Nowitzki averaged 27 points a game against the Spurs and actually shot a higher percentage from the field against the vaunted Spurs defense than he did against Battier and the Grizz. Defensive players are valuable, but geez, you can put any defender in the history of the league on Dirk and the Grizzlies still probably don't win a game in that series. Furthermore, while Simmons has been wrong, so have many people on this BBS. Myself included, of course... I don't want to give off the impression that I consider myself the exception to this. But many of the same people jumping off the deep end right now were thrilled to death when we traded for a different #1 overall potential player... Eddie Griffin. Look how that worked out.
Those fans that support the trade are hallucinating. They compare Battier to Bruce Bowen. What a joke! Battier's defense is not that great. There is a reason Battier is only 10/5. The guy is a mediocre player. He is not that great on defense and he is slow on offense.
Battier is 3x the player Bowen is. If your looking for a comparison think along the lines of a more athletic Mario Ellie, both on and off the field.
Rockets management traded away the rights to RICHARD JEFFERSON + Collins + Armstrong for Griffin. Yeah, so we both agree that the Rockets Front Office are run by the Keystone Kops. The only personnel moves they got right in the past few years (Yao, T-mac) were the ones so blatantly obvious that even George W. "Cya Sosa" Bush couldn't screw up. My question is this: Was there anything to gain by pulling this knee-jerk trade literally minutes after their pick? Why couldn't the Rockets Front Office hold on to their assets for a little bit (maybe longer than a day), explore other trade options, ya know, generally shop their assets around with some discretion? I'm sure they could have got a lot more for GayStro than just Battie don't you think? Also, did the coaches even get to run a personal workout with Rudy Gay at all? If they didn't, it's like winning a Ferrari in a raffle but then without even looking under the hood, trading it away for an Honda, because the reasoning is that the Honda is more reliable and a "known quantity." Sure the Honda gets more gas mileage and is probably more reliable, but still - it's a freakin' Ferrari! And to top it off, it comes with a free Stro. You're very welcome Jerry West. Now maybe could you lend us Pau Gasol for the 07-08 season? Pretty Please, we'll give you T-Mac + our first round draft pick afterwards! Quid Pro Quo. Quid Pro Quo.
