Too bad he did this one year too late. Rockets would have beat Jazz without AK. His defense really made Yao and Tmac's life harder. Don't know why people are so harsh on him. He is willing to give up 64million. For that money, he is entitled to quit anything.
Avoid cutting people, yes. But we'd be in salary cap hell for a while, because Kirilenko makes as much as Yao. T-Mac makes 19 million this year. AK & Yao make 13.7. That's 46.4 million for three players just this season. That's less than 9 million under the cap. Next year, T-Mac will make 21 million, and the other two will make 15. That's 51 million dollars - that's less than 4 million under this year's cap. In '09-'10, McGrady makes 23.2, Yao & AK make ~16.4 each. That's 56 million, or a million over the current cap for three players. In the 2010 offseason, we only have 25 million committed. Big name FA's would have been knocking down our door, but we'd have 43 million committed with AK. Oh yeah, and you need at least 12 players on your roster.
Staying under LT is what ultimately counts and AK47 helps to achieve that for next two seasons at least.
In NBA AK will be a solid player, but not the greatest. He's a great defender, no questions about it but in Europe in my opinion he will be a star, maybe even superstar not only defensivly.
Any trade we make can help us do that...we only need to drop a million or two; and with the 125% rule, that shouldn't be hard to accomplish before the tax bill kicks in at the end of the year. My point is that if we trade for him, we'd have to give up shorter contracts to total his current salary. Battier's is the same length, but 37 million less. Alston's is a year shorter, and WAY less. The two of them combined make about 4 million less per year until Alston's deal is up. That other 4 million would bite us in the ass starting next year, because Sura/Snyder/Wells are all expirings. And then we'd have to start signing role players to fill those voids, where we'd be getting too close for comfort.
Oh - I'm sorry to single you out, hooroo, you're just the only one that's playing the other side. No animosity intended...
In his current role with the Jazz, he isn't close to being worth what he's making. So, if he really did walk away from it all without asking for payment, he's doing the Jazz a favor. And he's getting what he wants. It's a win-win, and no one should complain.
i doubt very seriously if he walks away from all that money in his phat contract. probably his ploy is to try and get the jazz to trade him, but good luck since it will be hard to trade that contract. phoenix would be dumb to trade marion for him. and if he does walk away from it, you are right - he will be doing the jazz a favor to free up a lot of cap space and make a run at some top f/a next year.
VG is much much less tyrannical. Van Gundy may be stubborn but he's not a complete ******* like Sloan. Players actually like Van Gundy. No one and I mean no one likes Sloan regardless of whether they're winning or losing.
So does every coach not named Pop, LB, PJ and Riles the last 12 seasons. In fact, Pop, Riles and LB (that's 3 of the 4 if you're counting) are even more "tyrannical" than JVG and Sloan. Note the (lack of) comments from Pistons players about the neurotic perfectionist LB. Ask Rasho, Beno and Nazr how democratic Pop was with them. I wonder how Antoine Walker and James Posey felt about Riles and his "tyrannical" weight and % body fat requirements that caused them to be de-activated during the season. Yeah, coaches being "tyrannical" really hinders winning championships. So what's your point besides your head?
I think the only point can be that Sloan and JVG suck donkey balls. Seriously, Sloan is a pretty damn good coach...his teams play dirty, so I hate him...but his sets create better opportunities than JVG's. And JVG clearly sacrificed his defensive schemes last year to keep his stars out there on offense for maximum time...which is a flaw in my book. It's problem of bad offense leading to limited bench leading to over-dependency on stars leading to tired starters leading to sacrificing defense. I like AK-47. He couldn't shoot at all last year, and he was still greatly productive vs the Rockets. I don't know how much of that is due to the Rockets not taking advantage of AK's weaknesses, or him just overcoming them. His strengths have a place on the Rockets, who still are in need of front court length. Yes, I love Scola too...but Yao, Scola, Hayes, Deke...still not the greatest combo in terms of reach and quickness. Put in AK and cut out Hayes or Deke...now that's a great front court rotation.
