An apology and some hope

I didn't see this posted, but reading it gave me cause for some hope next year.

I've always stood up for Cuttino because he always seemed to catch so much unwarranted crap around here. Cuttino is not a superstar by any stretch of the imagination. He's a good defender, he has a great first step, and he's an excellent finisher. His FG% is quite respectable though this average seems to be derived from streaks of excellent shooting and streaks of subpar shooting. His shot selection often leaves us scratching our collective heads, but he plays hard and he puts in a lot of minutes. My main argument in defending him is not that he's a great player.....my argument is that he's a great player for the money. It would be awesome if we could load up every position with the best and brightest players the world has to offer, but then there wouldn't be much of a leage, would there? We have a salary cap in place to ensure that there's some parity in the leage. So when you get a 42nd pick in the draft who accepts an awfully reasonable salary yet plays as well as Cuttino, you should be pretty happy.

Often my arguments against him were at the expense of Steve. Steve is more athletic than Cat, slightly shorter, much stronger, a historically not-so-good defender, and his FG% isn't quite as attractive. And he can be every bit as boneheaded. These differences aren't drastic, and really the two players are almost clones of one another. And Steve costs almost three times as much. Steve is immensely popular, and I'm sure this puts a few butts in the seats. But strictly from a team standpoint, he really hasn't shown enough to warrant making that much more money than Cat.....

....until lately.....

Is Steve worth his salary now? I still don't think so. But he has the athleticism and heart to get there. And every once in a while, he shows glimpses of what he could be. I haven't felt that I've seen these glimpses with enough regularity until lately though. Sure, we just got knocked out of the playoffs, but I doubt that many people REALLY expected us to go that far. We still have a ways to go as a team before we could be serious contenders. But it seems that lately I've been seeing more glimpses of what Steve could be.....if he had the basketball smarts to match his heart and athleticism.

Now.....getting back to what I just read. Mark Jackson wants to be a coach. A head coach. He claims to get as much enjoyment from teaching as he did from playing. Could Jackson be the reason we're starting to see better play from Steve? Surely it must be a factor, and it gives me hope that next year Steve will come in here and truly earn his salary.

And if that's the case, I apologize for ever wanting to trade him.

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/sports/2538824