Rather than worrying about bringing in ANOTHER big man, maybe we should focus on the holes we have in our team like a back up shooting guard.
Jeff,I get the feeling that Oscar Torres won't be back with the team unless they can't get anyone better to back up Mobley. The Rashard Lewis thing isn't likely to workout and might cost us a chance to get Bryon Russell who can play at the 3 and the 2 although I wonder if he would be interested in joining us after Shandon Anderson's failure with the team. I'll admit I was a bit too optimistic about Nachbar moving into the starting rotation too quickly as he has still has a week or so to go before starting practice and I have doubts about Rice getting in form after his injury. Russell is rumored to be near signing a deal with the Wizards which could limit our option to getting Lenard who could be a good backup 2.
If we can somehow trade Cato for a backup SG and sign Bateer, that'd be perfect. But why would any team want Cato if they could sign Bateer straight up?
Although Yao's skills are ridiculous, I think that Mengke is the best strictly big man that China has. He competed very well against the US and does the aforementioned things like boxing out extremely well. You know if this keeps up, Chinese big men may in fact become very common their three centers I think are outstanding.
Trade Cato? Of course, in this Luxury Tax era where trades have become Twilight Zone material, if you can get anyone else to pay $6 mil for Cato you do it. And we will need him this year, but this season is about the future and rings. Anyone think Cato will be here when that happens? Bateer? Why not? He doesn't have the "upside" Cato has. But if Cato ever developed wouldn't we all have to relinquish our posting rights?
He joined the Nuggets on Feb 27, 2002 so he had a late start. This would be like judging Yao based on his play only from November and December. In his only game vs Houston (a 31 pt Denver victory), Bateer had 5 points on 1-5 shooting. 6 rebounds, 4 assists and 1 blocked shot in 18 minutes. The fg% isn't great but at least he can do other things in limited minutes.
I say sign him up, Please lets sign him, Cato will hurt his big toe or something and we will need a big man to take his place!
Bateer would make for a very fine backup for Yao, the problem is his willingness to be his backup. Bateer seems to be a competitive guy and is regarded as the 2nd or 3rd best center of China(depend on how Wang Zhizhi is ranked). It's like asking Divac or Wallace to go back up Shaq.
It could be possible that we're all hyped up over Bateer because he's the only guy we've seen play all summer that is available. God, bring on training camp.
