MoTaylor is way better than spoon. He is about as good as Howard. We got nothing good from that trade. No cap space or players. If we could use the expiring contracts we and get and get someone good then this trade would have been worth it.
Why? Baker and Morris were not meant to replace Taylor. Our backup forwards are Spoon/Padgett. People seem to forget that the sole purpose of the trade was to get rid of a contract that Taylor was not even coming close to living up to. Who cares what we got back as long as his contract is gone? Norris/Baker have much more manageable contracts that will be off the books sooner than Taylor's. That was the point of the trade - not to "upgrade" with Baker or Norris.
We may not have gotten cap space, but we did get salary relief. And who is to say that we can't use the expiring contracts to get an actual NBA player? Look at the crap New Orleans took just to get rid of Davis to Golden State. Plus, if Baker wakes up and realizes that he will not play a minute while collecting that salary, maybe he will opt out and go to a team to actually play and extend his career. If that happens, although it may be a long shot, that's more salary relief.
This could be the only argument I'd buy as a fan. If this were actually the case, than I can understand the mentality of the trade. But in my eyes, I see Les telling CD, "Save me some money, damnit," so CD padded Les's wallet in exchange for an extra wasted roster space. Anyone who thinks we gained any sort of depth at any position by trading a contender for last year's 6th man of the year for 2 guys destined to spend the rest of their careers either on the IL or collecting DNP-coaches decision is just fooling themself.
Again, I think it is very clear that this deal was not about gaining any sort of depth at any position.
Of course at that time PG was our weakest spot. But we addressed it with the James deal, a completely independent deal from the MoT deal and one that occured prior to the MoT deal (PG was no longer a problem when that deal went down). Further, it was clear Moochie was never in the plans to provide 1 support--we could have acquired him via the TE and kept MoT if we thought in any form Moochie was a suitable reinforcement at the 1. You can't predict injuries, but you do the best you can to have quality bench players at each position. 1) it gives you more bench firepower and puts less pressure on the starters, and 2) if you get a injury to a starter you are less screwed. We took a big risk with Spoon, Padget and Baker as our options past JH. Ding, ding, ding, we have winners. It wasn't about basketball skills it was about chemistry. But without being on the inside of the org I fault MoT AND JVG for not finding a common ground. Once Rudy T and CD shipped out Horry because the chemistry wasn't working and it devastated Horry. But Elliott failed his physical and Horry came back, and it all worked out. JVG said the reason MoT didn't play was because he was so similar to JH, well, with Howard down we could have found out. We should have just kept him until the offseason where we had time to find a servicable PF to share the load with Howard. You should not put personal factors ("CD, get rid of him at all costs") ahead of having your strongest team--if that is what it came down to. We had a great run with MoT on the IR so I don't see how it hurt chemistry to keep him there just in case. We took a calculate risk to gain 10 mil in 07 and a 2nd rounder to lose our insurence policy, basically. I got news for you, the production you get from Moochie and Vin relative to their salary is less than the production from MoT relative to his salary. MoT is an overpaid servicable player, the Vin and Moochie are overpayed worthless players. That is why we got the pick to swallow these to contracts, and thus I don't know how you can say they are more manageable contracts (implying their contracts are assets). And if the expiring contract was so great, why didn't teams line up for Vin and Mooch, and then wouldn't it make MoT one of the hottest commodities in 06-07? The truth is were are only talking significant savings over 1 year. I am with you that I really hope Vin decides to opt out and move on with his life though--but it is a longshot at best.
I don't think there's much else to say, as it's all suppositions now. I don't think even with Howard going down, Taylor would be playing the big minutes. You see Taylor as an insurance policy that would be kicking in right now. I don't. I think with that in mind, gaining 10 mill in 07 and a 2nd rounder for him is a no brainer. I also think CD saw a gamble in Vin Baker. He played extremely well at the beginning of last year for the Celtics. It flopped. Maybe he'll get another chance next year, maybe he'll be cut or bought out. As I said, whether JVG should have been playing MoT is another issue, but MoT's status was dead weight. I don't see clearing 10 mill and picking up a 2nd rounder as risky even if we got back equal dead weight in return, because I didn't see MoT becoming any more than dead weight as a Rocket. Taylor's value certainly wasn't climbing in the forseeable future. I also mentioned at the time of the deal, it was about rebalancing our contract-roster relationship. The consensus was and is we're pursuing a PF this offseason, and we had ~20 million tied up in Howard, Taylor, and Spoon for next year, plus over 15 mill for the following season. It makes it hard to sink a multi-year deal into yet another PF with those kind of commitments. We go from 20+ to 15+ for next year, and from 15 to 5+ (all these numbers off my head) for the following year. Makes picking up a PF through S/T or full MLE a lot more palatable. I think you're taking a leap thinking MoT would go back to his former production in the event Howard got injured.
I would say it is a bigger leap that Baker, Padgett and Spoon could adequately fill in in the case they have to play high minutes (versus spot minutes behind JH before). Assuming JH will be ready for the playoffs, this won't be a big deal and trading MoT when we did was fine. That said, 1) I was not pleased with MoT not getting the back-up minutes to JH in the 1st place (speculation if it is Mo's fault, JVG's fault or both, but based on MoT's past history and both JVG/MoT fairly nuetral public comments I suspect "both"); 2) I'd rather moved Taylor in the offseason after we had acquired a capable 4 in addition to JH. But it is done and we will have to see. But yeah as the original poster said, I would have liked to have MoT on the roster right now.
I understand your points. It is obvious that Norris/Baker will not contribute anything this year, and it would have been nice to have Taylor as some sort of "insurance." But come on, how long have we been trying to unload that contract? We found a sucker in Thomas, you don't think twice in that situation, you get rid of the guy who wasn't gonna do anything for you anyway. And if in the process it helps us get a better backup in the offseason for cheaper, then that's just icing.
