Wow, I can't believe how fast these things move. Page 12 already and I just found out about it. Which makes me think my comments will soon be gone and forgotten, but I'll give it a shot anyway.
My first reaction is disappointment. I feel like there were deals there for expirings if we wanted them. Nocioni negatively impacts our future salary situation even worse than Salmons does. Yes his contract is frontloaded, but it's not much lower than Salmons salary and it extends one year longer. That extra year is everything. It's potentially the difference between being the highest bidder and one of the also-ran's. Is Nocioni really that great of a player that you want to handcuff yourself like that? Did Paxon steal your lunch money and refuse to give it back unless you took on his least favorite contract or something? And we still have Udrih and Garcia's contracts on the books so nothing much was accomplished here salary-wise. Shedding Brad's salary a year earlier is a small accomplishment when you don't have enough to work with to sign anyone significant anyway.
Even worse though is that we stand to get better this season through this deal which is just ridiculous considering our current record and the rest of the league. It's probably not enough to matter. Maybe the Maloofs are still convinced that they need to win enough games to get a mid-lotto pick. Maybe they think that's something worth striving for. But half the reason for trading Salmons was the logjam at SF and bringing in Nocioni doesn't help that at all. Greene needs to start on a last place team. Oklahoma stuck with Jeff Green all last season and he was mostly terrible and look how much better he is this year? What do we really have to lose here? Nocioni is a decent complimentary piece, but he's just a waste on a team that needs to rebuild just like Salmons was. I'd love to see Diogu get minutes, he was one of my favorites from that draft, but do you see that happening with Gooden, Thompson, and Moore in front of him? So from a basketball standpoint, the only position this really opens up is the C position for Hawes. Other than that, our depth chart is a mess.
I don't think Petrie is a bad GM, I just think he's an inherently conservative one. Conservative moves are fine if you've lucked your way into a Richmond for Webber trade. But that kind of trade comes around once in a lifetime. If you already have a superstar in place you can re-arrange the pieces around them until you find the right fit, but failing that all the mid-level maneuvering in the world isn't going to transform a midling franchise into a contender. That takes more of a longterm vision which I haven't seen from this front office in a long long time. Throwing everyone else's outcasts against the wall and seeing what sticks is hardly the best, most direct route to rebuild a winning team.
My other observation has to do with the economy. A smart owner would realize that this is a perfect opportunity to bite the bullet on salary in order to place yourself in a good position for the future. If the team starts winning, the fans will come. That's guaranteed. You can't just skyrocket ticket prices forever without expecting consequences, but for the most part people pay to come see winning teams. Even in a recession. It's something to cheer for, something to get excited about. So with all of these owners cutting salary to avoid the luxury tax, there's a golden opportunity for someone else to make their team a lot better by paying more now when nobody else will. Like Portland buying up all of Phoenix's draft picks the past few years. Now Phoenix is collapsing and Portland is poised to contend for the next 10 years. Surely people could see that one coming. I think 5-10 million in additional luxury tax one season or even two seasons is a smart investment if it's going to allow you to acquire more young players and draft picks which will help your team for years to come. It's disappointing that our team is one of the teams cutting salary, following the trend, instead of one of the teams taking advantage of the situation.
True it's not my money, but I think the smartest business decision is the one that gives you an advantage over your competitors. I think there was a real chance to come out ahead with the trade market this season and instead we went nowhere. It's mostly the missed opportunity that's so disappointing. At least we got a draft pick out of Houston for Artest. Everything else that we've done has been re-arranging deck chairs.