Plan B: Shooting Guard

[TheGuiltyParty]

Here's why I really like going after Wallace.

1) He comes here and helps the team win 5-7 more games. He expires at the end of the year (with Andre Miller) and so we go into free agency next summer as a young 45 win team with $20MIL in cap space. That's not that bad.

2) He comes here and the team is in and out of the playoff race all season bouncing back and forth from a 7th seed to 10th. Assuming we didn't break the bank to get him now, I would look to deal him at the deadline to a contender who is looking to make the big push for a title. In return we would ask for whatever junk players with expiring contracts that they have plus a first round pick. We then go back to this past year's lineup and maybe make the playoffs, maybe not but again... we have $20MIL in cap space and multiple first round picks.

If we're not going to get "our guy" AKA Smith... I just don't see the need to tie up our cap with players who will only help us become the worst thing in pro sports: mediocre.

[Skates]

Signing Maggette or Childress in addition to getting a rental on Marion or Sheed is only a bad thing if you sign them to an untradeable contract.  Otherwise they remain assets that can be used to acquire the one franchise level player this team needs either by being traded themselvs or freeing up someone like Iggy to be traded.  If either one can be signed to an appropriate value contract (i.e. not a bargain or discount, not an overpayment), and possibly use the deckining salary method that the Bulls used on Nocioni and Hinrich to some extent, they would not clog our cap or hinder future moves. 

Of course I don't think we should overpay for anyone, including our own RFA's.  Bad contracts/bad players clog the cap, useful players with deent contracts do not.  I am OK with grabbing one more core player, who is a reasonably movable piece, and one rental player this summer.

I would be most interested in how the rental deal is structured to preserve or expand our future cap space.  As far as moving Miller goes, I think it is time to do it and start searching for his replacement.

[jemagee]

I'm pro childress, always been a big fan, but he's a sixth man, a very good sixth man, but a sixth man in my opinion.

[Skates]

I'm pro childress, always been a big fan, but he's a sixth man, a very good sixth man, but a sixth man in my opinion.

Absolutely, he is a sixth man and a very good one.  If we do go after Maggette or Childress and keep Iggy and Thad, at some point our signee will have to be a bench player.  Childress is suited for it and has had no problem with it in the past.  Maggette does not like coming off the bench and has thrown hissy fits about it in the past. 

This team is going to be built around players who can defend at a high level and run.  At some point we will need a dominant scorer like Pierce was for the C's this year and like Billups was for the Pistons when they won the title, in essence a guy who can get his points when they are needed even when you try to stop him.  Neither Childress or Maggette fits that description as a scorer, but Childress fits the description of the long, athletic defender type. Maggette can score better than Childress, but he's not doing that in the later rounds of the playoffs against the better defensive teams.  Thad and Speights are our best hope of developing a dominant scorer internally.  Otherwise, we grab one a little farther down the road.