Varejao Re-Signs with Cleveland Cavs: Danny Ferry Must Be Horrible at Poker

(Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)

The poker movie "Rounders" is a great metaphor for life in the NBA. 

You have to study your opponents moves, find a weakness and then exploit it.  Matt Damon plays a young, hotshot player, who hits bottom, only to climb back to the surface.  Preventing his rise is school, a best friend who is trouble and a girlfriend who doesn't understand his passion with poker.

Being a NBA GM requires you have similar skills of a poker player, being able to read hands of your opponents, and feigning weakness, when you are really strong.  I thought that Danny Ferry would be a good poker player, based on some of the moves that he made, but ultimately his latest play has been a headscratcher.

While I am not going to grade the Ferry regime, this particular move is the one that left me truly wondering if I could read Ferry's hand in a game of poker.  ESPN.com is reporting that Anderson Verajao is being retained for about fives times the winners stake at the Main Event of Poker.

The Cleveland Cavaliers have come to an agreement with free agent Anderson Varejao on a six-year deal, his agent Dan Fegan told ESPN.com.

Varejao's contract is worth $42.5 million over the six years, and the final year is only partially guaranteed. Incentives could push the total amount to $50 million.

As a 30 something sports fan, I have clear memories of Danny Ferry as a college player and as a pro.  His career at Duke was a great one, as Wikipedia points out.

He is among Duke's greatest players of all time, ranking 5th in career points, fifth in career rebounds, and seventh in career assists—the only player in the top 10 in all three categories.

Ferry's number 35 was retired in 1989 at the end of his senior season.^[2] In 2002, Ferry was named to the ACC 50th Anniversary men's basketball team honoring the fifty greatest players in Atlantic Coast Conference history.

But, as an NBA player, he was a bust, even though he has played in the most games in Cleveland Cavaliers history.

Danny Ferry as a player gives us hints about Danny Ferry the GM. The game that is being played by Ricky Rubio now was Danny Ferry's Player card at NBA.com provides this little nugget

Selected by the Los Angeles Clippers in the first round (second pick overall) of the 1989 NBA Draft...Played in Italy in 1989-90...Draft rights traded by the Clippers with Reggie Williams to the Cleveland Cavaliers for Ron Harper, 1990 and 1992 first-round draft choices, and a 1991 second-round draft choice on 11/16/89

Now, the first lesson here is that Danny Ferry is not afraid to get his chips in the pot and gamble. At the time, I clearly remember thinking that Ferry was crazy for risking his dream of the NBA. One injury overseas and no one would want him.  But, his resolute stand got him traded to the Cavs and a very rich contract.

Fast forward twenty years.  You would hope that your Texas Hold-Em game would improve in that time.  But, the only conclusion that I can come up with is that he has regressed in two short years. Plain and simple, Ferry got schooled here.

WHO else was going to pay AV that kind of money in this market?   This just tells me that Dan Fegan is a grandmaster of poker.  He is the Phil Ivey of the agent game.  HoopsHype.com, lists the agents and their players.

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