Suns, Mavericks, Pistons: Blockbuster Trades and The Aftermath

As an NBA fan, nothing excites me more than a blockbuster trade. As a sports fan, nothing excites me more than a blockbuster trade.

I don't care if its Shaq to the Suns, AI to the Nuggets/Pistons, Manny to the Dodgers, whatever.

Something about seeing a superstar in a new uniform is refreshing, it shows that the sport is shaking up.

Basketball (with baseball as a close second) has the most exciting trade season. It seems as though the last three seasons has seen first ballot hall-of-famers get traded either around draft day, or close to the trade deadline.

I even get excited when top-tier players are approaching the end of a contract, just because it excites me.

For example, when Billups was in a contract year two seasons ago, I was imagining him getting signed to the Mavs for Jason Terry, or to another team that I don't hate.

I was disappointed when he re-upped with the Pistons, even though I don't really care about him or the Pistons.

Sure, there's always the time when your team is on the wrong side of a trade. The Manny trade is an example. I love Jason Bay, but he's no Manny.

But the glory about a trade is that it often doesn't happen unexpectedly. Sometimes, in the Iverson to Denver scenario, a player is sat out until he is dealt.

In the aforementioned Manny situation, sure it was tough to see him go, but it was obvious that he (or Scott Boras) didn't want to be there. On a team that prides itself on chemistry, that means he had to go.

Personally, I find NBA trades are the most exciting. Basketball is the sport where an individual can take over a game, therefore when a superstar gets traded, he can immediately bring credibility. Just ask Celtics fans.

Last year, we were treated to three top 20 players being traded within the space of a month.

Pau Gasol was given to the Lakers for nothing, and all of a sudden, the Lakers not only had a replacement for Bynum, but they didn't have to get up anything to get him.

This prompted sweeping changed in two perennial Western Conference powerhouses, the Mavs and the Suns.

For Phoenix, getting Shaq, once the most dominant force in the game, it signalled the beginning of the end for the seven seconds or less era.

While they jettisoned a malcontent who hurt their chemistry in Marion, it now made the Suns stop existing as they once were, as the premier run-and-gun team in the NBA.

All of a sudden, Steve Nash didn't have Marion there, instead he had a bag of rocks, dragging the running game into sweet oblivion.

It wasn't all bad though. We got too see Amare as he was meant to be: a power forward. As his 49 points the other night shows, he is as unstoppable as anyone else in the league right now.

Most importantly, we saw a fundamental change, for better or worse, in the way a contender plays their game. And who knows? Maybe they were one missed Tim Duncan three-pointer away from a deep playoff run.

Now we come to my beloved Mavericks. There aren't very many sports transactions in recent memory that continue to boggle my mind the way this one does.

Unlike the Suns, who had a clear chemistry problem, Devin Harris was a well-respected member of the team, clearly on his way up to the upper echelons of the NBA.

On the other hand, Dirk and company weren't getting any younger, and the chance to sign a surefire first ballot hall-of-famer is hard to turn down.

I can see both positives and negatives either way. Sometimes, I'll curse Mark Cuban for not keeping Devin Harris. Other times, I watch J-Kidd thread a pass through three defenders on a break, and I think, "Devin who?"

In the end, it's hard to fault someone for taking a chance. Cuban went all in for this season, and we're not sure how it will turn out.

The Pistons face a situation that is both different and alike. Different, in that there were no chemistry problems, in fact just the opposite. Alike in that, neither team was achieving the ultimate goal: the Larry O'Brien trophy.

Then again, teams like Memphis and the Clippers would kill just to sniff the playoffs, let alone three consecutive trips to the conference finals.

So trading season is here again, and there are some other names that could be on the block, as well as the 2003 draft class closing in on free agency.

I always like to see players in fancy new uniforms, except for Dirk of course, then I would drive my car into a wall.

Stay tuned tonight (11/7/08), for my very first live blog for the Mavericks-Nuggets game. Log onto www.dirkismyhomeboy.blogsopt.com at approximately 10:15 EST and join in the fun.