Uncontested Shots: NBA News, Notes, and Observations June 23, 2009

This article originally appeared on the all new basketball website SirCharlesInCharge.

Leading up to this Thursday's Draft, there are a number of trade rumors involving the likes of Rajon Rondo, Ray Allen, Vince Carter, and Amare Stoudemire.

This year's draft also has more question marks than any in recent memory—both in terms of where certain prospects will end up getting drafted and whether or not any of the teams with lottery picks will keep their picks or trade them for veterans.

The nation's economy has already forced the Milwaukee Bucks to give away Richard Jefferson for a bottle cap, a ball, a paddle, and some jacks. Don't be surprised if the Bucks turn around and buy out both Bruce Bowen and Kurt Thomas and both end up returning to the Alamo city.

Remember when Gregg Popovich suggested the NBA establish a trade committee that could veto lopsided trades in the aftermath of the Pau Gasol trade last year? Something tells me that Pop's changed his mind since then.

Without further ado, I bring you this week's news, notes, and observations, now known as Uncontested Shots.

Really, Bill?

I don’t dislike Bill Simmons. I won’t deny that he has a passion for the game of basketball and it’s history and without him I probably wouldn’t have this space with which to share my own opinion. I would say that I tend to agree with him on 60 percent of his opinions on the NBA.

I just so happened to take issue with his postscript on this year’s NBA Finals mainly because of his attempt at trying frame the nation’s perception of this year’s Lakers team and provide outlandish talking points to the 90 percent of NBA fans who detest the Lakers. This is the same guy who posted “If I told you two NBA players just exploded after a homoerotic Sprite-like chestbump, wouldn’t your response be, 'Vujacic & Farmar?” on his Twitter page.

My biggest beef in general with Simmons is his refusal to allow comments to be posted on his articles and his constant proclamation that he doesn’t Google himself or read things that others write about him. The former is an act of cowardice while the latter is an outright lie considering his inflated ego (he calls himself “The Sports Guy” for crying out loud).

If you’d read Simmons’ writings from throughout these playoffs you’d notice his inconsistencies and constant contradictions. As if he would have truly believed that the Celtics/Bulls series in the first round would have been nearly as legendary had someone other than his Celtics participated.

Don’t get me wrong. It was a fantastic series. But a few overtime games in a first-round series between a two-seed and a seven-seed does not make for a legendary series—especially when the victor loses a seventh game at home in the next round.

The best response to Simmons’ piece was called Deconstructing Kobe and it came from Reed at Lakers Blog Forum Blue and Gold. I would recommend anybody read it because he points out not only the inaccuracies with this particular column but also mentions some of the other ridiculous comments Simmons’ made throughout the playoffs that couldn’t have been further from the truth.

In my opinion, the best point Reed makes is in response to Simmons stating that Kobe is no better a teammate now than he was in the past. He had this theory that Kobe somehow regretted sharing his workout regimen with his teammates on the Redeem Team because it forced them to change their practice habits and elevate their own game.

Reed writes:

“If Kobe proved so powerful in transforming superstars on the Olympic Team, then why don’t we believe he has had a similar impact on his Laker teammates over time?”

I agree wholeheartedly. Don’t you think his work ethic would have a much greater chance on rubbing off on teammates he hangs around with nine months out of the year as opposed to six weeks?

Ian Thomsen’s cover story in Sports Illustrated is also really well-done in that it describes Bryant as the type of leader who demanded his teammates play hard or they would find themselves on a different team.

Compare what Thomsen writes with what Simmons wrote:

“So many of his teammates are successful creations of this new, older Kobe Bryant. Pau Gasol, Lamar Odom, Trevor Ariza—none of them was viewed as anything like a championship contender until each began to play with Bryant. In turn, Bryant had to learn to see things their way, to help each of them develop as Bryant himself has matured in the seven years since he and Shaquille O’Neal drank the last of their champagne together.”

Simmons likes to point out that the 1986 Celtics were the greatest basketball team ever. He regrets that the defending champion Lakers didn’t hold up their end of the bargain when they lost in the Conference Finals to the Rockets—denying the Celtics the chance to avenge their loss from the previous season.

This year it was the Celtics who stood in the way of the Lakers chance at redemption. Simmons has no problem giving Ariza credit for the job he did in this year’s Finals but fails to mention whether or not it would have made a difference had it been Ariza guarding Paul Pierce in last year’s Finals instead of Vladimir Radmanovic.

But somehow he’s still convinced a healthy Celtics team would have repeated.

I’ll never forget what Simmons wrote after the Celtics won their title last season:

“Of the 10 best guys on this particular Boston team, seven of them weren’t Celtics during last season’s despicable tank job, and two of them weren’t Celtics as recently as January. As much as I like the new guys and everything they brought to the team, I still feel like I’m getting to know them. Posey, House, and Brown were hired guns. Garnett belongs to Minnesota. Allen belongs to Milwaukee and Seattle. Powe, Rondo, and Big Baby just got here. This season was like having a great fantasy team—the guys were thrown together and made some magic happen, but, still, they were thrown together.”

Perhaps that’s why Simmons is so bitter towards the Lakers winning it all this year. Not just because Kobe Bryant now has one more ring than his beloved Larry Bird but because the Celtics championship was a rental compared to how the Lakers bounced back from humiliation in 2008 to become World Champions in 2009—just three season removed from missing the playoffs.

One Last Note on the Lakers

If you don’t know who Larry Coon is it’s time to get familiar. Coon is the authority on the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement. He has his own NBA Salary Cap FAQ site and he is also a contributor to RealGM. Coon wrote a really descriptive article on Kobe Bryant’s options regarding his contract and possibly opting out.

Coon paints three scenarios:

Option 1: Opt out now and become a free agent in 2009: Sign a six-year deal for $135,070,031.

Option 2: Opt out next year and become a free agent in 2010: Sign a six-year deal for $135,015,989.

Option 3: Sign a three-year extension on top of the remaining two years for a total of  $127,654,734 over five years.

It seems that the best-case scenario for the Lakers would be Kobe opting out and signing a five-year extension now because his starting salary in 2009-10 would actually save the Lakers money as opposed to him declining to opt-out. Even though the difference in salary is only about $800,000 it would actually save the Lakers $1.6 million when you factor in the luxury tax.

What About Boston?

Disregard anything you hear regarding the Celtics attempting to trade Rajon Rondo.

First off, Rondo is eligible for a contract extension this year that would go into effect in 2010-11. Why in the world would an aging team trade a starter on a rookie contract who is one of only two building blocks for the post-Garnett-Pierce-Allen era (the other being Kendrick Perkins)?

If the Celtics decide not to extend Rondo then they risk having Rondo enter the market next summer as a restricted free agent and being forced to match an offer sheet. As good as the free agent class of 2010 is there will be a number of teams with cap space to burn who won’t land one of the prime free agents. Many of those teams will be forced to resort to overpaying B-level and C-level free agents and the Celtics don’t want to be forced to have to match an offer like that.

Now you know why the Lakers were so willing to extend Andrew Bynum despite the fact he was coming off of knee surgery. Had Bynum had the bounce-back year it seemed he was having before he got injured then the Lakers would have been forced to match an offer from a team like Detroit, Memphis, or Oklahoma City with plenty of cap space and money to throw at him.

The Celtics will and should explore trading Ray Allen, though. With Garnett, Pierce, and Allen scheduled to make almost all of the Celtics pre-luxury tax cap space and extensions due for Rondo, Glen Davis, Eddie House, Stephon Marbury, and Leon Powe, it would be in the Celtics best interest to trade a much-desired expiring contract for two players and possibly a draft pick instead of having to worry about re-signing Allen next summer when he’s 35, or worse, watching him walk for nothing and with no cap space to replace him.

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Andrew Ungvari is a Senior Writer for BleacherReport.com and now a lead blogger for the all new SirCharlesInCharge, part of the FanSided Network.

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