Big Baby Looking For a Pay Day

Boston's Glen Davis is a highly regarded restricted free agent in the 2009 NBA off-season.

In his first two years as a player and as a Celtic, Davis has average 5.8 PPG with grabbing 3.5 RPG. Those numbers could increase tremendously if Davis could receive a bigger role on a new team.

If Davis decides to stay with Boston, his role will increase gradually as he matures and as Kevin Garnett enters a decline in his career.

Several teams have showed interest in Big Baby and the two front runners, as of late, are Boston and the New Jersey Nets.

The teams that have showed interest in the early weeks of the NBA Free Agency period have been turned away because Boston has been giving off vibes that they will match just about any offer that is around the mid-level exception and a little more over that.

If New Jersey wants to win Davis over, they will have to offer him a little more than $5.854 million (mid-level exception) and they will have to convince Big Baby that he will have a bigger role with the Nets.

New Jersey is also in contract talks with another forward Hakim Warrick. Warrick is a commodity for the Nets if they don't want to offer Davis anything over the mid-level exception. So this might prevent New Jersey from over paying Big Baby and might increase Boston's chances with Davis.

Why would Davis want to leave Boston? He's surrounded by aging super-stars and the Celtics are likely to be a front runner again in the Eastern Conference, and probably for a few years after that. His role will likely stay the same and increase gradually, but he isn't ready yet to take on the sixth man role because of his below par rebounding skills. So Davis might not want to have a bigger role because that might lower his stock value for the next contract year or even potential set back his career.

I'm not too sure when Davis will decide to sign the dotted line, but I believe that Davis will end up staying with the Green considering that Celtics' President of Basketball Operations, Danny Ainge, will match every reasonable offer that is offered to Davis.