NBA News, Notes and Observations: November 26, 2008

The NBA season is reaching the end of its first month and already we've seen Allen Iverson, Chauncey Billups, Antonio McDyess, and Zach Randolph traded.

Two teams, the Wizards and Thunder, have already fired their coaches and others, like Sam Mitchell and Maurice Cheeks, are believed to be on the hot seat.

With so much going on I figured it was time to bring back my News, Notes and Observations column that I started last March.

In the immortal words of Cypress Hill, let's start the effin' show, ah?

This week's trivia question:

Who hold the record amongst current players for consecutive games played?

(Answer at the bottom of the page)

Time For Some Horn Tooting

Nearly four weeks before the season started I wrote a column listing ten players who could be dealt before the trade deadline. 13 days later, ESPN.com's Chad Ford wrote a similar article, made up of his own list of 10.

Our lists are nearly 50 percent identical. Two of the players on my list who didn't appear on Ford's list, Allen Iverson and Jamal Crawford, have already been traded. A third, Zach Randolph, was mentioned on my list as someone who could easily be had while Ford listed him, along with Jamaal Tinsley, as someone "...very difficult to deal."

So if you're scoring at home that's Ungvari 3 - Ford 0. Don't think I won't continuously mention these numbers as the season rolls along.

My rationale behind the Knicks trading Crawford was that, at 29, Crawford is likely to opt out of the last two years of his deal at season's end. He has a much greater chance of getting a long-term deal at 29 than he would at 31.

The Knicks were unwilling to take the risk that Crawford might sustain a serious injury or play poorly and decide to exercise the option and cut into their cap space in 2010.

I don't think that Al Harrington will be anything more than an expiring contract in New York. If he was unable to flourish playing for Don Nelson what makes anyone think he can do it playing for Mike D'Antoni? Unless Harrington plays center and figures out a way to improve his rebounding numbers, I don't see him as a valuable part of the rotation.

Who Should Be Buying Luggage Next?

There has been recent speculation that Chris Kaman might be the next one to be dealt. With Marcus Camby, Randolph, and Al Thornton the likely starters in Clipperland, Kaman could be the odd man out and Charlotte has been mentioned as the most likely destination.

The deal that seems to be talked about most is a Kaman-for-Jason Richardson swap. Speculation is that re-teaming Richardson with Baron Davis might just be what both players need to get the Clippers going.

A one-for-one deal wouldn't work straight up, but it wouldn't be difficult to make work. With Mardy Collins now on the Clippers (pending a solution to the matter involving Cuttino Mobley's heart), Jason Hart becomes expendable. Hart had his best statistical season with the Bobcats in 2004-05. His arrival would also give the Cats the freedom to trade Raymond Felton.

Hart would also seem to fit the mold of veteran point guards on Larry Brown teams. Whether it was Mark Jackson in Indy, Eric Snow or Kevin Ollie in Philly, or Lindsey Hunter in Detroit, Brown seems to like having a wily veteran point guard on his team.

A Richardson-for-Kaman and Hart deal would work but, according to ESPN.com, a Clippers source has denied that the team is trying to move Kaman.

With Richardson sidelined, the Bobcats have gone to playing small-ball with both Felton and rookie D.J. Augustin in the starting lineup.

I would be more surprised if neither Richardson nor Felton were traded than I would if both were moved. Augustin looks like the only one who should be buying green bananas.

Teams like the Heat and Warriors could still use a point guard. The Bobcats might be reluctant to trade with Miami since they are in the same division and the Warriors have plenty of shooting guards they could trade.

The Mavericks would also love to get their hands on an heir-apparent for Jason Kidd. A trade of Felton and Sean "64 games in four seasons" May for disgruntled Maverick and Tar Heel favorite, Jerry Stackhouse, and a first-round pick (likely in the lottery) makes sense.

Both May and Felton are restricted free agents at season's end. There won't be any type of market for May and the only teams with cap space for Felton would rather save it for 2010 or, like Memphis, already have an over-abundance of point guards.

Cleveland Won't Be Rolling the Dyess

Andy Miller, the agent for Antonio McDyess, let it be known that his client is returning to the Pistons in spite of overtures from other teams, most notably the Cavaliers.

The Cavs seemed to be the only other realistic option for McDyess. The Cavs offered more than twice as much money as the Pistons could afford to pay him, but McDyess turned them down. McDyess gave up about $7 million in his buy-out with the Nuggets and can only get the prorated veteran's minimum of $1.9 million from Detroit.

The Pistons, though, will have plenty of cap space this summer to re-sign McDyess to a substantial one-year deal that would still allow them to have cap space in 2010.

McDyess joins Gary Payton and Brent Barry as guys who returned to teams that traded them after being waived or bought-out by their new teams.

The NBA implemented the 30-Day Rule after complaints that teams were making pre-arranged deals with players and finding loopholes to make salaries match for trades.

It will be interesting to see if there will be some tweaking done to the rule during the next collective bargaining agreement negotiations. Seeing how weak the Pistons are in the middle without McDyess makes me wonder if they ever would have made the trade with Denver if they weren't assured that McDyess was going to return?

How Will the Down Economy Affect The NBA?

This is something that hasn't been talked much about recently but is something should be paid attention to.

The NBA uses something called Basketball Related Income (BRI) to determine the salary cap each year. BRI includes everything from ticket sales to broadcast rights to concession stands to dance team and cheerleaders appearance fees.

The BRI is then divided by 30 (for the number of teams in the league) to arrive at the cap figure. This year's cap is $58.68 million.

The bad economy will affect the BRI when it comes to any new broadcast deals, ticket sales, sponsorship deals, luxury suite sales, etc...

There's also the chance that we might see a more significant decrease after next season when another round of current sponsorship and broadcast deals expire. A lower salary cap also means less money to offer free agents on other teams.

This will only help the Cavaliers, Raptors and Heat in their attempts to hang onto their prize 2010 free agents.

Daniel Soussa of HispanicBusiness.com has an interesting article detailing how fans should be able to benefit during the down economy when it comes to ticket prices. The Bobcats have also rolled out what they call a "ticket stimulus package" where tickets will be discounted by 10, 30 and 50 percent depending on who the opponent is.

(Side note: this has to be the most I've ever written about the Bobcats in one of my columns.)

Can We At Least Wait Until January?

It's not even December yet and already there's chatter both on radio and in print about the possibility of the Lakers winning 70 games this season—especially when you look at the Lakers lackluster defense over their past few games.

The team is good enough to beat over half of the league when playing poorly, but they have shown a tendency this season to blow big leads and to not take lesser opponents seriously, especially at home.

It should be noted that the Lakers are 33-6 with Pau Gasol in their starting lineup. That's a winning percentage of .846. That would translate to 69 or 70 wins over the course of an 82-game schedule. The Celtics last year finished 66-16, a winning percentage of .804.

When will it be appropriate to start talking about the possibility of a 70-win season? I'd say March 1, 2009. By then, the Lakers will have just completed a stretch of 12 of 16 games on the road, including games in Boston, Cleveland, Toronto, Utah, Denver, and Phoenix.

Of the four homes games during that stretch, three of them are against Atlanta, New Orleans, and Phoenix.

Really?

If you looked at the current top-ten list of scorers in the NBA there's one name that seems a little out of place. See if you can guess who it is:

1. LeBron James
2. Dwyane Wade
3. Chris Bosh
4. Dirk Nowitzki
5. Kobe Bryant
6. Vince Carter
7. Joe Johnson
8. Danny Granger
9. Devin Harris
10. Amare Stoudemire

If you said Danny Granger then I wouldn't be mad at you, but no name on that list sticks out like Devin Harris.

Harris has only averaged 10.4 points per game over the length of his career, but is averaging 23.2 ppg this season. It might not come as such a surprise, given the fact that he's playing almost six minutes more per game this season. Harris' numbers really become impressive when you notice that he's also averaging a career-best 6.2 assists per game.

It's not out of the question for Harris to make the All-Star Game this year. Rajon Rondo might miss out with three other teammates more deserving. Chauncey Billups is now in the Western Conference. Harris, Jose Calderon, Mike Bibby, Derrick Rose, Mo Williams, Andre Miller, and T.J. Ford will all be battling it out for three likely roster spots.

It's not just that the Mavs were willing to give up Harris to get Jason Kidd. It's that the Mavs are capped out, even if they let Kidd go at the end of the year, and will either have to overpay to get someone like Mike James to sign with them or hand over the team to J.J. Barea.

Speaking of Derrick Rose...

I had a chance to watch Rose play in person last week against the Lakers and I can't tell you how impressed I was. The Bulls have spent the past ten years searching for an identity and after giving up on Elton Brand they finally have someone else they can build their team around.

If I'm general manager, Jim Paxson, I trade everybody on that team not named Deng or Rose. I would trade Tyrus Thomas and Joakim Noah for late-round picks at this point. I would let Drew Gooden go at the end of the season and see if I could get something for Larry Hughes (nice shot last night, Larry).

Knicks GM, Donnie Walsh, had a chance in the offseason to trade all of the guys he traded last week.

He held off on trading Randolph to the Clippers because they wanted him to take back Brevin Knight. He held off on trading him to Memphis because the Grizzlies wanted a first-round pick and three million in cash. Walsh's reasoning was that he felt that D'Antoni would increase the value of his players. And he was right.

The Bulls should do the same thing. If they have the opportunity to get rid of anybody on the team for an expiring contract, solid role player and/or a draft pick they should pull the trigger.

This team isn't winning as they are currently constructed. It's time to find a big man already and build the team around Rose.

Buyer's Market For Draft Picks

Many of the teams looking to clear out cap space for 2010 will be willing to give away or sell first-round picks in next summer's draft then risk taking on a guaranteed salary that would cut into their cap space.

Normally in these circumstances teams would hold onto their draft picks because it's the cheapest way to fill out a roster with quality players, but next year's draft looks particularly weak.

Teams have as much of a chance of finding a gem in the second round as they do with any pick once you get past five. Teams way over the cap, like the Lakers, Celtics, Nuggets, and Mavs could easily obtain a pick if they find someone they like.

Trivia Answer: Tayshaun Prince, who hasn't missed a game since his rookie season of 2002-03.