Monta Ellis: Warriors Must Part with Star Guard for Favre-Type Accusations
If the Golden State Warriors didn't have motivation enough to trade Monta Ellis before, they certainly do now.
The 26-year-old scoring guard has dragged himself and his ball club into shark-infested legal waters after pulling a "Brett Favre" and texting pictures of his nether regions to now-former team employee Erika Ross Smith between November of 2010 and this past January.
According to the Associated Press, Smith has since filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against Ellis and the Warriors, claiming that her rejections of his advances led to her being let go by the team at Ellis' request. Ellis and the team have stated that the relationship between Smith and Ellis was consensual, while Smith denies that it ever was.
And if that weren't bad enough, Burt Boltuch, Smith's attorney, has suggested that his client was essentially offered a severance package to resign and keep quiet on the matter, though Smith turned it down.
As far as Ellis is concerned, this development should've been beyond the last straw to send him packing. Ellis has been a problem child in Oakland for years now. He signed a four-year, $66 million deal with the Warriors in 2008 after being named the NBA's Most Improved Player and promptly injured his ankle while riding a moped, though Ellis initially claimed he'd hurt it while playing pickup basketball in Mississippi. The team suspended him for 30 games without pay for the incident, as riding a motorized scooter went against the terms of his contract.
Not surprisingly, that turn of events engendered animosity between player and organization, though Ellis continued to produce at a 20-point, four-rebound, four-assist clip.
However, with new ownership signing the checks and Jerry West consulting in the personnel department, it's time for the Warriors to try once again to turn over a new leaf. They've made it clear in the recent past that they'd be more than willing to part with Ellis via trade, with an offer of Ellis, Ekpe Udoh and Andris Biedrins for Dwight Howard prior to the lockout.
While these allegations certainly won't help Ellis' trade value whatsoever, there's still plenty of reason to believe that there are teams that would be willing to take him on. After all, Ellis is coming off a season in which he averaged 24.1 points and a career-high 5.6 assists across 80 games.
The team isn't likely to dangle Ellis anytime soon, though, at least until Stephen Curry's ankle heals up.
But once Curry is healthy, the Warriors would be wise to put Ellis on the block, if for no other reason than to make a clean break with a player whose attitude and conduct are indicative of a past that Golden State is attempting to part with, on the way to a more prosperous future in the Bay.
