Free Agent Update

by Tommy Dee on July 6th, 2009 at 10:47 pm

Via Ken Berger-

“…* Despite reports that the Trail Blazers were preparing to make a major bid for Knicks restricted free agent David Lee, a coaching source familiar with the situation said Portland is more interested in the Lakers‘ Lamar Odom. And the source described the Odom situation with Portland as “lukewarm.” The Blazers and Lee’s agent, Mark Bartelstein, discussed the situation early in the negotiating period, but Portland was preoccupied at that time with its pursuit of Hedo Turkoglu. Now that Turkoglu has spurned the Blazers and committed to the Raptors, Portland is deliberating what to do with its $9 million in cap space. The Blazers have been exploring point-guard options for some time, but the coaching source said Sixers free agent Andre Miller isn’t the answer because of his sub-part shooting ability…”

I haven’t heard much on Odom, but I’ve been told the Blazers have no issues with Miller’s shooting, they are concerned that they can’t pay him. They’ll need to go the 11 or 12 million per route and need to trade either Travis Outlaw or Martell Webster to make that happen. But yes, Lee is not a priority.

* Lee’s situation is complicated by the fact that the teams with cap space have either spent it on other players (Detroit, Toronto, Memphis) or are proceeding cautiously in the first wave of free agency (Oklahoma City, Sacramento). The market for Lee is difficult to navigate because teams are hesitant to endure the seven-day period during which the Knicks would have the right to match. Sign-and-trades, too, are untenable due to the fact that Lee’s first-year cap number would be exorbitant based on his status as a base-year compensation player. Knicks president Donnie Walsh has played this as close to perfectly as possible from the beginning…”

Really hard to argue how well Walsh has handled this situation, and that’s almost hard to believe based on how many fans thought Lee was a sure $10 million dollar player for the better part of this season. It was a roller coaster that Walsh seems to have navigated perfectly.

  • BiggieSmalls

    i wonder if they’d be interested in Duhon for Fernandez/Outlaw

    if DOnnie thinks he can get Rubio for Harrington/Fernandez and then find a way to get Nash and Barbosa from PHX for something like Mobley/jeffries and a resigned Nate @5 mil it would be a nice shake up.

    its juggling three balls but thats what DW gets the big bucks for.

    So we have players at each spot that actually play that position.

    Nash/Rubio
    Hughes/Barbosa
    Chandler/Outlaw
    Lee/Gallo
    Curry/Darko

    Barbosa goes against the 2010 cap BUT you can talk Nash into resigning for 3 years 21 mil it saves that money

  • Cammydog0123

    http://games.espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=mpga7h

    I thought of a trade so great donnie walsh wont think of it. The knicks want cap space. the rockets need a pg and a big center and dont want t mac. the bulls dont want hinrich cuz of derrick rose. heres a perfect 3 way team trade that works for every team and improves every team. SHOW THIS TO EVERY SO THIS CAN GET AROUND.

  • Adam L

    I like the enthusiasm Cammydog, but who runs the point for the Knicks?

    In essence, you have us trading Duhon, Curry, and Jeffries for T-mac (I’m assuming Dikembe was a salary match need). You really wanna trade those 3 players for T-mac? Sure we want to get Curry off the books, but Duhon and Jeffries are actually serviceable pieces at this point, and shipping them out for the ‘maybe’ that T-mac brings in just doesn’t make any sense to me

  • KBT1615

    Three Ways I Will Be Happy At The End pf this Offseason…
    -Lamar Comes Home For The MLE.
    -We get T Mac out of a salary dumping trade…
    - Getting Rubio….Least Likely but hey its how I would be happy..

  • Cammydog0123

    ADAM L

    which season do u care about 2010 or next year. your a retard if youd rather have duhon and JJ instead of a 1 year t mac and then lebron

  • evile55

    Interesting, but I would replace Duhon with Nate in a sign and trade. You said The Bulls would want to trade Hinrich because of Rose so why trade for the same point guard they wanted to move because of Hinrich? They just lost Gordon so with Nate they get a guy that can play the two along side Rose. Yes he isn’t Gordon but he’s pretty close and since he can also play some point it would be an interesting to see him bring the ball up and see how he can set up Rose. Plus, Duhon’s contract up at the end of this season and doesn’t affect the salary cap for 2010. All the rest of the trade is nice for all parties.