Re: Outlook

[damekmo@teleport.com]

Now this is more like it. A little agitation is a good thing. All of you,
great letters. I've had my doubts about the team Pitino is putting
together, but yesterday was, I think, a very good day. Once again, Chris
Mills is simply better than Eric Williams and I don't think there's any
spin that can make it otherwise. Pitino was not going to pay a small
forward who's never shown any ability to hit the outside shot and/or play
defense a lot of money. Ever!  Could he have gotten more? Perhaps a lot of
people were overestimating Eric Williams' value. I'm not sure, but I do
know that on Pitino's teams no defense, and no outside shooting, especially
at the three, means no value. Chris Mills has proven, read that again, has
"proven" that he can hit the outside jumper, play defense and rebound. The
Celtics just got a whole lot better at small forward. Now, having said
that, I'd like to also repeat that the Travis Knight, Andrew Declerq
signings were a huge gamble, could prove to be fatal, and I think we're
going to find out very early this season. If Knight and Declerq are
consistently in foul trouble there's going to be a lot of money sitting
around and I'm going to be writing the word "stiff" a whole lot. These two
guys have to come up big on the defensive end, they're going to have to
rebound, and they're going to have to stay out of foul trouble to do it. If
they can't, then this team is screwed for years to come. He's tied up
Knight for seven years and Declerq for five?!? If these guys can play more
minutes effectively every night then he got them on the cheap. If
not....this becomes the Clippers mailing list. Concerning Pitino's
lies...to be honest, I couldn't care less. He said one thing during his
first press conference which should've gotten everyone's attention. He said
it, I think, when asked to evaluate the talent and he said it more than
once: "There's a reason this team won 15 games." I don't think he cares
whose fault it was. I don't think he cares whose plan it was. These players
were, to put it bluntly, losers. All of them. There's not a single one
who's safe, including Walker. I'd write more but I have to read Michael
Holley's article. He's tense. One more thing. Perhaps Pitino and Wallace
believe their own hype a little too much. Then again, perhaps Baker,
McDyess, Smith and all the other players of the upcoming free agent market
are wildly overrated. Later.


Paul M.