Walker's contract

[Alex Wang <awang@mit.edu>]

I don't know why people would be upset with Walker wanting to be paid market
value. It's really something between him (with his agent) and Gaston. 
Regardless of whether he gets $17M or a way-under-market-value $10M, 
his contract will cap out the Celtics for the forseeable future so it won't 
affect free agent signings or the competitiveness of the club. The one 
potential problem is if Gaston becomes too cheap to sign Mercer as a result.

The issue of whether Walker is the franchise player or not is a different one.
If Pitino decides he's not (very very unlikely), the best he could do is 
probably trade him along with Ellison, Minor, Knight, Barros, etc. for future
draft picks, in order to clear up as much cap room as possible (the Denver 
Nuggets strategy). That might give us a shot at another franchise player.
Personally this seems a lot riskier to me than just signing Walker.

Alex