Mercer

[Alex Wang <awang@mit.edu>]

If Pitino really offered Mercer a four year, $30M contract, that doesn't 
seem that insulting to me. I could see that six years and $30M is a pretty
poor offer since Vitaly makes more than that. But after a four year
extension, Mercer would have seven years of experience in the league 
and be entering his chronological prime. Plus, under the new CBA, players
with 7 years of experience get a significant increase in their maximum
salary. So if Mercer really did perform as an All-Star, he would still 
get richly rewarded in his career. And making $7.5M a year is not a bad
average salary - it's actually on a par with Allan Houston.

I was looking through my old notes on the Rick Pitino show, and Pitino
really made some comments that revealed what he thought of Mercer's game.
First, he replayed a video of Mercer coming off a screen and taking a
shot even though he hadn't lost his defender. He said that Mercer has
a tendency to take that shot even when covered; it'll go in sometimes
but is low percentage. The other was that he talked about a game (the
Wizards game near the end of the year) in which Mercer made some 
spectacular plays and everyone thought he had a great game. In fact, he
graded out lowest on the team in most fundamental categories.

I think Pitino knows more than anyone else what Mercer is capable of; it's
not like he's trading a guy who he's soured on after coaching him for only 
a few weeks. And he may have realized that many fans, and possibly even
some other GMs, value Mercer more highly than they should because of his
scoring ability. I believe he's been ready to trade Mercer since last
season; he did tip his hand by talking about moving Walker to 3 and Pierce
to 2.

One other thing: I think that the player that Ron Mercer most resembles in
the pros, in terms of offensive tendencies and abilities is Calbert Cheaney.
Can anyone think of a better comparison? They're both college small forwards 
converted to pro swingmen, with a great jumper but lacking three point range. 
They both have trouble getting to the line. Cheaney's second year was 
actually better than Mercer's second year, in my opinion. It's almost as if 
Cheaney is this "future Mercer" whose career has taken a downhill turn. 
Another difference is that Mercer may be more assertive; it seems Cheaney
really ended up deferring to his more aggressive teammates (Howard, Webber,
and recently Richmond) while Mercer really didn't give up shots even with
Pierce and Walker there. It's not a good situation when you are a one
dimensional shooter and you're giving up your shots; what's your value?
But on the Celtics, he can hopefully learn to assert himself when he's 
playing on the second unit and put up a decent number of shots in limited
minutes.
 
Alex