Moves

[peter delevett <pdelevett@amcity.com>]

I'm pleased to see that we signed Popeye, even though I agree it virtually
guarantees we won't be signing Stewart (unless, as Warwick theorized, there is
some sort of sign-and-trade afoot). Perhaps Pitino worried he wouldn't be able
to outbid Toronto. All things being equal, I think I would rather have had
Stewart on the team than Popeye, given his height and shotblocking, but make
no mistake: Popeye will make us better. He is a tough rebounder and a good
post defender despite his size. Adding him and Pierce (with a full season of
Kenny) will help us win more games.

We still have a gaping hole at center, but if you really think about it, the
Travis trade didn't hurt us much here. (Yes, I am backing off my earlier
criticism of this move.)  We lost our only 7 footer but gained a big man
(Battie) who's more athletic and about an equal rebounder and shotblocker. In
the best of all worlds, Battie really is close to 6'11 and will be able to
provide decent minutes at center (remember that by the end of last season,
Travis was only a backup anyway). The worst case scenario is that Battie WON'T
be able to play the 5, in which case Walker will have to slide to the 3 to
give Battie & Jones playing time. In this scenario, I would look for us to
trade Pierce, hopefully for a decent big man (I would, say, take Potapenko if
there were other goodies thrown in; he is 6'10, 280 and last year scored more
than 7 ppg in just 17 minutes, although his rebounding numbers are
frighteningly low and his shotblocking is nonexistent -- Jones and Battie
would help out there). In fact, Pitino might already have this scenario in
mind. As I said before, don't look for Pierce in green; however, I will
continue to hold out hope. If it comes down to it, I'd rather try to trade
Battie (or Popeye) for a journeyman center. Big 4 + Popeye + decent center +
our bench = playoffs.

Keep Pierce!