Re: Good-bye draft picks-and future?

[Alex Wang <awang@mit.edu>]

Mark Berry writes: 

> The Mercer-Fortson trade was devastating. 
[cut]
> At this point, Pitino made a few mistakes. First, he chose Mercer as the
> tradeable commodity. Mercer was making contract an issue, which drove his
> value down. He immediately became the least valuable commodity of the three.
> If he had kept Mercer (and signed him), he could have dealt Walker or Pierce
> for much higher return. The second mistake was the return for Mercer. Good
> God, what a disaster. Fortson and Eric Williams. That Denver pick better
> bring in something pretty special to make that deal wash.

I disagree with the idea that Mercer should have been kept because he would
have just been an overpaid one-dimensional scorer. We've heard rumblings
from Denver that he hurt their team because of his selfishness. I was glad
that he was traded. But you are right about the return being disastrous.
I completely misjudged the impact that Fortson would have - whether it's
the coach's fault or the GM's fault, whatever, Pitino made a mistake. 
Now, I actually think that the Denver pick can probably net us a player
that helps our team as much as Ron does - it depends on where it is -
but it still hurts because future talent is not as good as present talent.

> The next bad decision: I've flip-flopped on the Vitaly trade. Yes, Vitaly is
> serviceable. And no, I don't think his contract is outrageous. Actually, in
> comparison to Geiger, Longley and Reeves, it's a bargain. But I've come to
> the conclusion that if you can't have a top center, don't waste your money
> on an average one. Get by with low-paid big bodies and expend your energies
> acquiring other talent. I'd sure like to have Andre Miller or Shawn Marion
> about now, with DeClercq or some other stiff at center. Or maybe we could
> have dealt that eighth pick and ??? to move up for an Odom, Francis or
> Bender?

Yeah, I've thought about a what-if scenario too. We know that Denver ended
up giving up the #5 pick in the draft for Billups. Toronto turned that
into Antonio Davis, which required them to have cap room, but let's assume
that the cap room wasn't the key part. Then we could have dealt Billups
for the #5, suffered with Barros at the point for a year, dealt the #5
for Davis, and drafted Miller with the #8. Our lineup would be Davis,
Walker, Pierce, ?, Miller. Of course this is all in hindsight, but I'd
rather have Miller than Anderson - younger, cheaper, bigger, and recently
better too. Davis is undersized at center but he seems to be doing ok
with Toronto.

Alex