Re: Celtics Notebook

[Francis Hsu <francis@ai.mit.edu>]

On Mon, Jul 16, 2001 at 03:45:58PM +0200, j.hironaka wrote:
> At 08:36 16/07/01 -0400, Francis Hsu wrote:
> >The Boston Herald Celtics Notebook for 7/16 has some good info:
> >1) C's want to avoid adding more young men, and are considering adding
> >   a veteran big man.
> 
> Hi Francis:
> Specifically, the article seemed to say only that Wallace might look to add 
> a veteran big man IF someone got hurt.
> 

I don't interpret the quotes (which were for O'Brien, not Wallace) as clearly
as you, despite the verbage.

The following does seem clear to me:
They will first try signing Palacio and Stith.  They are confidient they can
sign Palacio, but not as confident on Stith.  Should they not sign Stith,
they want a veteran.

Let's say they aren't going to sign Stith.  What's questionable to me is
whether they would spend money on a veteran big man during the season
after one of theirs were injured, or if they would spend the money in
advance in case one of theirs were to get injured.  I do not know the
rules, but I'm assuming that the C's do not get a 16th roster spot if
someone gets injured.  So that leaves three scenarios if the C's don't
sign Stith:
1.  The C's simply leave their 15th roster spot open.  If a big man gets
    injured, then they look for a veteran big man who was never signed.
    I'm not sure what kind of talent they could find for a veteran big man
    during the season, but it almost seems a waste.
2.  The C's do sign a veteran big man before the season, as insurance in
    case of injury.  The C's could just wait until near the end of the
    free agency signing period and see who they could get for cheap.
3.  The C's sign someone else to the 15th spot.  If one of their big men
    becomes injured, somebody's gotta go either via trade or contract buy
    out?

Scenario 2 makes the most sense to me.  Use the money you allocated for
Stith to go after a veteran big man.  But I suppose that lots of teams
will be looking to trade right before the trade deadline, so maybe we
could get lucky?

Francis