Re: Celtics have to get bigger!

[bird <birdwl@earthlink.net>]

> From: "Michael A. DiZio" <mdizio@rcn.com>
>
> Yeah, that line is in  questiomable taste (okay, I admit I laughed at 
> first)
> but the meat of Ray's argument isn't. He's got a point.

A point?  Sure, in that it wouldn't be bad for the C's to become bigger.  
I mean, Walker is installed as the power forward, and we rotate T & V, and 
Mark Blount.  The only other guy over 6'8" or so is McCarty, and he's a 
physical freak.  Getting bigger ... eventually ... is hopefully going to 
make the team better.

But too many other "points" are too easily refuted to have been 
well-thought out.  "The past draft was the time for finding a big man."  
Uh oh, draft over, quest for big man crashing around me.  Well, whaddaya 
gonna do?  Should've listened to WayRay.  Can't get a big man no way no 
how, now.  Bummer.

Shooting guards are "dime a dozen".  Sure, there are more players under 6'
10" than over it, but that's obvious.  Quality swingmen are almost as 
valuable as quality big men ... almost, but there's nothing more valuable 
in the world than an NBA-caliber big man.  Nothing.  Oh, back to the point.
   Arguing that the C's should have taken other people in the draft is fine,
  but the "point" seems to be that the C's have hamstrung themselves by not 
drafting a big man, because the team will never get anything of value for 
anyone on the team, even if the rookies pan out, because they are a "dime 
a dozen" shooting guards, and not the elusive Big Man.  Well, I ain't 
buying.  It's far too early to close the book on any of the rookies, and 
you never know what sort of situation the organization will find 
themselves in even a couple of years -- salary cap, luxury tax, new CBA, 
that sort of thing -- so who knows *what* the team might acquire with 
whatever talent we have at that point?  Certainly no one does.

But for WayRay, it's all about making predictions, stirring things up, 
jocking certain players, criticizing the C's for not taking those 
aforementioned-jocked players, and doing so in such a snide "know-it-all" 
manner that it makes him the next Bill Simmons -- another pseudonym-using 
internet media-wannabe turned mainstream.  I hope he makes it.  I don't 
read "Page 2".  Anyway, rhetorical "points" as we know them do not enter 
into it.  Celtics players suck (except for Paul Pierce), other players 
rule.  Zach Randolph has "outstanding skills and potential"; Joe Johnson 
is a crumpled ball of wet newspaper in the corner.  The usual.

To be fair, one sub-point I thought was valid was the idea that big men 
are hard to acquire in the NBA, but it's not like that's a news flash, nor 
is it for the reasons given (no one wants shooting guards, they are a 
"dime a dozen").  Well, I tried.  The point, buried deep, that the team 
ought to get bigger is accurate, though.  And just as applicable to about 
90% of the teams in the league.

Bird