Last night

["hironaka@xxxxxxxxx"<hironaka@xxxxxxxxx>]

As noted, Josh Ozersky, Michael Gooen and I had great 
seats for last night's game, courtesy of Michael's firm. 

And much to my surprise, Chris Wallace spent a lot of 
time talking to us, right up until the opening buzzer for 
teams to break the huddle. 

I won't report on what he said to Josh (I'll leave that 
to him). Josh asked a lot of good questions and has a 
good rapport with CW. But here's what Wallace said in 
response to some of our other questions, this to the best 
of my recollection. 

I asked if the Sonics had specifically asked for Joe 
Forte to close the Baker trade, or if it was done to save 
the million off next year's payroll. He replied that it 
was a "financial decision".

He added that the Shaw League standout would NOT have 
gotten playing time this season in Boston behind Bremer. 
He said Bremer had "way more experience" playing the 
point. So that tells you what he thinks.

I asked him if his opinion of Forte and Joe Johnson had 
changed since draft day (when he had lots of good things 
to say about their future).

He replied that there was a misperception in the media. 
He said that sometimes you draft a player to build team 
depth in talent, which can be used in trades that improve 
the team's competitiveness. 

Well we've more or less heard that before. But he also 
added at one point that Joe Johnson "isn't a point guard" 
or "isn't going to be a point guard". I was kind of 
caught off-guard by that one, but I think that's what he 
said. Maybe Josh or Michael can confirm? 

He posed to us the rhetorical question: "tell me this, 
who would you guys rather have, Vin Baker or Rodney 
Rogers?". Thankfully, none of us retorted with "but who's 
contract would you rather have?!" 

I was starting to wonder if our questions were a bit too 
aggressive, although we were all polite and cordial. 
Whatever the case, Wallace was engaging and stuck with us 
until the tipoff. I believe he trusts Josh a lot. He said 
he was looking forward to reading his next column etc. 

But yeah, he cares about fans and was candid to a 
surprising extent. It probably didn't hurt that Michael 
was wearing his Bill Russell #6 jersey (which as he noted 
in his post, Rodney Rogers also seemed to appreciate). 

Michael asked about our rights to overseas players, 
specifically Ben Pepper. That gave Wallace an opening to 
remind us that we have Ben "safely salted away."

Wallace said that the Celtics still own the rights to 
Josip Sesar as well, and that he'll monitor how he 
develops. 

He said that of all our overseas players, the guy with 
the best chance to make it in the NBA is Darius Songaila, 
who's been looking good in Russia. 

Wallace confirmed that we own these player's rights "in 
perpetuity", but that they could force the issue by 
coming to training camp (and getting cut).

There were other interesting comments, but I'll leave 
that for Josh's column. 

We all had a lot of fun whooping it up during the game, 
with Michael's dad also there. Josh got in a chat with 
Mike Gorman as well. It was a very relaxed environment. 
It didn't take any special effort to get these guy's 
attention. They were standing right there. 

Continental Arena is a strange place to watch exhibition 
basketball. There was complete silence between highlight 
moments, like we were watching the Amish Basketball 
Association. 

Oddly, the arena even set up an artificial "sold out" 
cheering section of around thirty people, including 
hidden cue cards that read "make noise". The section was 
flashed up on the jumbotron and presumably out to TV Land 
during time outs. I've never seen something like that 
before. 

But there was one very audible "ooh" from the crowd when 
Shammond put a cross-over ankle breaker on someone (Tamar 
Slay I think). 

(Mr Gooen aptly suggested the Michael Jackson-inspired 
nickname "I'm bad, I'm bad, shammond...")

I felt Shammond and Delk again managed to "look the part" 
of point guard tonight. Delk seemed at ease with his job 
and was a weapon from the top of the key. Shammond had a 
high number of shots that rimmed in and out, but still 
shows a lot of flash and self-confidence. 

But neither guy or Bremer is at all methodical in hunting 
down assists or moving the ball to the hot hand. Again, 
I'm not sure that's even there role on this team. The few 
times the Celtics saw sufficient daylight on the break, 
it was off a direct defensive rebound and dribble by the 
captains. As inept as the Celtics were on offense, the 
Nets were also doing a good job of transition defense I 
thought.

Bremer finally impressed me a great deal, with his 
defense and those two strong slashes to the hoop in the 
fourth. Nice. He'd be a great two guard if he were 6-6. 
His funny jumpshot is a turnoff. 

I know Josh might disagree here, but I'm actually 
starting to believe Obie when he courted ridicule by 
saying point guard is a team strength.

Obie's one proven ability is relating to NBA players, 
bringing out the creative strengths of the captains and 
getting maximum team-based contributions from the other 
guys. Everyone's happy.

This being the case, Obie really needs to figure 
something out with Baker and his 50 million contract. 

They say you can't be seriously disillusioned unless you 
had illusions in the first place, and Baker's "illusion" 
is that he'll finally be happy in Boston and be allowed 
to succeed. 

Last night, no one gave Baker the ball and he very much 
looked like a spare part. He seemed like a guy who won't 
fit in at all with the team as a sixth man. The scrubs 
either won't look to pass to Baker, or they are too short 
to look over defenses and find him.

I frankly don't care if Battie isn't REALLY hurt (he 
looked it for awhile), Obie needs to seize this excuse 
and give Baker some starting minutes with Walker and 
Pierce. Baker's injury just looked like a mild kick in 
the shins, whereas Battie was seriously limping off the 
court.

And, yes, there STILL seem to be no plays run for Baker. 
Obie had four days since Thursday to work on something, 
and nothing has happened. Vin subs in and appears to run 
through the same high post plays of the starting center 
(Battie), or a bit of Walker's point forward role. He's 
miscast in either role. 

Obie needs to get over the fact that he wanted the same 
roster as last year, and opposed the trade. He's stuck 
with Baker now and he needs to make the most of a still  
in-shape and reasonably talented player. 

Right now, Baker is getting half the touches he got in 
the darkest days with Gary Payton and the Sonics. 

Sooner or later this is going to come to a head. How the 
Fleet Center treats an underperforming Vinnie might 
trigger all kinds of things. 

Obie's main coaching challenge this year will be to 
address this. It should be a night and day obsession. If 
Baker is unhappy and underutilized right off the bat, 
this team is going nowhere for four years. 

I'd hope Obie is thinking hard about this after last 
night's game. And like Josh I hope that he fully consults 
his father-in-law on this subject, rather the Dayton 
playbook.

Joe H.




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