Mouton Rothschild to sign?

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

Below I've pasted most of an interesting and long article 
on Antoine Walker from a few weeks back in the Lowell 
Sun. No doubt someone else posted it earlier and I missed 
it, so apologies in advance. He thinks Boston is going to 
have big problems at point guard and that Rogers wanted 
to come back. See the relevant parts are below.

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Also, yesterday's Idaho Statesman published an article on 
Maryland starter Byron Mouton, claiming "Mouton is about 
to sign a free-agent contract with the Boston Celtics" He 
might just be a training camp body, if the report is 
true. Unless he can shoot the three. :-)

http://204.228.236.37/Sports/story.asp?ID=20744

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Lastly, there's some coverage of the whole sordid Paul 
Pierce stabbing trial. 

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/262/metro/Witness_ID_s_o
ne_of_Pierce_s_assailantsP.shtml

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Here's the Antoine article. If your wondering, I got 
these off a Google news search. I just wanted something 
to read over lunch. Oh and I'm sorry about yesterday's 
rushed and incoherent post about the draft. Yes, in 
hindsight we shoulda drafted Richard Jefferson a bit 
higher than was projected. He was a known commodity, who 
now looks like a bonafide star in the making particularly 
if Jason Kidd stays in NJ. But my feeling is we got two 
of the outstanding up-and-coming prospects from of what 
was available in our draft range (picks 9-20). And we did 
okay at 21. I still don't think we could have traded into 
the top-five to get Gasol. Unless I've overlooked 
something, that and Richard Jefferson are the two reasons 
Chris Wallace deserves to get whacked by fans who blame 
him for his scouting of the draft. 

Anyway, onward to the Antoine story. Its far more 
interesting than anything I have to say about the draft. 
As for his golf obsession, that's something I'll never be 
able to understand.


Checking in With Captain Antoine
http://www.lowellsun.com/cda/article/print/0,1674,105%
257E4767%257E820533,00.html

"To be honest, three or four of the guys on the 
(selection) committee came up to me at the All-Star break 
and asked me if I'd be interested in playing," remembered 
Walker. "Obviously I told them I would love an 
opportunity to play. Then I never heard back from them. 
Why didn't I get picked? I didn't know and I didn't ask."

Walker knows his basketball concerns stretch well beyond 
joining teammate Paul Pierce for the World Championships 
in San Francisco. Like everybody else associated with the 
Celtics he has been contemplating how the addition of Vin 
Baker and Shammond Williams is going to alter what had 
been an ultra-tight Boston club. 

Or, perhaps more importantly, the uncertainty of how the 
subtraction of point guard Kenny Anderson is going to 
change the team's dynamic.

"My concern is that the pick-and-roll was such a big part 
of our offense and Kenny was one of the best at setting 
myself and Paul up off the pick-and-roll," said 
Walker. "What's also hard about it is that we were a team 
that had everybody knowing their role. Now we're going to 
have to adjust somewhat to fit Vin into being part of the 
team.

"We've got to get back to where we were on the defensive 
end last year," he added. "Vin and Shammond have got to 
fit into the caliber of defense we portrayed. If we can 
do that we'll be fine. Offensively, the pick-and-roll is 
really going to be hurting right now. We're going to have 
to figure out different plays to adjust to that. But 
that's really going to hurt us."

The trade for Baker and Williams hardly came as a 
surprise to Walker, who has been kept up to date on all 
the Celtics' maneuvering by the coaching staff throughout 
the summer. He also was well aware of the difficulties 
Boston had in trying to re-sign forward Rodney Rogers, 
who had been an intregal part of the playoff run since 
arriving from Phoenix with Tony Delk in mid-season.

So when Rogers finally signed with another team, Walker 
could fully understand his decision. Getting a three-year 
deal for $9 million is a lot better than the one-year $1 
million offer Boston could afford. But, as Walker half-
joked, did it have to be the Celtics' chief rival, the 
Nets?

"It hurt, especially with him going to New Jersey," 
lamented Walker. "Sign with anybody else but them.

"I don't blame him though. I knew he wanted to come back 
and I knew he would come back, but the problem is that he 
had to do what was best for him money-wise. It was a 
tough year to be a free agent because there wasn't a lot 
of money out there. If it was me in the same boat, I 
probably would have picked the team I knew I was going to 
get a lot of playing time with and play out that one 
year. But I'm not in that situation."

What adds to the uneasiness about the Rogers situation 
for Walker is the reasoning behind the sub-par contract 
offer. He realizes the situation the Boston brass finds 
itself in thanks to an impending luxury tax, but that 
doesn't make a possible detour on the road to a 
championship any easier to swallow.

"It's difficult for a team like us, who struggled for the 
last few years and finally got to go to the Eastern 
Conference finals, and then not to be able to put the 
same team on the floor. That hurts a lot. That bothers 
me," Walker said.

But just when the ire is raised, and the prospects of 
wind sprints start to appear, the talk turns back to the 
links. Besides, when it comes to measuring room for 
improvement, basketball can't even compare to golf.

"It's great," said Walker regarding his latest sporting 
endeavor. "Now I've just got to get good at it."

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