Banks, Perkins and the draft

["Berry, Mark S" <berrym@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I spent the day yesterday dreading Banks and Perkins, then spent all night
getting excited about them, only to have that excitement tempered somewhat
this morning. Here goes... 

Having never seen either guy play, it's impossible to form any strong
opinions. I'm hoping Banks is Tinsley with a jump shot. That would be a
dream come true. The highlights last night certainly looked great, but
everyone looks great in highlights. I have no doubt he can push the ball,
but can he run an offense? And when he pushes it, will anyone run with him?
But I'll come back to that point in a minute... 

I've warmed up to the Perkins pick. You have to address the center position
sometime, and if you find a young kid with the right body, the right
attitude and a good work ethic, and he's available late in the first round,
then it's hard to criticize that gamble. He might be a bust, but at the 27th
pick, he's worth the risk. You just might end up with a legitimate starting
center three years from now. He didn't look good in the McDonald's game, but
that doesn't prove anything.

And Brandon Hunter (by the way, did Danny Ainge just openly tell Chad Ford
who he was going to pick? Is this the Celtics' idea of subterfuge? Ford had
all three picks pegged) has a chance. I was thinking he was more of a
scoring undersized power forward and didn't realize he had been such a
prolific rebounder. Like I said in the Sweetney discussion yesterday (and
like Papile/Wallace said in the papers this morning-scary), rebounding tends
to translate pretty well from college to the NBA. Whoever mentioned Popeye
Jones, I think that's a great comparison.

OK, so I was warming up to the picks. Then I read the papers this morning
and realize the picks had the fingerprints of Wallace and Papile all over
them. 

They had Banks and Perkins "in the icebox" (I really hate Leo Papile, if for
no other reason than comments like this), for weeks. They again made
promises to players, apparently dating back even before Ainge took over.
Now, if everyone is to be believed, Ainge felt just as strongly about Banks.
We'll see. But the talk of Banks being their highest rated point guard in
the draft, that he never would have been available for them if he'd worked
out, and Papile's quote about the league being upset and saying "there they
go again... " just remind me too much of the Kedrick fiasco. Papile saying
they explained to Ainge how they landed Kedrick-as if that was some
brilliant maneuvering of something. UNLV isn't Okaloosa-Walton JC. Banks
wasn't a secret, and before the Celtics made him any kind of promise, the
kid was considered a borderline first-rounder. Are the Celtics really that
much smarter than everyone else? That was the attitude that led to the
Kedrick deal, and that's exactly what this feels like. I want so badly for
Banks to be the real deal, but I'm going to wait and see. Kedrick Brown was
McGrady or Kobe when they drafted him, remember? 

And we get the news that Perkins was "in the icebox" for a while too. The
arrogance of Wallace and Papile is limitless. I hope Ainge was as sold on
Perkins as the other two morons, and wasn't just upholding a deal. 

Now, beyond looking at the players, look at them in the context of the team.
First, Banks... The team desperately needs a point guard. No argument. But
this kid's strengths are leading the fast break and penetrating in the
halfcourt. I love that. But will he get a chance to do those things? Antoine
doesn't run the floor unless he's leading the break. And I mean he DOESN'T.
AT ALL. Pierce likes to jog up court. Same with EWill. Is everyone suddenly
going to turn into James Worthy just because a rookie point guard likes to
push the ball? And you have to rebound to run. In the halfcourt, will Banks
be able to pry the ball away from Antoine and Pierce? Don't kid yourself
into thinking Antoine developed his bad habits because the team didn't have
a point guard. He played the same way the previous year when Kenny played so
well. And we know Obie will defer to Antoine over any rookie. So be prepared
to be frustrated. I have high hopes for Banks, but I'm convinced this is the
beginning of an Ainge-Obie-Antoine explosion.

Then you add in the necessary nurturing and development for Perkins and you
have the recipe for a real showdown. I'll go on record now as a saying I'll
be shocked if Obie and Antoine are here at the start of the 2004-05 season.

Miscellaneous draft thoughts:

1.	Weird draft. There seemed to be so many natural fits, and yet none
of them happened. Here are a few of the head-scratchers:

a.	Wade to Miami. Good player, but they have Eddie Jones and Caron
Butler, and Wade isn't a point guard.
b.	Hinrich to Chicago. For a year they had a point guard controversy
until they finally decided to trade one of them. Then when Jay Williams gets
hurt, they decide they have to have a point guard? Hinrich seems like
another weird fit.
c.	Sweetney to the Knicks. I like Sweetney, but don't the Knicks have
Kurt Thomas, Antonio McDyess, Clarence Weatherspoon and Othella Harrington?
Is undersized power forward a position of need? But, in their defense,
Sweetney seemed like the best player available at that point. That was a
team that would have been better served trading down.
d.	Pietrus to Golden State. With Jason Richardson, Mike Dunleavy,
Antawn Jamison, Bobby Sura, etc.? 
e.	Bell and Jones to Memphis. They're athletic. Great. Bell probably
will be a nice third guard. This is your lottery pick?

2.	Was anyone else distraught when Luke Walton went to the Lakers? I
want to root for Luke Walton, but now I have to hate him. Sad.
3.	Why was I so excited when Steve Blake was picked? I immediately
thought of Gene.
4.	Lampe. After seeing some highlights of the guy, I have to say I'm
skeptical. He's big and he can shoot, but he looks really slow and
lead-footed. He's no Nowtizki or Gasol. He looks like an outside-shooting
big man to me, and that's after lots of work in the weight room.

That's about it. I'm holding out hope for an Antoine trade before the start
of the season, because nothing will change if he's still here. He controlled
things when Kenny was here, and he's not about to change-and Obie isn't
about to force him to change-just because there's a rookie point guard.

Mark