Pitino's optimism, Scottie Pippen

[Alex Wang <awang@MIT.EDU>]

It seems that at the beginning of the free agency period, Rick Pitino
was overly optimistic and believed that with the players he had inherited,
drafted, and signed through free agency, he could win enough to get into
the playoffs. After having a look through the camps and the preseason, 
he became discouraged at the short term prospects of the Celtics and dealt
Mills and Massenburg, which got us below the cap. If he does deal Billups,
I would imagine that it would be to take us further below the cap, among 
other reasons. 

For instance I believe a straight-up trade for Steve Nash would save 
over $1M, I believe. There seem to be various opinions on the list about
how good Nash is; Danny Ainge claims he is one of the ten best point guards
in the league but clearly there's a major bias here. He had some big games 
in the preseason: 35 pts 7 ast vs. Houston, 21 pts 9 ast vs. Vancouver.
He's a good shooter from 3pt range and a good free throw shooter.

On ESPN.com it's hypothesized that the new TV deal could mean a salary
cap of $32 million next year which would allow us to make an effort to sign
Scottie Pippen. Although several other teams would have more money, he has 
expressed interest in playing for Boston. My guess is it would be possible
for us to get $10 million under the cap by next year if Pitino could deal
Minor with Billups, or perhaps ship Dontae Jones, John Thomas, Roy Rogers
for draft picks. Which would let the Celtics offer Pippen a six-year $100M 
contract - not that Pippen has six good years left but it might be what it 
would take. Of course this assumes he completely recovers from his injuries.

Imagine a lineup of Knight, Walker, McCarty, Mercer, and Pippen (at point)!
Well, I guess Pippen would probably play SF but you get the idea. I understand
the concerns about trading away our draft picks for Pippen but if we could 
sign him as a free agent that would be awesome.

Alex