So apparently, the Jazz entertained discussions regarding a possible Tracy McGrady-AK47 trade. The Deseret News suggested that it was a distinct possibility, yet the Jazz decided to pull away… being frightened by the health woes of Tracy McGrady.
While I’m not a huge Tracy McGrady fan, and don’t believe he’d be a great fit for the Jazz… it’s quite clear to me that the Jazz must make a trade in order to re-structure the team or blow it up and start over. 1- Because Millsap will carry us deep into the luxury tax (if we decide to keep him). 2- Boozer seems like a rented-mule for another season, with the Jazz and its fans not willing or wanting to keep him around. 3- Every team in the West is upgrading their championship caliber teams. 4- Kirilenko’s contract is destroying our ability to keep our “wanted” players around. 5- We’re not good enough to win it as we're currently constituted (so why pay the luxury tax?), and we have to make a change.
I believe the Jazz should definitely make this trade. It would accomplish both of our goals… 1. Attempting an experiment to upgrade our team (healthy McGrady > AK47) in order to make one last run at a championship with this group of players. 2. If it doesn’t work, McGrady, along with the expiring contracts of Boozer, Memo and Korver, will push $50 million off of our payroll in 2010... allowing us to be a "player" in the free agent market for next summer. We’d essentially be starting over (which would be fine by me). This would allow Deron Williams the ability to recruit -and attract- the type of players that he'd ultimately desire to play with in the future.
2 comments:
I wouldn't mind blowing the team up either, although I'm not sure we totally have to. It would be nice to move AK but Boozer will be gone next year no matter what. And Andrei's contract is up the year after that. With Deron, and if we can keep Paul and Memo around at decent prices, we've got some good building blocks. Plus the draft picks next year.
Obviously the Jazz don't want to pay the luxury tax this year but they may have to. After that we can get some real relief.
I agree with Pasty. I, like Guru and every other TCG author, am not a McGrady fan.
Also, we'd have to throw in someone else to make the salaries match (probably Harpring). Does McGrady make us better than Harp/Kirlenko? Doubtful.
The only advantage of this is we lose Kirilenko's salary NEXT year. I am not that worried about the salaries next year, but if management is they may see this as an attractive option.
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