I don't care what he's doing now, I didn't respect or want Chandler anymore. Dude was a malcontent, a crybaby, a limited player that never added to his game, he was sick all the time and just plain old overrated. You can't pick and chose when you wanna play hard -- for the money we were paying him, you play hard all the time!! And this guy didn't...Didn't provide nearly enough leadership, leadership this team desperately needed out of him. Unloading Chandler--that part of the trade I agreed with and had no problem with at all. Still in his prime more or less, a sizable expiring contract (in itself, a HUGE asset we had) and still presumably had decent value around the league -- at least to Mark Cuban he did...However, I had a big problem taking back Calderon's salary. After the trade, like everyone else I was in 'OK, what's done is done' mode and chose to focus on the positives: the young players, the picks, etc...I even thought Calderon could maybe give us something close to Steve Nash (poor man's Nash of course)--but sadly, that doesn't look like the case. Not only can't he penetrate the ball, he's a poor defender and the biggest surprise to me--he doesn't take great care of the ball for someone with his level of experience. How many brutal cross-court, low % passes have we seen out of this guy? How many times do we see him just inexplicably cough up the ball? That's the part of Jose's game that's most alarming to me--you'd expect an older vet PG of his caliber to at least take good care of the ball, right? He makes what, 7X the amount Pablo makes and is a few years younger yet truth be told, Pablo's probably the better overall player.
I said at the time that this would've been a great trade to make IF we could've swapped out Calderon for someone else, maybe a Brandan Wright and/or other filler. I didn't even care about holding tight on Felton -- yeah, he just went through the trouble off the court and his value had hit rock bottom but the bottom line is he was less years and less per year than Calderon. When you wish to rebuild quickly through FA and are contemplating dealing off a sizable expiring contract, future cap space is paramount and must be considered above all else, even over what Jose Calderon could give us (which doesn't look to be much as it turns out 
)...I think if Phil would've declined and been more patient, we could've gotten a more favorable deal outta Cuban in time. Cuban wanted Chandler--dude regretted trading him the first time and really wanted him back. And he works well there with Dirk and co. They knew that the first time around. They won it all with him. The proof was in the pudding...I just don't see how, in the position we were in of trying to maintain optimum cap flexibility for the summer of 2015 and 2016, you take a big expiring asset like Chandler and instead of taking back nothing but a fellow expiring contract(s), young players and/or picks, you take back a large long-term deal like Calderon's. How does that happen? Didn't he realize Calderon wasn't putting us over any hump, that his contract sucked and that he put our rebuilding plans in jeopardy or at least hampered them a great deal??? Just my opinion but I feel Cuban would've caved and we could've gotten a more favorable deal. I mean you explain it to Cuban -- "sorry Cubes, we're semi-rebuilding on the fly here and can't take back any long-term commitments for Chandler. I understand you want Tyson back. Still interested in a trade--let us know if you come up with any counter proposals." I betcha he would've. That dude's passionate and gets what he wants. We should've exploited that. Instead, this deal comes off like Phil got played..
12/5/2014 9:37 AM