Kenyon Martin, and TJ Ford. I love Ford and I think he is perfect for the Knicks right now but I think his career will be over within 18 months. I believe he will either have to retire because of injury/paralasis or choose to retire to avoid this. I think Zach is worth more than this. I would not trade for Martin because he has a horrible contract, has had microfracture surgery on both knees, and he has had problems in the locker room with teammates and coaches. Martin cannot hit a jumper and he does not have the athleticism anymore to play the game the way he did pre surgeries.

Posted by BasketballJones:

I wouldn't trade him for Howard Eisley and Travis Knight.

Why not?

Posted by TMS:

i'd trade Zach for just about anyone w/a shorter length contract at this point... but i'll agree w/Nene & Rashard Lewis... both of their contracts are ludicrously overvalued.

i'll also add Jason Terry to the list.

as for Diaw, if u could unload Zach on the Suns for Diaw & Raja Bell's expiring where do i sign?

[Edited by - TMS on 06-14-2008 3:12 PM]

Good point about the Diaw deal. I wasn't thinking about the fact that you could package Diaw with a player with a short contract.

Posted by Bonn1997:

Posted by TMS:

i'd trade Zach for just about anyone w/a shorter length contract at this point... but i'll agree w/Nene & Rashard Lewis... both of their contracts are ludicrously overvalued.

i'll also add Jason Terry to the list.

as for Diaw, if u could unload Zach on the Suns for Diaw & Raja Bell's expiring where do i sign?

[Edited by - TMS on 06-14-2008 3:12 PM]

Good point about the Diaw deal. I wasn't thinking about the fact that you could package Diaw with a player with a short contract.

i'd even trade Zach for Diaw & Barbosa to be honest.... at least both those guys would fit in well w/the new system & would probably be easier to move later on.

Posted by King1:

I wouold trade him for a pair of Bitty panties and a naked pic of DJ. We arent getting anything for Zach unless you give up Lee or a pick

then let Zach stay at home until his contract runs out.

For sanity's sake, keep the pick, and take Mayo/Westbrook. Unless he assaults D'Antoni on opening night, his stock will almost certainly improve. And if not, the stock of other players will improve - allowing us to package potentially inflated assets (Nate/Balkman)) with him. Right now, the options are either trading the #6 or Lee to remove Zach and both of those moves remain unattractive to me.

The gamble of course is that a year saving salary deal might not be available next year. And thus we'd lose out on the opportunity to hand out 2 max contract in 2010. But, looking around the league, I think that scenario is unlikely and dumping Zach now would be playing the situatino too conservatively. The Cleveland deal for Ben will still be there. Other teams like Denver, already close to the cap in 2010 and looking to improve their playoff potential, will likely be in the same position. So let the stench of Isiah dissipate and the dust settle and Zach will fetch more in a year.

If a deal not involving Lee or the #6 is available (maybe Ben Wallace for Zach straight up), then the decision is more difficult. But, even then, I'd be inclined to keep Zach and sell him next year because the odds are that a team will bite on Zach's talent and think less about his off the court issues.

[Edited by - codeunknown on 06-14-2008 10:13 PM]

There's almost no deal I wouldn't do for Zach as long as we work around getting under the cap by 2010/2011.

Rashard Lewis was mentioned but you know what I'd even trade for him. I'd just couple Zach with another albatross contract to make the deal a little more favorably for us financially for the first couple yrs until Lewis's deal gets real brutal. Since Lewis makes considerably more than Zach I'd do...

Lewis and Battie for

Zach and Jamal

My logic would be Battie's contract expires at the completion of the 2009/2010 season. So we'd have 1 yr free of Jamal's deal not to mention come 2010/2011 it would be the difference between Zach's and Jamal's contract vs Lewis which is...

$27.3mil
vs
$20.5mil

The only think that sucks is we'd have Lewis for 2yrs more at $45mil remaining on his deal. Not an ultimate killer because all we're looking for is to be under the cap 2010/2011. Well the salary cap will be about $60mil by then if not possibly slightly higher by a $1mil or 2. Well Lewis, Curry, and Jeffries will be due $37mil. We'd have approximately $20mil to play with if we made no moves outside of the draft picks. Now of course it'd be in our best interest to move Jeffries with Nate for picks and a expiring contract by 2010/2011. If we do that Lee can be signed with the offset of their combined salary to not change our figures. Let's say we could sign Lee to a deal between $45-55mil his first yr starting salary would be somewhere around $8mil. Come 2010-2011 Lee would be slated for a salary between $8-9mil. So here we go...

2008 pick( Mayo, Gordon, Augustin, whoever$2.8mil) projected 2yr salary increase for 2010-2011($4mil)
Rashard 2010-2011($20mil)
Curry 2010-2011($11mil)
Lee 2010-2011($9mil)
2009 pick(undetermined salary because we don't know the draft position)We could package it with Balkman for a future 2010-2011 pick to a team who we almost have a hunch who could finish in the Top 10 if our pick is in the Top 10 and take back an expiring contract and second rounder(low salary is what I'm looking for) Top 5 protection on the pick.
Chandler if we pick his option up 2010-2011($2mil)
Draft picks from Jeff and Nate trade(low first maybe a second rounder approx $1.5mil)

$20mil(Lewis)
$11mil(Curry)
$9mil(possibly less I doubt it)(Lee)
$4mil(2009 Draft Pick)
$2mil(Chandler)
$1.5mil(Low First Rounder + Second Rounder from trades)

$47.5mil Total salary. If the Cap is around $62mil this is where I project it to be, we'll have about $15mil in cap space to play with plus a roster for Lebron or whoever to play with. Our cap figure could be better if Lee signs for less, or we let Lee go, get draft picks back only in a S&T(trade him to a team with cap space) do the same with Nate and instead keep Balk.




[Edited by - TrueBlue on 06-15-2008 12:43 AM]

I agree. Find a way to reduce the cap that doesn't involve trading valuable assets.