http://twitter.com/#!/Al_Iannazzone/status/40443314167750656 http://twitter.com/#!/Al_Iannazzone/status/40441055707004928
For the cynical fan, seems like NY got played for as fools. Nets drove up the price for Melo. Knicks bit. Then the Nets got a good player for their own! Dont know if this had been in the works for a while. Quite frankly it had to be! You dont trade a player of Williams caliber on the spur of the moment! Well done New Jersey.
NBA.com and Yahoo Sports have officially confirmed this mysterious news. Deron must be thrilled for a new beginning since it seemed like the Jazz weren't trying to make smart moves. This madness started when they traded Ronnie Brewer, their best defender. The Nets aren't playing around now. 2012 will be interesting. http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=aw-jazzwilliamsnets022311
IMO Deron is better than Melo. Amazing move by NJ. They still get their superstar for the move to Brooklyn and remain somewhat competitive (at least in the east)
Yeah, the next seasons can be really entertaining with New York and New Jersey fighting for the area.
Well Melo and Deron are two different players. Melo is a baller who is a straight up scoring threat who simply adds/compliments your team. Deron is a leader and a scoring threat who can jump start your team and get everyone involved. This is why Billups being included in the trade is so important.
Contending teams in the West should be ecstatic. The East can beat each other up to the finals until they face the West.
Definitely rather start a team with Deron than Melo. Word is Prokorhov may be eying Dwight in a few years. Deron/Dwight/Lopez aint bad, SG/SF are a dime a dozen in the NBA. I've read that with the CBA and current cap structure they may be better off spending this offseason though (about 17 mil of cap space as currently constructed I read) so who does that leave? David West, Nene, Perkins, Big Baby, Caron Butler, Battier, Z-Bo, J-Rich, Carl Landry are all UFAs.
Lopez will probably be a part of the sign-and-trade if Dwight goes to you guys. Not bad, considering Dwight is much, much, much (x100) better than Brook Lopez. Even then, many people are already saying Dwight wants to go to LA. sucks for the small market teams.
It's gonna take a lot of convincing to keep Deron there. Granted, it's not like you guys are working with nothing. Have a decent, respectable coach in Avery. A rich owner in Prok. A new arena coming up, and a bigger market city in New York. It's just a matter of convincing him with talent to go with him, if you guys can do that, then....damn, there's your "F you" to New York
Apparently Deron didn't see it coming either and he's pissed. He found out he was traded reading the ESPN ticker while he was getting his ankles tapped up in the training room.
It could've been worse. At least he wasn't sent to Cleveland as Baron Davis was. Deron's new owner seems to be serious about being a contender and will not settle for less than quality players. Before the end of the season Deron will be pleased with this move.