RE: oh no

["Berry, Mark S" <berrym@BATTELLE.ORG>]

Joe, 

Joe, 

You're right about the importance of chemistry, but you can never have too
much talent in this league. Will it all make for a good mix in L.A.? Maybe
not, but guys like Taylor and Anderson are assets even if they don't fit in.
You don't think one or both of those guys couldn't be dealt or packaged for
a role player who delivers whatever it is West thinks the Lakers still need?

The Celtics desperately need assets. They are capped out and helpless in the
free agent market. They're just good enough to miss the playoffs and draft
at the bottom of the lottery. The one way they can improve their personnel
is through trades, but our collection of stiffs on the bench are
untradeable. Barros, Overton, Cheaney, McCarty, Pervis, Battie and, the most
untradeable player in the NBA-Eric Williams-have virtually no value.
Fortson's is dropping. Maybe we'll be able to turn Fortson into a
serviceable player-an asset-but I'm not counting on it. 

That leaves our only tradeable commodities-our five starters. But trading a
starter only creates a hole someone else has to fill. Who?

No, I'll take a valuable problem like Mo Taylor or Derek Anderson over a
no-talent problem like Eric Williams any day.

Mark 

	-----Original Message-----
	From:	opi@unesco.org [SMTP:opi@unesco.org]
	Sent:	Monday, February 7, 2000 4:21 PM
	To:	Berry, Mark S; Celtics@igtc.com
	Subject:	Re: oh no

	"Berry, Mark S" wrote:

	> Sounding like the Lakers-Clips deal is close to happening. Let's
see, that
	> lineup looks something like this: Harper, D. Anderson, Kobe, Mo
Taylor and
	> Shaq.
	>
	> My one hope: The Lakers feel DA and Kobe play the same position
(they do),
	> so they deal DA to the Celts for Fortson (although with Mo Taylor,
the
	> likelihood of that happening probably drops). More likely: They
deal DA to
	> Chicago for Kukoc.
	>
	> I can't stand it. Good bye, cruel world.
	>
	> Mark

	Some of the greatest NBA teams in terms of on-court talent imploded
	beautifully through selfishness and imagined sense of entitlement.
Think of
	the Sixers with Doug Collins, Julius Erving, George McGinnis and
World B.
	Free. Think of the Laker of the late 70s with the heavyweight talent
that
	surrounded Kareem before Magic arrived. Or think of the Lakers with
Wilt,
	West, Baylor cockily leading the league in every possible individual
statistic
	imaginable.

	You could even put the late 70s Boston Celtics in that category,
with their
	coup to acquire two selfish All Stars in Sidney Wicks and Curtis
Rowe to make
	up for the loss of Paul Silas. How could a team that also had Bob
McAdoo, Tiny
	Archibald, Dave Cowens and the sensational rookie Cedric Maxwell
have the
	worst season in Celts history prior to the ML Carr era?

	Should Celtics fans worry about Derek Anderson as the starting point
guard of
	the Lakers? Puh-lease!! The guy is in the contract year of his next
7-year
	extension and regards himself as a what-me-worry scorer in the Kobe
Bryant
	mold.

	You want Maurice "Liz" Taylor as your starting power forward? This
guy is
	rugged enough to finally deliver 6.6 rebounds in over 36 minutes per
game this
	season, raising his girlie-man average to a sweet 5.1 for his
career.

	Hey, now that sounds like exactly the type of "power fairy" the
Boston Celtics
	really need right now to upgrade Fortson (if the they want to
emulate the La
	La Land Flakers in terms of overall fairy-ishness).

	Jerry West is the type of soul who was born to tinker with what
works. So he
	just might commit the Lakers' future on a couple of free-agent-to-be
fruits
	who believe that slick scoring numbers are a perfect substitute for
not doing
	the dirty work that even a "me first" and "out of shape" jerk like
Antoine
	Walker assumes to be an obvious part of his job description (he's in
his
	fourth season leading our Celts in rebounding if you're  keeping
track).

	You'd think Jerry West would have learned his lesson from all the
consecutive
	cans of whup-ass the Boston Celtics organization has given him. It
sounds like
	he's bending over for a few more.


	****