Could We Win?

[AnakinJoe]

I know that there are several Dooms Day senarios that result in Smith leaving us with nothing in return. But there seems to also be a fairly plausible scenario that has Smith left with no one but the Hawks in a position to offer him a lucrative deal.

If Brand takes the Philly offer (after clearing out Carney), then that leaves the Warriors as the lone team with a lot of cap space. I'm assuming that the Clippers aren't going to renounce a proven scorer like Maggette to chase a RFA, that would be fairly stupid. And after signing Baron, I don't think that they could offer Smith much more than maybe $8-10M/year. Memphis doesn't appear to be interested in Smith.

(By the way, remember Smith's agent talking about visiting other teams? Has anyone read of any visits since Smith left Philly last Thursday?).

If the Warriors are left, why would they spend their cap space on Smith when they have NO point guard? Seems to me that Mullin would rather see if he could acquire someone like Jason Terry, Mike Bibby, Kirk Hinrich, Bassy Telfair or one of the Seattle veteran PGs before adding Smith to a forward mix that already includes Harrington, Wright and Jackson (assuming Ellis becomes the full-time SG). Plus, with Nellie in his final season, holding onto some cap space to re-shape the team for the next coach may make some sense.

So what if Smith wakes up on Friday and finds that after the dust settled, a 5 year/$60M offer is about the best deal available? Wouldn't that send shock-waves that the Hawks actually deftly played their hand?

[AnnArborHawk]

Smith could always just sign the one year qualifying offer and become an unrestricted free agent next year.

[crimedog]

Well it would be more a case of lucking out than of deftly playing their hand... but yeah, if Brand chooses the Sixers it could make the Hawks BIG winners. Chil would probably be in demand at that point and we might be able to get a couple of nice peices out of him.

I was explaining to a coworker that Brand might be better off, beyond just money, playing for Philly. The supporting cast is better, Dalembery complements him better than Kaman, they are in the east, etc.

On the other hand, he might like it in LA.

[AnakinJoe]

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Smith could always just sign the one year qualifying offer and become an unrestricted free agent next year.

I don't see that being a bad option for Hawks management. Next year, the ownership fiasco will likely be settled AND that could mean the end for Woody. With Bibby and Zaza being off the books, we'd have the luxury of a settled ownership, cap space and possibly a new coach (Avery Johnson, Flip Sanders, Mike Fratello, etc.) to run the club. So while he would be a UFA, we'd still have the advantage in terms of being able to offer him the most lucrative deal as the incumbent team.

[Traceman]

to Smoove even if they don't get Brand. If it were such a LOCK that they were going to do that, wouldn't they have at least made an offer to Smoove starting at $11M or so? I may be reading too much into the situation but it seems to me that they were not 100% sure that he was worth even the $11M to start, let alone $14.5M.

That is a good point regarding the Clips by the way. I hadn't thought of that but it makes sense.

[AnakinJoe]

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to Smoove even if they don't get Brand. If it were such a LOCK that they were going to do that, wouldn't they have at least made an offer to Smoove starting at $11M or so? I may be reading too much into the situation but it seems to me that they were not 100% sure that he was worth even the $11M to start, let alone $14.5M.

That is a good point regarding the Clips by the way. I hadn't thought of that but it makes sense.

If they make an offer at $11M and we match, they lose. If they clear cap space and offer $14M, they are assuming that they have crossed the threshold between where we match and where we don't.

[crimedog]

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to Smoove even if they don't get Brand. If it were such a LOCK that they were going to do that, wouldn't they have at least made an offer to Smoove starting at $11M or so? I may be reading too much into the situation but it seems to me that they were not 100% sure that he was worth even the $11M to start, let alone $14.5M.

That is a good point regarding the Clips by the way. I hadn't thought of that but it makes sense.

If they make an offer at $11M and we match, they lose. If they clear cap space and offer $14M, they are assuming that they have crossed the threshold between where we match and where we don't.

Apparently not...

[AnakinJoe]

I think this scenario is playing it's way out. GS has spent their money on Maggette. And I don't see how Smith fits on the Clippers, not with Baron AND Eric Gordon AND Kaman AND Al Thornton. You can only play with 1 ball. If you don't have Gordon out there, it's Mobley, who is even more of a ball hog. Clips would do better to target Okafor. Philly took Brand. Ultimately, teams chose Brand, Baron and Maggette over Smith.

I think Smith is about to wake up and see the Hawks is the last team standing with a meaningful offer to make.