.

[GloveGuy]

He'll be in Boston next year. The words were taken out of context, and the reason he didn't show up to the physical was because he was on a cruise with his family. He met with Ainge and Rivers when he got back, and they're confident he'll be playing for them next year. He's just really pissed off at the Lakers -- which he should be.

[Fresh8]

Two games to watch!

Kobe vs. Shaq. vs. Lakers vs. Boston

and Payton vs. Lakers

hooray!

[Sauru]

omg, lakers vs celtics. its the 80's all over again.

[Matt]

minus the legends and any reasons to get excited about

[Alcoholic]

I don't feel sorry for him because it was his choice to play for the Lakers.

He agreed to play with them, but secretly they just needed trade bait.

[Carlos Boozer]

payton sucks..

[Sauru]

honestly i dont even want payton is boston. all he would do is take much needed minutes away from west and banks. let the bum retire. cant guard anyone anymore anyway(ok to many any's in a row).

[GloveGuy]

If you don't think that Payton was an upgrade to Chucky Atkins, there has to be some bias going on.

Payton's depletion was totally overblown by the media and Laker fans looking for an excuse on why the Lakers lost to the Pistons.

The Lakers' achilles heal on defense last year was defending the pick-and-roll, which takes a team effort(or more than one player). The point guard would constantly receive picks from Shaq's man, and since Shaq didn't know what the fuck he had to do, it gave the point guard easy shots. Whether Payton went around the pick or through, it didn't matter, because Shaq wouldn't step up. That's why Billup's production was so high in the Finals.

Payton's defense won't be an issue if the Celtics play good team defense. That's all it takes. Mark Blount is great at defending the pick-and-roll, much better than Shaq was.

It won't be "much needed" minutes that Payton will be taking away from Banks and Allen. They're still young and they're in no place to start for this Celtic team. They'll be able to learn from one of the best, especially Tony Allen, whose defense was praised on in college and this preaseason's Summer League.

[Sauru]

the way i see it, the celts wont be winning the title this year. with this in mine its my opinion to give the young guys the minutes. at best payton will play 1 season for the celts then be gone. thats not what they need right now. it would be nice if payton did get in there and showed our young guards a thing or 2 but i doubt that is the kind of person payton is. now i like payton, and i do believe he got a raw deal with the lakers, but the last thing the celts need now is someone on the team who is gonna constantly complain about being there.


edit: of course i know that payton is a upgrade over atkins. i never even mentioned atkins in any of my posts.

[GloveGuy]

Well the thing about Payton is that you just don't know how he's going to act. If Ainge and Rivers handle him the right way, he'll be just fine.

You don't give Banks and West more minutes just because they're younger. If they're better and more productive than Payton -- which they aren't! -- then yeah, give 'em the minutes.

They'll be learning from Payton in practice, much like how Arroyo learned from Stock and how Darko's "learning" from the Wallaces. Just because they have great potential, doesn't mean you give them the better half of the minutes.

[air gordon]

haha no surprise gloveguy is still defending payton at this point...

considering boston's plans and payton's expiring contract, what exactly is the right way to handle payton? i'm very curious to know

i'd very much like to see this new gary payton, aka pg mentor.

[Carlos Boozer]

the way i see it, the celts wont be winning the title this year. with this in mine its my opinion to give the young guys the minutes.

That sort of tactic pretty much sums up everything that is wrong with the NBA. The 2004-2005 season hasn't even started and teams are talking about the next 10 years becuase they're sure this season is tanked.

What the hell does that sort of attitude say to people who want to see serious effort and a good game when they pay money to see the Celtics, or any other team play.

It's ridiculous. I'm sorry, but teams need to start focusing on doing everything they can to win a damned basketball game and stop worrying about what's going to happen in 10 years. Notice the teams who concentrate on getting it done NOW (Pistons, Spurs, Lakers past few years...) seem to be the ones who take home the title. I won't mention the Clippers, Bulls, or any team that has been "future oriented" for a bit too long now.

I mean c'mon, it's good to have a plan to make a team succesful for years to come, but when it starts getting to the point of not starting your best player (you're saying Payton takes up minutes... well he should. He's the best PG on the Celtics...), etc, ideas like that, it's gone too far.[/b]

I don´t agree with you.

[GloveGuy]

haha no surprise gloveguy is still defending payton at this point...

Yeah it's a bias. People should know that by now.

If Payton refuses to play, they should just let him retire, take a year off, and then let him sign with any team he wants. But if he does play -- which I'm confident he will -- the trade will have Ainge coming out like a saint. I wouldn't trade him unless you get something really good out of it.

[Alcoholic]

I think Payton will play. He's not gonna be a quitter is he? Besides, whenever big players get traded they go, "yeah yeah, but I know, NBA is a business, they're doing what's best for the team blah blah blah."

If they let Payton play right, then Payton will do good. He didn't go from 20 ppg to an immediate decline because of a sudden loss of talent. He was still good, but other things hampered him down, for example cutting his minutes in half.

It's like when the Lakers set up Iso's just so Payton could score. Payton went to work down low, and he scored. If he had the ball (and minutes) he could still work his magic.

[Sauru]

you wanna know whats really wrong with the nba? simple, the salary cap. give the nba a hard salary cap like the nfl. this will definetly even the playing field. raise the cap a bit and make it a hard cap. this will force a equal playing field as much as you can force one.

[Andrew]

Hard caps have their problems though. Here in Australia, the National Rugby League has a hard cap and it's been causing problems for the Newcastle Knights. Our "top player" (he's barely played the last couple of years due to injury), Andrew Johns, is set to re-sign (or has re-signed, they have a really strange free agency system) a contract that will eat up most of our cap. As a result, we're going to lose some of our good, young and most importantly healthy players.

With all the player's salaries these days, you couldn't set a hard cap unless you raised it to about $70 million. Otherwise teams would have to forfeit players and I'm sure the player's union wouldn't be happy about players taking huge paycuts simply so the league could implement a new salary cap.

If the salaries were lower and they weren't players on $25+ million a season, the NBA might be able to do it.

[Colin]

A hard cap of 60 million would be good. Players like hedo Turkoglu wouldn't get 40 million dollar contracts. That allows for an average salary of 5 mil, which is an amazing living. Maximum contracts would be 9-10 mil, and a 10th man would make about 1 mil.

[Andrew]

But how would that be implemented in the NBA? Guys like Shaq and KG probably aren't going to give up their $20+ million deals so the NBA can implement a hard cap. The player's union won't want to see guys like Kobe forfeit the big contracts they've just signed either.