Daily Babble: Boykins Signing Serves As Sad Proof of Eastern Putridity

the west is surely the best-amen. michael jordan was a great superstar but seems more like larry as an exec. boykins is a pest and can score, but he can be posted up and he can monopolize the ball. the cats will make the playoffs. the team if healthy that scares me the most is the cavs.

Biggest disparity may yet to have come.

Look at the West and how many teams are planning for their future? Now look at how few in the East are.

Teams like Charlotte going all-in despite no hope of ever winning anything with that roster. The only team that is doing this properly is Phily and they’re only starting and have nothing on their roster. Orlando was in great shape but contracts for Lewis/Nelson have muddied their flexibility going forward. Even teams with youth like Milwaukee, they have long and large contracts littered throughout their roster. Indiana likewise.

So where’s the future in the East? Phily are the only ones playing for it

The future in the east is Orlando and Toronto, and possibly Cleveland when they can get Hughes and Ilgauskas off the books and start to put some better young players around LeBron, who just turned 23 years old.

Toronto got a lot of work to do. They have a lot of needs and Bargnani needs to get his game back on track, even with the return of Andrea the team hasn’t enough of an interior presence, toughness, rebounding, shot blocking. Two top PG’s. Need a top level wing also. Toronto just have an awful lot of needs. Hard work is ahead for Colangelo and a lot of hard decisions.

Even Orlando. Howard is clearly one of most dominant forces in the league and will be for the rest of his career. But they’ve locked up their salary cap already. They’re limiting the moves they can make. That’s by no means a finished roster. Their PG is weak, they have little inside presence beside Howard. Turkoglu is going to be difficult to pay if he continues on. They have very little of the bench. And again little flexibility to make moves. It’s going to take a lot of brilliant moves from their GM to fill out that team.

LeBron and the Cavs will get another shot to build around him when those contracts expire. That’ll be interesting. Chances are Ferry will have learnt some lessons by then.

Maybe Miami could enter the list but that depends on Riley’s next few moves.

We’re talking about a lot of teams with serious flaws and few ways of correcting them. Bosh, Dwight, Bron are all clear top level talents but where’s the supporting casts? very unbalanced teams

Take a look at the West:

Dallas[/b] – Contender
[b]Denver[/b] – Contender
[b]Golden State[/b] – Playoff team while rebuilding by adding cap space to sign their youth and build around Baron Davis
[b]Houston[/b] – Contender
[b]Clippers[/b] – Trying to be a contender, Injuries muddying the picture. Can be a contender next season.
[b]Lakers[/b] – Contender, Bynum’s growth has seen to that
[b]Memphis[/b] – Young and lost, still trying to find there way. Leadership is distinctly missing on the court, on the bench, in the front office. But Gay, Gasol and Conley is an interesting start to putting a serious team together.
[b]Minnesota [/b]- Full blown rebuilding. In all liklihood they’re about 2 years away before they make a serious move to improve their squad.
[b]New Orleans[/b] – Contender
[b]Phoenix[/b] – Contender
[b]Portland[/b] – Rebuilding but most of the work has been done, now a Playoff quality roster. Will be a contender by the end of next season when Oden finishes his rookie year and they have oodles of cap space to add an established vet.
[b]Sacramento [/b]- Middle of nowhere. They think they’re a playoff team. They’re not. Management has been overly slow in directing the team since the Webber/Peja trades, attempts to rebuild on the run have failed.
[b]Seattle[/b] – Full blown rebuilding which management is bundling so far but there’s a lot still to do.
[b]Utah – Contender

Just feel the clarity of direction. The management in the West is far superior to the East. I’ll do the East in a second.

Notice there’s only two teams without a clear direction – Memphis, Sacramento. Geoff Petrie is a very talented GM so it won’t be long before he picks a path, he’s just waiting on a few things. Sacramento should feel comfortable with their future because of Petrie’s class. Other GM is Chris Wallace, well we’ll see how that goes.

Here’s the East’s outlook:

Atlanta[/b] – Teetering on the edge and could go either way. Still building. Hands have been tied with off court ownership drama. It’s been slow but there have been reasons. Team is close to making a push to being something more.
[b]Boston[/b] – Contender
[b]Charlotte[/b] – Nowhere. Trying to be a playoff team. Went all in with Richardson/Nazr trades and Wallace/Carroll contracts. They’re not a playoff team and have no hope of contending in the near future. Next few years will be mediocre at best without some great fortune coming their way.
[b]Chicago[/b] – Nowhere. Lottery bound. Meant to be a contender but a flawed team fell apart. Direction clearly lacking from management, once young then added Wallace but failed to go all in for the chance at a title. Now a new direction needs to be decided upon. Rebuilding is more likely than many like to admit.
[b]Cleveland[/b] – Contender. Several flaws but right there.
[b]Detroit[/b] – Contender
[b]Indiana[/b] – Nowhere. Trying to make the playoffs. Over-run with bad contracts and lack of prospects. Very mediocre future. Unlikely to have any chance of contending without major changes, most likely avenue is rebuilding. Management picking no direction.
[b]Miami [/b]- Nowhere but reason for promise. Trying to contend. Management failed. New direction still to come. Nobody is sure if they’re rebuilding or not, Riley says Shaq will stay and thinks he can build a contender for next season. Hopeful but maybe.
[b]Milwaukee [/b]- Nowhere. Some prospects but overloaded with bad contracts and a horribly unbalanced roster. No hope of contending without major changes. Management won’t pick a direction.
[b]New Jersey[/b] – Nowhere. Overloaded with 3 horrific contracts. Not a playoff team. No future. Management won’t make a move.
[b]New York[/b] – Nowhere. Overloaded with bad contracts. Not a playoff team but not far from it. Absolutely miles away from becoming a contender. Management hasn’t made a move to change their direction.
[b]Orlando[/b] – Great future handcuffed by two contracts this summer, Rashard Lewis and Jameer Nelson. Suddenly they lack flexibility going down the road and have an awful lot of holes on the roster. Still, Howard is good enough to make them an outside contender. Moves can be made but their mangament needs clear and forceful to keep the team on track. Some shuffling of the decks will certainly be needed. No moves will result in a dangerous future full of disappointments.
[b]Phily[/b] – Full blown rebuilding is around the corner. Waiting on an Iggy and Miller decision. Far from being a contender. They need two top players including a post presence. They’ll be awhile but they’ve done alright in clearing cap space and giving their youth opportunities.
[b]Toronto[/b] – Future looked bright a year ago but new developments at PG, Bargnani’s stall in development, and still the same concerns (interior presence, toughness, defense, wing who can create off the dribble) reside. Some hard decisions are coming. We’ll know more by this summer. Colangelo is one of the best so they’re in good hands but the Raps future could go either way based on his decisions this summer.
[b]Washington – Nowhere. Jamison and Gil are FAs this summer. Blatche hasn’t panned out. Team is playoff worthy but nowhere near being a contender. Struggling to balance out the squad, struggling without an interior presence. Management’s indecision is costly. Moves need to be made. A lot to work with on this team with a solid GM there to do it.

Count them. That’s eight teams – Charlotte, Chicago, Indiana, Miami, Milwaukee, New Jersey, New York, Washington – that have no clear direction. No path to becoming a contender and are in trouble.

There’s another three – Atlanta, Orlando, Toronto – which have huge decisions to make which will change their futures monumentally

That’s the difference. The West GM’s take a clear direction and work towards becoming a contender. The East GM’s haven’t, that’s why their teams are unbalanced and why top talents like LeBron, Dwight and Wade don’t have supporting casts that suit their talents and are good enough to contend.

I’d like to update my Memphis point – they now have a clear direction; They are in full blown rebuilding.

That makes it only one team in the West without a clear direction versus 8 in the East.

I don’t see Houston or Denver as contenders.

I don’t see Houston or Denver as contenders.

Their GM’s do. Their coaches do. Their players do. Their fans do. Contender in that sense.

In my estimation? Let’s just say I don’t have them high on my list either.

I have Houston above of Denver and a few other teams but below my top 5 right now. They’re starting to make a run and still have a very interesting roster. If they played a better 2 minute spell at the end of game 7 last season, Houston could have given San Antonio a run for their money because of how well they match up with them (Yao does well enough in that series and T-Mac has always caused San An problems). 2 minutes and Houston could have been a contender but it didn’t go their way. My point is they’re not as far as their record this season or past playoff victories indicate. Although I have them a good bit back because they haven’t been able to put it together yet this season. Oh and Carl Landry is starting to impress me.

Denver are a wild card that if they play their best basketball for three weeks … they could surprise. But I think they’re too flawed to be a contender. Then again I thought Miami was the same way two years ago.