631: 223: You Spineless Shark (Monthly Ticket Please!) 631: 223: You Spineless Shark (Monthly Ticket Please!) Because of the lockout, Pete Babcock had ample time to think about where to send Stevie Smith in order to maximize benefits.
The trade value of Stevie Smith was somewhat awkward.
It seemed difficult to trade him for someone better, because the Hawks were initiating the trade.
In a trade, the proactive party is often at a negotiation disadvantage.
Trade for someone slightly inferior?
Babcock felt that was a loss.
Moreover, Babcock didn’t want to trade Stevie Smith to a strong team in the East, as that would be akin to strengthening a competitor.
So, the trade possibilities for Stevie Smith became very limited.
The Trail Blazers offered Isaiah Rider and Kenny Anderson, two problematic guards Babcock didn’t fancy; he wanted their problematic young star, Yelling Maestro, but was refused.
The Kings offered Chris Williams, who averaged 17+5 last season.
Chris Williams wasn’t bad, and at first glance, his stats looked good, but his ceiling and talent were quite ordinary, certainly not someone fit to be a secondary scorer.
If he agreed, it would be a typical case of “trading a dollar for sixty cents.”
It wouldn’t necessarily be a huge loss, but it just didn’t seem worth it.
Many subsequent offers were similar; Stevie Smith’s trade value was awkwardly stuck at that position which was neither high enough nor sufficiently low.
Currently, there was only one possibility that could allow the Hawks to trade for a player better than Stevie Smith.
That was to trade Stevie Smith for a draft pick.
With that draft pick, maybe they could select someone better themselves.
Of course, this was gambling.
Because you could just as likely end up with a worse player, or in the worst case, someone utterly worthless.
Michael Jordan always believed he could win the bet, but then he kept losing everything.
However, such an unfavorable result could never happen to the Hawks.
Because Roger could steer the draft, and he knew which players were good and which were not.
Looking back at the 1999 draft list from his memory, Roger still remembered several decent guys, especially some excellent wings.
Odom, Hamilton, Marion, Artest, Kirilenko…
some of them could play a role not less significant than Stevie Smith.
And apart from Artest, who was a combination of mindlessness and unhappiness, the other few didn’t have any major character flaws.
He was just a bit sullen, what crime did he commit?
However, Roger had to choose someone who was ready to fight.
After all, his goal was to build a dynasty in Atlanta.
Whom to specifically pick depended on the final draft pick.
In any case, Roger told Babcock to bring back a 1999 lottery draft pick if possible.
He should target stable teams like the Clippers, Raptors, Hornets, and Grizzlies; they were certain to be in the lottery.
Other kings contend for a championship: let the team trade draft picks for stars, mortgaging the future to aid their championship victory.
Atlanta’s kings contend for a championship: let the team trade stars for draft picks, grasping both the present and future.
Who knows how future fans will compare these two strategies from the Kings.
Once Babcock had a clear objective, he began to prepare for the trade, but due to the lockout, nothing could be executed yet.
Since the players’ union president, Patrick Ewing, made his famous quote, the advantage had shifted to the owners’ side.
Following the end of the season, “The New York Times,” this troublemaker, leaked Kenny Anderson’s financial statement showing his eight cars’ annual maintenance and insurance cost a whopping 750,000 US dollars.
This amount of wealth, unseen by most in a lifetime, was merely loose change to Kenny Anderson.
“Yet, these greedy guys are still saying they earn too little,” the owners retorted, seizing the opportunity.
And the hard-liners lashed out, “We kind and naive people are being taken for lambs, while those damned cowards achieve their goals using lies and shortcuts!”
Capitalists comparing themselves to lambs, that’s a sign of life’s frustrations.
What could Roger say?
Under the leadership of these hidden dragons and crouching tigers, it was no wonder that the ’98 lockout became the most impactful in NBA history and the longest one.
Although the lockout had a significant impact, Roger didn’t intend to get involved, because he knew very well, as a person who’d been through it, that the season would not be canceled; it would all end sooner or later, and he didn’t have the same sense of crisis that other players did.
He wanted to take this time to rest, but a few days later, a piece of news made Roger’s hair stand on end.
“Labor negotiations nearing completion, the era of a hard salary cap is coming.”
Roger’s feeling at that moment was probably like how a CCTV host feels when seeing the Blue Man Group sing, his mind fiercely shaken.
What’s this about a hard salary cap all of a sudden?
How did things develop to this point?
Soon, Roger received a phone call from the players’ union executive director, Billy Hunter.
He was asking for help.
“Roger, we invite you to join the negotiation committee.
Now, the union lacks players with enough influence!
In any affair, your greatest opponent is often not the enemy, but your own comrades.
The biggest problem facing the players’ union now was the beginning of internal divisions.
Some players were getting scared; they wanted to compromise with the league.
They just wanted to finalize a new collective bargaining agreement to ensure that next season could proceed normally.