|
NBA BASKETBALL
The Case Against Rebuilding
<January 22, 2002>
By
Matthew Sherwood
As I type this, I'm watching
Marcus Camby walk off the court with a towel over his
head with the rest of his Knicks teammates following
a blowout by the Hornets. There really wasn't any part
of this game that seemed even remotely close, and the
Knicks have been dropping a lot of them lately. At once,
my mind jumped to the conclusion that I've been hearing
(and secretly thinking) for some time now: It's time
to rebuild!
You all know what rebuilding is. It has less to do with
building than it does smashing. It's not the like the
gentle process of reshaping, nor does it resemble re-tooling,
re-working, or restructuring. Those words imply taking
the good out of something and enhancing it. Rebuilding
means to completely rip apart and start over. Take the
sand castle and pound it back into the beach. Knock
over all the building blocks. Or, in the case of an
NBA team, it means to trade away your stars for draft
picks and 'potential players,' robbing the fans of any
hope of the postseason, much less a title. But is all
this destruction really necessary?
Certainly, there are times when it's called for. Sometimes
the mess is just too big, the knot too tangled. But,
just as often, there are times when it really isn't
needed, but we do it anyway. Maybe it's human nature.
The sick part of us wants to watch something blow up,
even though we know it will take years (maybe decades)
to put it together again.
Writers covering the Knicks and Blazers are guilty of
this line of thinking, although they aren't even close
to being the only offenders. Portland came within an
inch of preempting the Laker 'dynasty,' while New York
shocked the world by showing that an eighth seed with
a lot of heart and some vicious D could scratch and
claw their way to the finals. Both of these teams have
a lot of the same players now as they did then. There's
still some gas left in the tank, it's just a matter
of getting the car to go.
The situation in Miami is similar. Pat Riley has Alonzo
Mourning, Eddie Jones and Brian Grant in his locker
room-not to mention a lot of strong role players---
and all anyone wants to talk about lately is taking
the dynamite to his team. He has one of the only true
centers left in the league on his roster, and it can't
be dismantled fast enough. I'm not arguing that the
Heat don't have their problems, I'm just saying that
they also have the personnel to go deep into the playoffs.
I'm not David Aldridge (yet), but even I can see that
the Knicks & Blazers have front office leadership that
would struggle to make ice into water (much less manage
a Dairy Queen.) But, of Scott Layden and Trader Bob
I beg this one thing: DON'T DO IT! Don't blow up good
teams with problems to entertain the fantasy of magically
building stronger ones later.
Kids are being drafted right out of preschool now. Who
knows how these guys are going to turn out? They could
be sitting the bench in Croatia before they're old enough
to drink. Or worse. Portland and New York, on the other
hand, have players that are proven in the league and
would be valuable to other teams. Some of these players
should be kept, some should be sent away. Most other
teams in the league have some specific needs, and some
extra bodies at one spot or another. By working with
that, along with some careful draft picks (read: not
Eric Chenowith) and shrewd free agent signings (read:
not Allan Houston at $100 mil) decent teams can get
better without sitting in the dumpster.
Rebuilding is a sham. It's management's way of saying
that they want a free pass for a few years while they
get their act together. It makes sense when they explain
the need for it; in the same way that it makes sense
to have leeches suck out your diseases. Fans need to
rally together against this kind of outdated thinking.
For once, let's see a team remodel instead of rebuild.
Matt Sherwood is freelance writer
in Denver, Colorado. Threats, hate mail and other comments
should be directed to khapheen@aol.com.
|
