Cleveland Sports Chatter

[POJO_Risin]

It's hard to fault the guy for taking 30 million...but damn...

Hey...are they saying anything Twona...

1. Who they'd sign if they go after someone to replace him...

2. Who they'd let go if they kept him...

[twonabomber]

nothing on 1, and supposedly have to let a lot of guys go to keep him. they said the Utah offer is really front-loaded and it would be hard for the Cavs to do anything.

[twonabomber]

The Cavs issued a brief statement after hearing of the potential deal with Utah.

"Our actions have been based upon what Carlos told us he wanted. This was also entirely consistent with his public statements in the media July 1,'' said the statement from general manager Jim Paxson and owner Gordon Gund. "We are both very surprised and very disappointed by what is now being reported.''

[POJO_Risin]

Yeah...I saw all that shit...

fucking Utah frontloads the deal to make it near impossible for the Cavs to match...

outstanding...

no wonder the fucking NBA blows...

[twonabomber]

it's still early, probably won't hear anything really good for a couple days.

and Wagner misses the first day of summer workouts Saturday morning...but made it Saturday night...

[POJO_Risin]

Well...the offer sheet doesn't officially go into effect until next Wednesday right?...so we have 20 days for the Cavs to figure shit out...

Boozer isn't worth 68 million dollars...and they better not fucking match that...it's ridiculous...

[POJO_Risin]

Wagner...christ...injury prone...and now late...lmfao...

welcome to the bench...again...

[twonabomber]

yeah, and Silas is trying to turn Wagner into a point guard...

It didn't take long for Dajuan Wagner to put a damper on what otherwise was a glorious summer day for Cavaliers coach Paul Silas.

Wagner was a no-show for Saturday morning's initial summer-camp workout at Gund Arena.

"It bothers me that he's not here," said Silas, looking stern. "He should be here.

"He needs this."

Wagner, who showed up for Saturday's evening workout that was closed to the media, is needed because he's the subject of the Cavaliers' grand summer experiment.

Silas and the team's coaching staff want Wagner, a 6-2 natural shooting guard, to learn point-guard skills and mentality.

Summer camp, and summer leagues, is where these skills are best taught and carried out.

Not on the fly during the regular season.

Wagner, 21, scored points with the Cavaliers' front office by committing to take part in the summer workouts and the subsequent summer leagues in Orlando, Fla., and Las Vegas,

He lost points by not joining 15 others for Saturday's first workout.

"It will take a total commitment from him to do this," Silas said. "If he can't make it, we'll have to look at this situation closely."

Translated: The Cavaliers will actively seek to trade Wagner, a first-round pick (sixth overall) in 2002.

With LeBron James and Jeff McInnis getting the bulk of the shooting guard and point guard minutes respectively, Wagner can give himself the opportunity for more time on the court as a multi-purpose guard.

But to do this, he must improve his point-guard skills and mentality.

"I could see Dajuan becoming a Mark Price kind of player," Silas said.

Price, a 5-11, 175-pounder when he played for the Cavaliers in the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, had point-guard skills and mentality parlayed with a shooting guard's perimeter game.

In nine years with the Cavaliers, Price was a four-time All-Star and a first-team All-NBA selection in 1993.

"Mark Price," Silas said, "was a shooting threat who got his shots off in pick-and-roll situations.

"He was also someone who could bring it up the court and get a team in its offense."

In two injury-riddled seasons with the Cavaliers, Wagner has bounced between both guard spots - averaging 10.1 points and shooting 37 percent from the field playing 91 of a possible 162 games.

"Playing the point is more mental than physical," Silas said. "It's understanding how to get others' game off. It's understanding how to get your game off.

"If you haven't done it, it's hard to learn."

Silas said that he's convinced Wagner can pull this off - turn himself into a multidimensional guard.

"Dajuan has extraordinary talent," Silas said. "If anyone can do this, he can."

Silas paused, and smiled. "Having said all that," he added, "the [expletive] should have been here."

[twonabomber]

i wanna know what the expletive was!

[POJO_Risin]

lmfao...

"fucker"

"cocksucker"

"bastard"

"bitch"

"dickhead"

"alloftheabove"

I wouldn't want to piss off Silas...but that's just me...

[POJO_Risin]

Chripes...

this is what the Cavs will have to choose from...

it may be a long season...

Some of the other unrestricted power forwards the Cavs might give a look include Samaki Walker, Robert Traylor, Rodney Rogers, Brian Cardinal, Keon Clark and Mamadou N'diaye.

Antonio McDyess is also an unrestricted free agent, but he would probably demand more than the Cavs' available midlevel money.

and some guy named Al Long...

Good Lord...they should have went after McDyess...

[twonabomber]

Bill Livingston

Paxson should pay for Boozer blunder

Saturday, July 10, 2004

For all the dissembling of the player involved, the Carlos Boozer Affair still goes on Cavaliers General Manager Jim Paxson's record as the most colossally boneheaded move since Fred Merkle and the most ridiculous personnel flub since Ted Stepien.

What is it about "free agent" that Paxson didn't understand?

His greatest triumph, outside the Ping Pong Ball Miracle that delivered LeBron James - and you or I could have picked James No. 1 - was sleuthing out Boozer in the second round. Now, Paxson has either (a) fumbled him away to Utah or (b) forced the team to overpay Boozer grossly just to keep him, in a re-run of the John "Hot Rod" Williams scenario in the early '90s. If it's (b), it not only means years of being strapped on the salary cap, just as were Wayne Embry's Cavs by Williams, but also bulldozing the roster of a promising young team just to clear the money to allow the Cavs to match Boozer's Utah offer.

You have to wonder if (c) isn't out there, too. To wit, how in the world can James - potentially the greatest star in the history of Cleveland sports - possibly want to spend his career in a cockamamie organization that takes part in such a prolonged seltzer squirt?

Spare me the laments that Boozer broke the bond that supposedly exists between fans and jocks. Fans are free to indulge any loyalist fantasies they wish. It's a perk of being a fan. A professional sports GM ought to be a little wiser than that. It is probably best that a GM treat anything an agent or a player says with enough salt to cure a whole pig, not just the hams.

So the dimensions of this mistake cannot be understated.

It's not a team making a bad trade, although the Cavs (see Danny Ferry for Ron Harper) have a formidable body of work in that area. It's not a player walking away for more money, a big factor in the decline and fall of the 1990s Indians. This is losing a guy or putting yourself in a payroll bind for years because you let him become a free agent!

Why would anyone ever do such a stone-cold nonsensical thing? If the Cavs had re-upped Boozer for his third season, he'd still have been grossly underpaid and he would have been unhappy. His gravy train would have been sidetracked for another season, after which the Cavs would hold full "(Larry) Bird rights" to pay whatever it took over the cap to keep him.

A lot of serious problems needed to be resolved by Paxson in the coming season, although they were temporarily dimmed by the glow of James' rookie year. The team had three starters who were in the last year of their contracts - Jeff McInnis, Boozer and Zydrunas Ilgauskas, which is never a good thing. Guys play for numbers and contract leverage then, not for the team. Now, amazingly, Boozer, with Paxson's blessings, did it a year earlier than expected.

Boozer is calling all the shots. I thought he was somewhat overrated, because he plays the kind of defense in the paint that Chuck Wepner played in the ring. Still, on rebounding alone, he was valuable. Now the Cavs will have to overpay an overrated player even more. The only way they can do that is to try to package some of the dross Paxson drafted (DeSagana Diop), with some of his luckless guys (Dajuan Wagner) and a veteran with injury problems (Ilgauskas.)

Paxson has been the Teflon GM in Gordon Gund's feckless organization. But this should stick. This should be the magic word that makes him disappear.

[twonabomber]

Cavs' options are meager if Boozer bolts

Saturday, July 10, 2004
Branson Wright
Plain Dealer Reporter
Orlando, Fla.

Luke Jackson didn't have to wait long for the hard realities of professional sports to fall into his lap.

Minutes after the Cavaliers made Jackson the 10th overall pick in the NBA Draft, Jackson started to imagine playing on the same court with Zydrunas Ilgauskas, LeBron James and Carlos Boozer. Now that the Utah Jazz expects Boozer to sign an offer sheet worth $68 million over six years, two out of three isn't bad.

"I was looking forward to playing with [Boozer] because he's a guy that would help the team win a lot," Jackson said. "When you have the potential to lose a player like that, it's going to hurt."

It's especially painful for Jackson because he imagined so much success with Boozer as one of the leaders.

"I'm disappointed because you want the team to be the best and win as many games as you can. But to have a guy leave like that is something I'm not used to, especially since I'm coming right out of college."

Welcome to the NBA.

The Cavs, meanwhile, have options if they choose to not clear cap space and go after Boozer. Tony Battie would start at power forward, but the team would need to provide Battie some help by acquiring another power forward via trade or free agency.

Unfortunately for the Cavs, the free-agent pickings at power forward are slim.

That's one of the reasons Boozer was able to command so much from the Jazz, and why New Jersey's Kenyon Martin is in line to receive the maximum, about $80 million over six years.

The Cavs could use all or half of their exception, about $5 million, to sign an available replacement.

And the word is out.

Several players participating in the Orlando Pro Summer League want to apply for the Cavs' opening.

"I'm interested in any job because I just want to play," said power forward Art Long, a member of the Washington Wizards' summer team. "I'd love to play in Cleveland. I would fit in because I'm a 6-9 athletic guy who can run the floor and I can defend the three positions."

Some of the other unrestricted power forwards the Cavs might give a look include Samaki Walker, Robert Traylor, Rodney Rogers, Brian Cardinal, Keon Clark and Mamadou N'diaye.

Antonio McDyess is also an unrestricted free agent, but he would probably demand more than the Cavs' available midlevel money.

[ALinChainz]

Boozer $tory revolve$ around 1 i$$ue

By Brian Windhorst, Beacon Journal staff writer

CLEVELAND - On a sunny afternoon on June 30, Carlos Boozer and his party walked away from a meeting at Gund Arena believing he was going to be a Cleveland Cavalier for years to come.


On the sixth floor of the arena's executive offices, team owner Gordon Gund and general manager Jim Paxson believed they were on the verge of making a deal that would satisfy everyone, a rarity in today's NBA.


But somewhere between the goodwill of that day and last Thursday morning's phone call from Boozer's agent Rob Pelinka to Paxson, those good feelings went awry. Now Boozer seems to be headed to the Utah Jazz for lots more money, and even if the Cavaliers match the $68 million offer, they still appear to have made a costly, ill-advised decision.


Here is the story of how Boozer's contract situation turned into a national circus based on interviews with people inside and outside the Cavaliers organization, NBA general managers and players, agents and news media. Boozer and wife CeCe, reached by e-mail, declined to comment, and Pelinka did not return a telephone message Saturday.


The story began last summer after Boozer's very successful rookie season. He rose from second-round draft pick status and the end of coach John Lucas' bench to average 10 points and 7.5 rebounds and was named to the NBA's All-Rookie Team. The Cavaliers and Boozer were excited about his future.


Boozer, however, was not pleased with his contract. A year earlier, in August of 2002, after being impressed with him in summer league, the Cavaliers got Pelinka and Boozer to agree to a two-year guaranteed contract with an option for a third year. This was a rare deal for a second-round pick. Such players seldom receive long-term contracts but Boozer was given $989,000 over the first two years, including a $75,000 bonus for inserting a third-year option. In the third year, Boozer's salary would be $695,000 for the 2004-05 season.


Then, with Boozer's stock on the rise and the fact that a former second-round pick named Gilbert Arenas had just received a $65 million deal after his second season, Boozer's contract suddenly didn't seem so appealing.


Boozer's agent is employed by the sports management group SFX, founded by Arn Tellem. Pelinka asked last summer if the Cavaliers would consider what it would take to let Boozer out of the contract a year early.


During the 2003-04 season, in which Boozer averaged 15.5 points and 11.4 rebounds and finished second in the voting for the NBA's Most Improved Player Award, Boozer and his agent took their contract pleas public to several newspaper reporters.


In late April, after Boozer completed his breakout season, Pelinka brought it back to the Cavaliers' attention and both sides agreed to consider it in June. The parties met twice, once before the NBA's Pre-Draft Camp and once June 30.


Meeting time


On June 30, the principals gathered around a Fortune 500-style boardroom table at Gund Arena. Pelinka had flown in from Los Angeles. He sat on one side with Carlos and CeCe, a Duke graduate who has experience working for sports management giant IMG. Owner Gordon Gund flew in from his offices in Princeton, N.J., on his private jet. He joined Paxson and members of his staff on the other side of the table.


The meeting opened with Gund telling Boozer how valuable he was to the Cavaliers' franchise and their fan base. Gund was perhaps closer to Boozer than any other Cavaliers player. To Gund, players like Boozer and center Zydrunas Ilgauskas represented the transition the organization was trying to make. Each time Gund visited the Cavaliers during the season, either in Cleveland or at road games in Boston, New Jersey, New York or Philadelphia, he spent time talking with Boozer.


Paxson informed Pelinka and the Boozers that the Cavaliers were considering letting Boozer out of the option year. That decision had to be finalized by midnight that evening. Paxson explained to them that after losing Jason Kapono in the recent expansion draft and making a trade to acquire Sasha Pavlovic, the team's payroll would be $43,434,000 next season. That would put the Cavaliers within $3 million of the salary cap, expected to be announced next week.


Paxson said that if the Cavaliers allowed Boozer to become a free agent, the only thing the team could do was offer him something referred to as the maximum "Early Bird" contract. That would be a deal starting at $5 million that would increase 12.5 percent each year for six years, making it worth around $40 million. This was not a contract offer to Boozer, just an explanation of what the Cavaliers' salary cap constraint would be.


Paxson told Boozer that the team would not make any trades or other player moves to try and get drastically under the salary cap to attempt to offer more.


And, as a part of the goodwill gesture of not picking up the option, Boozer and Pelinka would have to calm the fan base by making public statements July 1 of his intention to return to the Cavaliers.


They would not be saying they had agreed to a deal, because that would be in violation of NBA rules because it came before July 1.


Pelinka had brought a copy of the NBA's collective bargaining agreement and referred to the contract rules and read from it several times.


The Cavaliers made it clear to Boozer that as many as seven other NBA teams could offer him more money and the team was taking a risk. Gund told Boozer he didn't want him to commit to a contract that he would regret signing a few years down the road.


The Cavaliers reminded him that by picking up the $695,000 option, the team would be able to sign him to a contract larger than the $40 million deal after the 2004-05 season because they would not be under NBA salary cap restraints.


But Carlos and CeCe, who only a few days earlier were looking at expensive houses in the affluent eastern Cleveland suburb of Bratenahl, said they wanted security now. They understood there was a limit, due to the league's salary cap rules, on what the Cavaliers could offer, but they wanted to remain in Cleveland.


Then Boozer and Gund spoke to each other. As they talked, they appeared to come to a trust they both thought would eventually lead to a deal.


Caucus time


At that time, the parties broke and had separate discussions. It was a tense 10-minute period that might be remembered as one of the most crucial moments in Cavaliers history that didn't take place on a basketball court.


Gund asked Paxson if he thought the Cavaliers could trust Boozer. Paxson pointed out that Pelinka was present when the Boozers said they knew it was possible to get a larger offer than the Cavaliers could put on the table after July 1 -- but they still preferred to stay in Cleveland. At that time, Paxson and Gund agreed to allow Boozer to become a restricted free agent if that was what he wanted.


The Boozers and Pelinka came back into the room and said they indeed wanted to be let out of the contract. They knew they could not make a deal on that day, but Pelinka said he was sure he could work out a deal with Paxson after July 1. Paxson promptly left the room and went to his office, where he had prepared a "qualifying offer," which is part of the procedure in making a player a restricted free agent. Under NBA rules, all qualifying offers have to be issued before July 1.


The meeting then broke up, midnight passed, and Carlos Boozer was no longer a Cavalier.


Crunch time


On July 1, the Cavaliers stunned the NBA by revealing they had not picked up Boozer's option. Boozer and Pelinka granted interviews to the Associated Press stating their preference to re-sign with the Cavaliers. But, in retrospect, they did not issue any guarantees.


"I want to be in Cleveland, I want to be with the Cavaliers," Boozer told the Associated Press. "Now it's up to my agent and the Cavs to work things out."


"Carlos and his wife, CeCe, made it clear to me that they are very comfortable with the Cavaliers organization," Pelinka told the AP. "I'm confident (Paxson) and I will continue to have conversations and we'll be able to work something out."


That afternoon, Utah Jazz owner Larry H. Miller made a previously scheduled phone call to a reporter in Salt Lake City. During the course of the conversation, the reporter asked Miller if the Jazz had any interest in Boozer. Until that moment, Miller didn't know the Cavaliers hadn't picked up Boozer's option. Miller told the reporter he was planning to call Jazz vice president Kevin O'Connor to have him look into Boozer's availability.


On July 2, Boozer disconnected a cell phone that the Cavaliers and media had been using to contact him.


On July 3, the Boozers were telling people that there was no deal with the Cavaliers in place.


Over the July 4th weekend, the Golden State Warriors came to an agreement with center Adonal Foyle on a five-year, $41.6 million contract, a deal worth more per year than what Boozer could sign for with the Cavaliers under NBA rules.


Also, the Jazz agreed to an offer sheet with Detroit Pistons forward Mehmet Okur for six years and nearly $50 million. Neither Okur nor Foyle are regarded as players as talented as Boozer and both were about to get richer deals.


The Boozers and Pelinka took notice. With contract values soaring, especially for big men, Boozer getting a six-year, $40 million deal with the Cavaliers would certainly be lower than his market value.


If the player signed for such a figure, it would affect the agent, too. Potential clients might be told that Boozer had signed what was perceived as a "bad contract." This was what the Cavaliers feared, that Boozer would be tempted to look elsewhere.


On Monday, July 5, Pelinka called Paxson and told him the Boozers had decided to test the market. He took calls from a number of teams and found interest in the Denver Nuggets and the Jazz. On Wednesday, July 7, the Jazz prepared their huge offer sheet.


To ensure they wouldn't lose Boozer, the Jazz wanted to "front-load" the offer, meaning they would pay a large salary in the first year to make it harder for the Cavaliers to try to match. The Jazz were scheduled to host free-agent forward Kenyon Martin in Salt Lake City on Thursday. But they canceled his visit.


Offer time


On Thursday morning, Paxson was in Portland, Ore., for the funeral of his wife's daughter-in-law. Pelinka called to say that Boozer planned to sign a six-year, $68 million offer sheet with the Jazz.


Coach Paul Silas got the message while with family in Oakland, Calif., gathering after the death of his mother, Clara.


Gund was on vacation with his family in Canada.


Upon hearing the news, he got in his jet and departed for Cleveland to deal with the situation.


During the day, Paxson took calls from Gund in his jet in between church and graveside ceremonies at the funeral. Later, they issued a statement expressing their shock and disappointment at the turn of events.


In the following hours, Cavaliers fans filled up reporters' e-mail boxes, expounded on Internet message boards and jammed sports talk-show phone lines as the shock trickled down.


Messages for Brian Windhorst can be left at 330-996-3819 or bwindhor@thebeaconjournal.com

[POJO_Risin]

Adonal Foyle...

God I hope the NBA disbands...

Owners and agents ruined the game...

If the player signed for such a figure, it would affect the agent, too. Potential clients might be told that Boozer had signed what was perceived as a "bad contract." This was what the Cavaliers feared, that Boozer would be tempted to look elsewhere.

Yeah...that's just great...