Darius Miles, Cap Space, E-mails, Oh My!
January 9, 2009 12:20 PM
This Darius Miles situation is a mess.
Before we get to talking about threatening e-mails and all that, let's back up for a minute, and all agree on one thing: Darius Miles is not, and should not be, medically retired.
Portland's claim, supported by an independent doctor, that they should get salary cap relief for his career-ending injuries was a mistake. And now there's a 27-year-old who demonstrably would like to play basketball for a living. The Collective Bargaining Agreement's standard for assessing when a medical retirement was a mistake appears to have been a good one. Even before ten games are up, it's pretty clear.
No, it's not obvious that he's one of the 300 or so best players in the world who get NBA roster spots. I'm not a fine enough judge of talent to declare that. But it is crystal clear that he's one of the thousand or so professional players who are in that mix. Europe, the D-League, the NBA ... he belongs in there somewhere. His body is still suited to running and jumping. He's a professional basketball player.
I just watched video of all of his regular season minutes. From the January 6 Grizzles vs. Timberwolves game, we can learn that anyone who tells you he's permanently broken is blatantly wrong.
* Ask Randy Foye. He had a nice path to the hoop on the secondary break, and Miles swooped across the lane, and skied to block it.
* Ask Kevin Love. Miles was isolated on the right wing against the Minnesota rookie. Miles beat him to the rim off the dribble. Miles didn't get the bucket. He seemed to be lacking explosion -- but in that he joins many post-surgical NBA players.
* Ask Al Jefferson. Jefferson is one of the deadliest post scorers in the game. Miles, beefier now, guarded him solo in the post, and came up with the block. But for a foot on the baseline, he would have come up with the loose ball and started the break, too.
* Ask Mike Conley, who noticed too late, at one point, that Miles had beaten everybody down the floor and just needed the ball to complete an easy layup.
the article goes on, but you see the point. How is it that we won the game and we still manage to get pwnd in an article about a guy like Darius?
http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/0-3 ... h-My-.html
