RealGM

Everypeople knows Pau is on the trading block.... he's an all star but has an enourmous contract (2 years left around 19-20 millions per year) that few teams can absorb. Utah can.

We have the trade exception (more than 10 mill).

Or we can trade Al Jefferson and Raja Bell (who likes LA and Kobe likes him) for Pau http://basketball.realgm.com/tradecheck ... de/6089256 .

Or we can involve a third team, who need a big (if Pau comes, Jefferson goes): trade Harris-Bell+ trade exception for Sessions Gasol, then trade Jefferson for a top pg-sg, or just sign Steve Nash, who would be attracted with a Gasol-Favors-Hayward team.

Ok, we still have quality bigs, and we don't need more.... that could steal floor time for developing favors and kanter.
Ok, Pau's contract is veeeeery big.


But, with Pau i think we can be a contender, AND he can attract quality free agents.

Pau's value on the market is falling (big contract, aging, LA needs to change something and wants to keep Bynum), but imagine

C Pau Gasol (Kanter)
PF Derrick Favors (Millsap)
SF Paul Millsap (Carroll, Hayward)
SG Gordon Hayward (Burks)
PG Devin Harris (Watson)

Gasol and Favors seem to mix very well.

Thoughts?

I don't think LA touches that deal. My guess is, if the Jazz want Gasol, It will cost them Millsap, Harris, and the GSW pick.

I'm curious to see what LA can get for Pau. In all honesty, they can't take on salary beyond this year unless they want to get hammered by the tax.

There aren't a whole lot of other teams in the league that can afford a 20 million dollar a year player,so the team that does may pay a bargain basement price for him ala Dallas and Lamar Odom.

i'm a millsap fan... however Millsap+exception for Gasol (then we have to trade Jefferson, i don't see big al and Gasol playing together), works, end maybe even Harris+exception for Gasol. As for the pick, Utah can add the GS pick, or his own.

Gasol for Millsap + exception+ a pick

and Harris +Bell for Sessions

i still say yes.

I don't know the exact deal, but Utah has all the tools to make it works that few other teams have (Houston?), and LAL no way will get a player like Chris Paul in the aborted deal with nola.

maybe Memo will get us another gift, with his trade exception...

p.s. happy birthday Memo, we miss you!

There is zero point to getting gasol unless your keeping Jefferson. Jefferson actually outperform Pau this year and Jefferson is younger. They also have similar stats despite Jefferson having a much higher usage rate. I love Favors but stop it .... His shooting was atrocious this year, he was inconsistent to say the least and while is defense is good; its far from game changing right now.

Favors not ready to be on a contender and neither is anyone else on this team except Jefferson. We would need to basically trade the whole team if were take the Pau route to be a contender. I'm not interested in a 20 million dollar whoo-dini (He disappeared in playoffs the last 2 years). This will not work and we should have no interest.

Just to clarify for everybody:

A TPE can NOT be combined with another player. It has to be big enough to absorb the entire salary of an incoming player

reapaman wrote:Favors not ready to be on a contender and neither is anyone else on this team except Jefferson.

Al Jefferson wrote:We’re playing against a team that is at its peak, and I don’t see nobody beating ’em. … It’s a great team. I just take my hat off to ’em. Mad respect

How has Al showed anything that would imply he's ready to be on a contender?

Bat wrote:

reapaman wrote:Favors not ready to be on a contender and neither is anyone else on this team except Jefferson.

Al Jefferson wrote:We’re playing against a team that is at its peak, and I don’t see nobody beating ’em. … It’s a great team. I just take my hat off to ’em. Mad respect

How has Al showed anything that would imply he's ready to be on a contender?

This guy had little in the way of consistent help, litlle in point shooting to spread the defenders out, lack of a good distributor, had defenses targeting him like he was the #1 guy, had tons of responsibility on him, ect ... yet this guy still manges to put nearly 20 and 10 on 49% shooting and was able to get close to that in the playoffs versus the spurs while pretty much everyone else was inconsistent and/or played like complete crap. His defense was also not nearly as bad as people were saying it was although still not good.

Imagine if this guy was able to play and gel with a couple stars such as Nash and Pau for instance. I think he would be even better with much less responsibility and defensive attention.

I think we saw the best Al has to offer this year.

DiscoLives4ever wrote:Just to clarify for everybody:

A TPE can NOT be combined with another player. It has to be big enough to absorb the entire salary of an incoming player

thank you, i had some doubts on it.

so the TPE we had can be used only on players under contract with a 11million less salary? In this case, it won't be directly useful on Gasol.

reapaman wrote:Imagine if this guy was able to play and gel with a couple stars such as Nash and Pau for instance. I think he would be even better with much less responsibility and defensive attention.

Here's where I disagree strongly. I don't think Al would be successful with those two guys. He's such a ball stopper and shot clock killer that he almost has to be the first option, and he's not good enough to be the first option on a contending team. If he could learn to be a no. 2 or 3 guy then he'd be more valuable, but I haven't seen that from him.

Its a bit silly to say that Al is better than Gasol. I dont know that anybody has said that just yet but its been implied, and someone did say that Al out performed him this year. Whoever thinks that did not see the Lakers a whole lot. Gasol was rendered much less important by the change in coaching philosophy this year. Bynum was given far to many touches (in my opinion...afterall his efficiency numbers are worse than Gasol) and Kobe was doing much more one on one than in the past few years, leaving Gasol on the outside looking in. Being in an offense that relies on post passing and ball movement like Utah does Gasol would be an all star again, and maybe even an MVP candidate. I dont know what it would take to get him and that might be another debate altogether, but he would be a HUGE upgrade from Al, and it isnt even close.

More like a "stupid idea to acquiring Pau Gasol".......

Steve don't give me that. Gasol's usage, shot attempts and his minutes are all higher than they have ever been as a laker. The media took that Kobe going one on one stuff too far, Gasol is just declining. Plus Gasol came up very small in the playoffs the last 2 years.

I think Al's best season will be next year. We saw him be a more willing passer and his d-rating hasn't been this high since he was in Boston. This year, Jefferson had a 12.1 assist percentage in the regular season and 16.6% in the playoffs which is by far the highest it's ever been (Not to mention they are great numbers compared to other bigs) so don't give me he's hasn't changed into a more willing passer. Yes he still sucks at getting to the free throw line but at least he's shooting better from the line. As the #1 guy on a playoff team, he still put up great numbers. I also wanna mention he's committing less turnovers and fouls per game than ever before. I think Al's best season will be next year when he puts it all together and I don't wanna miss it. He's more of a #2 or #3 type of guy like happy said, but he is valuable.

Gasol has already proven he can be a #2 guy, on a title team nevertheless. To ignore the extenuating circumstances around their team this year is just that, ignorant. Al is what he is, which is a nice offensive player and an awful defender with a very low overall basketball IQ. Im not saying it would be worth it to give up whatever the Lakers would want to get rid of him but head to head, Gasol is still better than Al hands down.

I think its more about the system these two play on. With our limited patch job system right now our guys can only do so much. Its easy to blame AJ for holding the ball but its also our system that promotes him doing so. We have very limited plays which mainly involve dumping it down which hurt our spacing. Bad spacing means horrible passing angles so it takes a long time to pass out and by the time it gets passed out if it does our guards are forced to make rush shoots. These problems hopefully gets addressed in the full training camp by our coaches. If we can add a pick and roll as well as designed plays for perimeter shots we should be able to stretch the floor. If gasol had to play in our system right now he'd struggle to score but I do believe Gasol would be a better active defender just not worth 19-20mill. Id rather give a max to a solid guard and expand our playbook this summer.

I like what the Jazz have done with their bigs core. Gasol and his mammoth contract can go someplace else. he's not worth Paul or Al who both want to remain loyal to the Jazz.

Remember when Pau played for Memphis? Yea, neither does anyone else...

Thats_my_chippy wrote:I like what the Jazz have done with their bigs core. Gasol and his mammoth contract can go someplace else. he's not worth Paul or Al who both want to remain loyal to the Jazz.

Remember when Pau played for Memphis? Yea, neither does anyone else...

Paul and Al are both severely limited players...but if youre more impressed with 'loyalty' thats what youre gonna get. By the way, those two are loyal to whoever pays them, like everyone else.

stevebozell wrote:

Thats_my_chippy wrote:I like what the Jazz have done with their bigs core. Gasol and his mammoth contract can go someplace else. he's not worth Paul or Al who both want to remain loyal to the Jazz.

Remember when Pau played for Memphis? Yea, neither does anyone else...

Paul and Al are both severely limited players...but if youre more impressed with 'loyalty' thats what youre gonna get. By the way, those two are loyal to whoever pays them, like everyone else.

"severely limited?" You make it sound like they're in wheelchairs.