Saturday, March 7, 2009

Finding an Answer in the Boozer, Wading through All This Mess !

To the regular readers of The Daily Hurt, apologies for the tardiness in writing, hopefully today marks the return of some more regular content.
Anyway, enough of that...let's get to it.

First off, Allen Iverson is known as "The Answer" but perhaps it's meant more as a question rather than a statement.

It is abundantly clear that the Detroit Pistons are much better off without him. It's a bit sad but for a while, many have suspected that for all of Iverson's offensive talents, he is a terrible team player and he's always more concerned about his own scoring, rather than his team winning.

Iverson will kick around the league for a few more years, but this season has exposed him as a problem, not an answer.

*****

Carlos Boozer has made his return to the Utah Jazz recently, but the strong play of Paul Millsap has made the Booze expandable. Boozer is a solid double-double guy, but he doesn't provide enough at the defensive end. In 18 games this season, Boozer has only four - FOUR - blocked shots, which is simply not good enough.

Millsap is an energy guy and look for the Jazz to let Boozer walk this summer. Boozer has a player option of a few bucks less than $13-million. He'll probably get a lengthy deal, but you can bet the market won't be as lucrative as it might have been at the end of last season.

Boozer is ok, but he isn't in the elite crop of power forwards in the league.

*****

Glen "Big Baby" Davis has no class. Riding the coat tails of Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce, Davis acts like he's someone in the NBA.

He's not. All he really is, is lucky. His cheap shot on Friday night on Anderson Varejao deserves a suspension.

The Celtics tried to dump him prior to the trade deadline but found little interest in him. No doubt because he doesn't really have much of a game. He can fill in a few minutes here and there, but his lofty frame means that he is slow on defensive and he is very limited offensively.

*****

Dwyane Wade is on a tear right now and has overtaken Kobe Bryant as the strongest challenger to LeBron James' MVP season. Wade is carrying the Miami Heat to the playoffs and, perhaps even home court advantage for the first round at least.

Chris Bosh should take notice because Wade's supporting cast in Miami is arguably worse than what CB4 has in Toronto, yet the Raptors season was effectively over around Christmas.

*****

Speaking of Bosh, he often gets referred to in the same class as draft mates Wade and James. However, after this season, the question has to be asked as to whether or not he deserves it. The Raptors have been awful and Bosh has to accept a large portion of the responsibility for that.

His season started out well enough, but he has been a huge disappointment. He's had his injury problems, but that's always been another problem for Bosh, he always seems to miss anywhere between 6-12 games every season, further lowering his value. He has one season left on his contract in Toronto, but don't be surprised if Raptors General Manager Bryan Colangelo deals him away this off season.

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