The Utah Jazz | as seen by Basketball John

This will be my last post about AK barring a trade or until he does/doesn’t show up for training camp.  Thanks to the slow NBA off-season and with training camp starting up in  a few days, the AK and Marion trade demands have been discussed ad nauseam.  It’s even to the point where ad nauseam has been used to the point of ad nauseam.

Nothing more can be added?  Well, there’s always room for green j-ello in the Beehive State.  The obvious trade that works out for the Jazz that nets them the most for an AK trade is obviously with Phoenix.  We would have to send Giricek and take on Banks probably.  Another ad nauseam topic: despite every Suns fan’s dream that they would simply be taking Millsap off our hands in any trade, it isn’t going to happen.  I should post that PHX would have to add Amare to make the deal work.  Now of course I’m not saying that Millsap is as good as Stoudemire, but the reaction Suns fans would have to that proposal is that same one that Jazz fans have. 

And by now we know that Marion has demanded a trade.  It’s an obvious deal that should happen.  Even The Sports Guy said the trade should happen.  The Jazz would get Marion and Banks and the Suns would get AK and Giricek.  The Jazz benefit in that they’re rid of a disgruntled player and they’d save beaucoup dollars to pay Deron and Mansap in a couple years.  Marion would give the Jazz an athletic three who is capable of knocking down the outside shot.  And they don’t lose much defensively.  And the financial bonus comes when Marion opts out of his contract next year.  If he stays with the Suns and does that, they get nothing for him.

The Suns get one of the only players available that could replace the defense and slashing of Marion.  And as we’ve seen from the GS playoff series last year, Kirilenko thrives in that situation.  Maybe he would even move up to the second or third option.  Of course they’re stuck with AK’s contract for four more years.

Aside from his obvious basketball talents, it appears we would be getting the same fragile-type player in return.  At TrueHoop, there’s a column concerning Marion’s perceived insecurity.  Read through that article and instead of Marion/Nash, substitute AK/Williams.  Almost the entire article reflects the same situation with our two.  Marion will come here and still wouldn’t be the the #1 or #2 guy on offense.  And how would he take Sloan as a coach?  He doesn’t really have an error in translation excuse.

So apparently AK’s & Sloan’s rendezvous didn’t heal wounds.  But at least Sloan was up front with AK after the season and told him that the play situation wouldn’t change next year.  Maybe a Sloan trip to the Mother Land would have changed things.  But I doubt Sloan would have said anything other than you better be in camp on Oct. 1.

So as much as it pains me to write it, I think the trade needs to happen.  If we’re going to have an insecure, slashing, athletic, high-jumpin’ player, it might as well only be for one year.

EXTRA: HarpringSucks has one of the best pieces I’ve seen on the subject.  You know, in case you’re not experiencing the ad nauseam.

I was going to include this with my next post, and although there’s not much to warrant a separate post, it didn’t really belong with a AK/Marion topic.  Scary stuff about Carlos Boozer’s boy.  According to the Trib, one of his boys has sickle cell anemia and is recovering from a bone-marrow transplant.  It wasn’t specified which boy ( he just had twins in July to go with an older son).  And there’s apparently a 60-80% chance that the transplant will cure him.  Prayers are of course with Boozer and family.  And we’ll see him in camp when his boy is well enough.