Q&A: Preetom Bhattacharya from Hoopsworld 1/3/07 (Part 3 of 3)

by Atma Brother ONE on Jan 8, 2008 5:42 PM PST in Interviews

It's time for the final installment of our recent Q&A with GSoM friend Preetom Bhattacharya from Hoopsworld. Definitely flip back to Part 1 and Part 2 for some more interesting discussion.

Hit Read More for some thoughts on the Portland Trail Blazers and a little NBA rule change game.

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Golden State of Mind: Portland is going nuts! 13 wins in a row and at the top of the Northwest division. I don't think anyone expected them to be this good with Oden out. From what you've seen in the past few weeks, do you think this team will make the playoffs? 30 games into the season, there's a 10 team race for 8 spots in the West. Which two of these 10 teams misses out on the playoffs? For those two teams, what moves do they need to make to get in the playoffs?

Preetom Bhattacharya: The Blazers have what it takes to make the playoffs; I have no doubt that they can keep playing well because they've won games as a team, not because they rode the coattails of a single star. Aldridge and Roy are the real deal and what Outlaw is doing off the bench is really great. They've got a solid trio of PGs (Blake, Jack, Rodriguez) and a respectable big man rotation (Aldridge, Przybilla, Frye).

Their weakness will continue to be outside shooting, but they're very solid all the way around. They've got to keep their ball movement up and keep people involved - it'll be tough, but it's doable.

Golden State of Mind: The new rule change or rather change of enforcement where players cannot step in at the last second to draw a charge has seemed to, in Warriors games at least, decrease the number of charges called and let the players play. The NBA is not perfect right now, so if you were commissioner, what kinds of rule changes would you make to improve the NBA?

Preetom Bhattacharya: I think I'd make the salary cap a hard cap and do away with this luxury tax business. :)

In all honesty, I think I'd get rid of the salary-matching in trades. It should be about talent rather than contract figures like it is now. I can understand expiring deals being important, but why can't a team deal a budding star on his rookie contract for an aging veteran who has a max deal if both teams agree to it? I know what the team was hoping to protect .. I just don't know if it was necessary.

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All of us at GSoM wanted to thank Pree for all his continued support. Hit up his work on Hoopsworld on the regular.

Feel free to leave some follow up questions and thoughts in the comments for Pree. If he has time and your follow up thoughts are well researched and thought out, he'll try to get to them. Please be respectful of our guest and make sure to give our brother that golden treatment!

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Comments

Troy Hudson and C.J Watson

How come troy hudson hasn't been cut yet and is it 100% that C.J Watson will suit up for the game vs the grizzlies?

by riceisnicee on Jan 8, 2008 5:52 PM PST reply actions

Rule enforcement

I remember watching a Mavs-Suns game on espn and JVG mentioned something about Devin Harris being a flopper and that if he was a ref he'd NEVER give him a charge call, even if it was legit. Now I wouldn't go as far as that to clean up the flopping, but I have an idea that might help.

Create a most notorious flopper list. Have flopping be a stat to keep track of and give the refs a list of the top floppers playing in the game that their reffing. Its usually the SAME guys who do it game in and game out. Harris, Varajao, Fisher, ELLIS, AI, etc. Guys get penalized with no-calls and the game's rythm doesn't get disrupted.

Best duo since...

by Tim N Chris Burger on Jan 8, 2008 5:56 PM PST reply actions

YOU FORGOT!

RAJA BELL, Oberto, Scola, Manu and even Baron to some extent.

by saintdee on Jan 8, 2008 6:02 PM PST up reply actions

I could write a whole diary just listing names...

That 300 character minimum would be toast! The ones I listed were just the tip o' the iceberg. I think "ETC" would suffice.

Best duo since...

by Tim N Chris Burger on Jan 8, 2008 6:06 PM PST up reply actions

i

just couldn't believe you left out the notorious Manu in favor of AI.

by saintdee on Jan 8, 2008 6:39 PM PST up reply actions

Another

Al Harrington deserves some sort of nomination here. I wouldn't say he's a notorious flopper, but he damn sure doesn't try to block or change shots. He prefers to try to draw a charge. It seems to me that more often than not he ends up fouling the guy rather than drawing a charge. Challenge the shot big man!

by Fantasy Junkie on Jan 8, 2008 9:46 PM PST up reply actions

Hard cap

I think I'd welcome a hard cap actually. It's done a good job of balancing the teams in the NFL. You have to be damn smart to put together a dynasty as the Pats have done and it penalizes teams for poor spending. In the NBA, you could do away with the luxury tax, but keep the exceptions. It won't ever happen in the NBA, but is an interesting idea.

by Fantasy Junkie on Jan 8, 2008 9:54 PM PST reply actions

Compromise

A compromise could simply be to relax the matching criteria. Now trades are prohibited where u take back 125% + $100k of what you send out; if the even made it 150% + $xxx amount, more trades would be plausible.

We should also get rid of those stupid "trade kickers" that Kobe/Garnett/Generic Superstar X never waive even tho they "Want to win".

SB Nation Quality Control

AIM: Jetforze

by OptionZero @ Golden State Of Mind on Jan 9, 2008 1:02 AM PST up reply actions

Relaxing the Trade Restrictions

I'd be for some sort of in between of what Pree suggested and what you've written above. I'm not sure what the exact percentage should be but I agree with Pree that if a team wants to take on extra cash, let them do it. If a GM believes they can improve their team by doing it, then it should be allowed.

I'm no cap expert, so what is the reason for the 125% + 100k restriction? I can't imagine that it's simply to keep teams from spending too much. Is it all for competitive balance? If so, isn't that what the lux tax is meant to do?

by Fantasy Junkie on Jan 9, 2008 10:06 AM PST up reply actions

Trade restriction

I imagine it's to prevent teams from doing what the Yankees do- trading cheap scrub player X for expensive but unwanted star player Y.

With the salary matching and cap, no team will be able to take on significantly more salary in-season, so you can't "buy" improvements right away.

Of course, you take on "longer" contracts if you want to "go all out", as with Denver and Iverson, which is why expirings are relevant as a trading piece.

SB Nation Quality Control

AIM: Jetforze

by OptionZero @ Golden State Of Mind on Jan 9, 2008 11:51 AM PST up reply actions

Let's see...

The tax itself is much more of a deterrent to teams with a smaller fan base and smaller revenues. The luxury tax doesn't eat into the margins of teams like NY, LA, or Dallas.

Without the trade restriction, those teams could just count bad signings as a loss and pick up whoever they want by taking on further bad contracts or doling out draft picks, etc. If the money makes sense ($ spent on players < extra revenue), you make the trade. Since the revenue increase is going to be pretty much proportional to the current revenue, you can see how teams with large fan bases and revenue streams have more of an incentive to pay more for talent.

The trade restriction limits their ability to just ignore bad signings, creating more parity.

Is it perfect? No. Does it need to be fixed? Maybe. How do you fix it? Dunno. As has been mentioned, with guaranteed contracts, a hard cap is unreasonable. You could make an incremental salary cap/restriction. Something like: teams less than 15M over the cap have 100% luxury tax and 150% trade restriction, while teams greater than 15M over have a 150% luxury tax and 90% trade restriction.

by Dubs fan in Boston on Jan 9, 2008 11:53 AM PST up reply actions

hard caps

The NFL has a hard cap (mitigated somewhat by signing bonuses that are divvied up over a contract life), but the vast majority of contracts are not guaranteed. Guaranteed contracts with a hard cap would be a disaster for the quality of play.

As it is, the Lux tax is getting much closer to a hard cap, in that it's a target that most teams are now aiming at. The reality is as constructed, spending and team success are not tightly linked at all in the NBA. You have to spend a certain amount, but the diminishing returns on spending more come rapidly and it's easy, quite easy, to spend without seeing any results. In fact, there's evidence that spending very large sums tends to backfire more often than not. There are substantial penalties for poor spending in the NBA as it is.

by jae on Jan 9, 2008 9:20 AM PST up reply actions