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July 30, 2007
Garnett to Boston would make spot in playoffs tougher for Bobcats
If Kevin Garnett is traded to Boston – and that sounds like a very strong possibility – the Charlotte Bobcats’ task next season becomes that much more challenging.
New Bobcats coach Sam Vincent says he’ll be disappointed if the team fails to reach the playoffs, for the first time, next season. Vincent’s optimism is good; it’s time for this team to at least be in the playoff hunt. But it looks like it will be harder to be a top-eight team in the East next spring than it was last spring.
Boston – one of the worst teams in the league last season – will have dramatically remade itself if this deal goes down. Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen form a dynamic (and expensive) core. Then consider how Orlando (signing Rashard Lewis) and New York (trading for Zach Randolph) upgraded their talent. The Bobcats did, too, trading for Jason Richardson, but it’s no foregone conclusion the Bobcats finish eighth or better in the East.
Posted by rbonnell on July 30, 2007 at 01:23 PM | Permalink
Comments
LO-f'ing L.
I saw your blog was updated. The first part I caught was about the proposed Boston deal, and was like, "gee, go figure, Bonnell doing a whole lot of not reporting on the Bobcats."
Then I read the rest.
And not only are you not reporting anything substantial on the Bobcats, you're actually saying something negative about them....again.
Bonnell, just shut the hell up already. The only thing worse than your bare-bones Bobcats' coverage is you constantly finding negative twists on anything/everything that happens.
We get it, you're bitter that the organizatin's higher-ups hate you and refuse to give you interviews, as do most of the players.
Maybe if you changed your ways, your "exclusives" would include more than an interview with Knight (oops!) or Carroll every now and then.
Posted by: Will | Jul 30, 2007 1:41:47 PM
Even with all the moves being made in the east, I see the Cats getting into the playoffs. Boston might get KG but at what cost? Once again they are trading young talent for aging veterans. This is coming from a KG fan. The Knicks did improve with Randolf but they still have Isiah as a coach. How many times have we seen the Knicks add big name players who can't play as a team?
The Bobcats improved because they didn't lose any core players and they gained a 20 ppg player. I believe the Cats are going to wake a lot of people up this year. The Observer will change their tune after the wins come in.
Posted by: DS | Jul 30, 2007 2:41:41 PM
Will,
Thanks for the effort. From your post, it's obvious, 'You can't handle the truth.'
There's nothing negative about Bonnell's post. The worst teams in the East are all getting better, making for a tighter playoff race.
For something negative... The Bobcats could instantly improve the roster by dumping Fat-Body May. HT-f'ing H (Hope this helps).
Posted by: Col. Jessep | Jul 30, 2007 3:20:17 PM
The Bobcats are still going to be young again this year, but if the young players improve and they get a boost from better coaching, there is certainly legitimate hope that they can make the playoffs. I think one of the keys to a 10 win swing (which would likely put them into the playoffs) is Raymond Felton. As a Carolina hater I never thought he would become the player he did in college, and he has shone flashes of brilliance at times. The key will be for him not to try and do too much, which he did often last season, and become more comfortable in taking good shots when the time arises, not just when the team needs a basket. Richardson should certainly ease some of that pressure, and remember that Wallace is still maturing, and although his game isn't always pretty, he's much improved at creating his own shots. Fat body May has been exactly what you'd expect out of a 14th pick for his first two years, and the 15 ft jumpshooting 6th man that he is can certainly help this team if he can stay healthy. What the team really needs is a decent fan base that isn't astonishingly quiet.
Posted by: Greg | Jul 30, 2007 3:31:39 PM
Rick, did you take a leak in the Amazon River while on vacation and have one of those little fish crawl up your....wait, nevermind, you must be perfectly healthy since you wrote another negative article about the 'cats. Ironically, your "inside source" aka Sports Illustrated wrote a very similar article before your post. At least you're doing your part for the environment: reduce, reuse, recycle.
Posted by: Jefferson Davis | Jul 30, 2007 3:48:40 PM
Greg, I think you are exactly right about the key being Felton.
You knew as soon as Bernie was gone, BK was gone -- exactly, BTW, the kind of internal team/organizaiton politics Rick has been loathe to devote much attention to.
With Raymond handed the PG duties straight up -- recall how often he essentially played as a too-small SG, especially on defense the past couple years -- this is a huge change.
Raymond clearly has chemistry with Carroll on the spot up and the Bobcats have the luxury (and curse) of bringing three spot-up guys off the bench in Matt, Morrison, and the Herrmanator.
The Bobcats need one of their young bigs to develop ASAP as Voskul gave good minutes and kept the Bobcats from being tissue soft on the inside.
I think this team has the parts to go .500 and I think that'll be the floor for the playoffs in the East this year.
Oh, and while you are right are the quite crowd, the Bobcats did that to themselves by pricing actual basketball fans out of the building.
Posted by: JAT | Jul 30, 2007 3:55:58 PM
wow, talking about bobcats and how much Bonnell stinks, the good ole days are back!!!
His point is fine, but how does he get paid for stretching the ludicrously easy "the east will be harder to beat with KG" into 300 words. Really, bonnell, adding KG to the east makes it more competitive? Wow, I wish I worked at the Observer. Maybe I can be a bcats writer too with articles like "If the Bcats lose Felton GWallace and Jrich, they're really going to have a tough go this year!" or "To win more games, the bobcats need to stop other teams from score and score more themselves"
Brillant!
Oh and a health Sean May is one of the best 10-15 PF's in the game.
Posted by: Bonnell=Greatest Reporter Ever! | Jul 30, 2007 4:20:14 PM
Yeah Col. Jessep, you are right, the Bobcats can't use the 18 pts & 9 boards that Sean was putting up coming off the bench last year... IF he gets healthy! I understand thats an IF but if you aren't a Tarheel, just stay away, you aren't going to like this team DOOKIE! Or are you a Wolfpecker?
Posted by: CHillyDoggy | Jul 30, 2007 4:40:33 PM
ChillyDoggy, you are a breath of fresh air, though I am saddened by your lack of any anti-bonnell comments
Posted by: Bonnell=Greatest Reporter Ever! | Jul 30, 2007 4:42:10 PM
*Firstly, I disagree about Boston being a big challenger. I see the Bobcats spot in the playoffs coming via a division crown due to an overrated Orlando team, a top-heavy, yet thin Washington team, and a very old and injury-prone Miami team. It'll be as the #4 seed, but that's how I see it happening.
Greg, the notion that May has given what one would have expected from a #13 (yeah, 13, not 14) pick is BULLSHIT!
*Recent #13 picks who all achieved to higher than Sean May did in their first two years:
2006: Thabo Sefalosha
2004: Sebastian Telfair
2003: Marcus Banks
2001: Richard Jefferson
2000: Courtney Alexander
1999: Corey Maggette
And that's just in the last 10 years.
*JAT, I won't again go into the fact that Felton was more successful in the very limited (less than half) time he spent at SG, and that he shot MORE OFTEN at a LOWER PERCENTAGE while playing the point. To think that he'll magically discover that he's not supposed to shoot every other possession or commit ridiculous turnovers while trying to pull off some And1 wannabe bullshit to impress the BabyBlueBoyz with the sweater vests and the Colombia Blue-tinted glasses is, at best, overly optimistic and foolish, and, at worst, ludicrous.
*CD, I hope you're not really banking on May's health going forward...he's never shown the ability to stay on the court, and beyond that, he's never so much as shown the desire to get on the court. He got paid, the team made the RETARDED decision to exercise his option a full YEAR before he had to, and he doesn't care about actually helping the team OR selling those tickets he was supposed to.
Posted by: Michael Procton | Jul 30, 2007 7:34:53 PM
I say lets see what May can do this season if its apparent that he isnt going to be able to keep up then waive him or trade him in a package deal that would benefit the Cats making it where he has to go in the trade.
Posted by: David | Jul 30, 2007 8:03:21 PM
It's being reported that 10 of the bobcat wins last season were called by the dirty ref. This all but guarantees that the bobcats will miss the playoffs again next year.
Posted by: kevin | Jul 30, 2007 9:57:39 PM
I agree with you kevin, no playoffs again next year. No playoffs, no season ticket sales, no $10 beer sales, another losing season both in the win/loss column and the P&L statement. HHHHOOOORRRRRRAAAAAHHHHH, SSSOOOO LLLOOOONNNNGGGGG bOBBIECATS, SEE YOU IN VEGAS.
Posted by: ironshiek | Jul 30, 2007 10:05:15 PM
Zach Randolph shoots under 50% from the field, doens't get to the line, and is an average rebounder. He scored 20 per game last year because there were so few people in Portland worthy of shooting the ball.
KG going to Boston surely makes them better, but possibly at the cost of pro-longing the East's disadvantage as the Boston trio are all pretty up there in age (NBA years, anyway).
But Orlando takes the cake this year. I'm shocked that thes guys who ONLY score, aka Lewis and Randolph, are able to attract such attention. G Wallace does it all, but didn't attract nearly the offer Lewis did (Hey all you Bobcat front-office bashers, at least we're not Orlando). The only guys worth max money right now are the ones that do more than just score.
The Bobcats are headed to the playoffs this year, and depending on two factors, 1) how Ray Felton plays at the point and 2) injuries, may make some noise.
Posted by: BustaCat | Jul 30, 2007 10:21:49 PM
Hey Kevin, it's also been reported that he didn't do a THING to affect the games' outcome or the point spread, so why don't you shut your damned mouth?
Posted by: Michael Procton | Jul 30, 2007 10:22:43 PM
I seemed to have touched a nerve with the great Michael Procton. Say what you want Michael but the bobcats got 10 more wins than they should have. You and Busta can keep praising the bobcats all you want, but the only way the bobcats will make the playoffs is if the nba starts letting every team in, they let almost everyone in now, that is except the great boobcats. Up your Michael.
Posted by: kevin | Jul 30, 2007 10:45:26 PM
I have to agree with you kevin. Here is an idea. Maybe Bob Johnson can start paying the black refs under the table and buy a few wins next year. I say black refs because he's a racist and doesn't want anything to do with white people, unless they are players and can pay them less. I find the nba to be a third or forth tier sport, especially now that you can't even trust the referees.
You thought the playoffs got low tv ratings this year, just wait until next year....What A Joke.....
Posted by: insider | Jul 30, 2007 10:50:44 PM
Dear Observer:
Please turn off the comments on the Bonnell blogs. This is dreadful.
Posted by: Bobcat Gamer | Jul 30, 2007 11:52:32 PM
Look at the coverage of the Bobcats compared to the coverage of the Panthers and tell me these bastards aren't negative all the time.
A Panthers player threatens to kill someone, and you can't find a peep about it from the Observer unless you are looking for it to begin with.
Pretty damn pathetic. Just look at Bonnell's blog entries. The only positive one is about Wallace re-signing, which Bonnell promptly followed up with "dominoes pushing Wallace back," as if he had nowhere else to go, so he reluctantly returned.
Oh, and by the way...
"It's been reported?" By who, you dolt? Fox News? He officiated six Bobcat games, and lost four of them. It shows you know jack and sh*t about the Bobcats though, actually thinking we benefited from any calls a ref has ever made.
All you racist rednecks need to take your ignorant @sses back to the Panthers page and get your rocks off looking at pictures of Kris Jenkins fat @ss in tights some more. You guys need to savor this time all you can, before the regular season starts and the Panthers disappoint as always.
You all might as well cheer on the Bobcats, because I'm sure you'd like to see at least one of the city's pro sports teams make the playoffs. Lord knows it won't be the Panthers, not unless, oh, Reggie Bush and the entire NFC East is implicated in the Vick doggy fights.
Posted by: Will | Jul 31, 2007 12:25:55 AM
Will......you are funny and so right. Don't listen to Col. Jessup. Bonnell is horrible....was there no way to send him to New Orleans with GerryV and the others? The sad part is that he gets most of his info from ESPNinsider and realgm.com messageboards.
Posted by: andy | Jul 31, 2007 12:35:43 AM
No one cares where you went to college. If you live in Charlotte and want to root for our city's team, then do so. If you don't then please keep it to yourself.
Bonnell - I don't agree that Boston is necessarily a contender with Garnett. True, they have more talent but at the cost of less depth on the bench and getting older not younger in the front court.
Its naive to say that it pushes a much younger team out - this is a small ball NBA whose refs will be compelled to take away the superstar bias now that they're under greater scrutiny.
Finally, the Bobcats aren't going anywhere. They can't leave Charlotte without reimbursing the city for a portion of the building costs of the arena (please correct me if someone has read the lease) but I understand that we have at least 20 years of Bobcats before they can actually leave. By then, either they've won a few games and we have taken them as our own or the city is populated with more people who don't have their heads up their a$$es.
Go Cats.
Posted by: DAW | Jul 31, 2007 6:28:53 AM
ok let's pretend they stay for 20 years. The first year they couldn't fill the old new charlotte coliseum. What did BJ do? He moved into a smaller charlotte coliseum and jacked the ticket prices. This resulted in even smaller crowds. So the third year he decided to stop giving tickets away for free. This resulted in even smaller crowds. He has cried to David Stern as well as George Shinn that he is losing money.
It doesn't sound like he and his passie is doing as very good job at winning fans.
So now he has asked Rent-A-Jordan to come in and try to win some love for the bobkitties. Rent-A-Jordan signs a letter last year asking for forgiveness for this pitiful team and it's owner. It doesn't appear that Rent-A-Jordan is winning anymore fans than BlackEveryTime Johnson has.
The Hornets filled a 24,000 seat coliseum every game. Bobkittens can't even fill a 10,000 seat gymnasium on a consistant basis.
Being a taxpayer I feel that we as a group have been robbed by they johnson guy. He tried to take advantage of the support that we gave the Hornets. Funny how we didn't have money to build the Hornets a new building, but this johnson crook thought we would support him. What A Joke.
Being a former hornet season ticket holder, and a current panther psl holder, I will never attend a bobcat game as long as this racist and his group of black followers are part of this team. Bob, go back to Washington, Chicago, NY, or where ever you call home, notice charlotte is not on the list. He doesn't even come to his own team's games.
Rent-A-Jordan and friends of Rent-A-Jordan is not working by the way.
Posted by: imataxpayer | Jul 31, 2007 9:38:48 AM
The panthers don't have a lot of black execs and no one seems to care. Why is that? It's amazing that when a black man has a business and has a lot of black people working for him it's a problem, but when a white person does it it's okay. That's the way business works. You put people around you that you feel comfortable around.
If Larry Bird would have gotten the franchise, only hired white people, and built a new arena you wouldn't have a problem and would go to every game. So don't give me that tax payer crap.
If you don't like the CATS then just don't go to or watch the games.
I live in Detroit now and it is sad to see the crap that people right on here everyday. Some of you have something to say on every bobcats article. Get a life. Why are you guys so full of hate. Does your life revolve aound hating the BOBCATS. That is so sad. It's also sad to see that my home town is so racist.
Anyway whether you're white, black, asian whatever. If you're a BOBCATS FAN I love you and pray for me during the winter.
Posted by: qcinthed | Jul 31, 2007 12:34:20 PM
The panthers don't have a lot of black execs and no one seems to care. Why is that? It's amazing that when a black man has a business and has a lot of black people working for him it's a problem, but when a white person does it it's okay. That's the way business works. You put people around you that you feel comfortable around.
If Larry Bird would have gotten the franchise, only hired white people, and built a new arena you wouldn't have a problem and would go to every game. So don't give me that tax payer crap.
If you don't like the CATS then just don't go to or watch the games.
I live in Detroit now and it is sad to see the crap that people right on here everyday. Some of you have something to say on every bobcats article. Get a life. Why are you guys so full of hate. Does your life revolve aound hating the BOBCATS. That is so sad. It's also sad to see that my home town is so racist.
Anyway whether you're white, black, asian whatever. If you're a BOBCATS FAN I love you and pray for me during the winter.
Posted by: qcinthed | Jul 31, 2007 12:36:56 PM
Another uninformed, ignorant idiot.
Johnson attends the games.
Johnson owns a place in Charlotte.
Oh, and the Bobcats will have a better winning % this year than the Panthers.
The Bobcats are young and improving, the Panthers are old and getting worse and worse. When their steroid-fueled Superbowl dreams fell short, that pretty much was all she wrote for this crew.
If you can't win when half your team is on steroids, when can you win? Oh, that's right -- never. 6-10 season, here we come!
Posted by: Will | Jul 31, 2007 12:45:25 PM
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