Wolves Acquire Eddy Curry, Randolph

No word on what the Wolves give up. No mention of Brewer or a pick. Commentary will follow when the trade is final, but it’s looking like the Wolves really failed to leverage an unbelievable situation and really helped the Knicks here.

Some Thoughts:

Well the Wolves’ role in this has been finalized. One word: yuck. Not because of Anthony Randolph. Randolph will be intruiging, but I mean, if there is any reason why Kahn is a questionable GM, this is it.

-First and foremost, if he is indeed gone, hats off to Corey Brewer. He had his ups and downs but he was a great Timberwolf for his 3 1/2 seasons. It won’t be the same without him. Thank you Corey, you will be missed. My favorite Brewer moment was running into him one time after a game. My friend told him he needed a cheeseburger. Brewer laughed. That sums him up pretty well I think.

– Anthony Randolph for Brewer as a trade in a vacuum is really ok. The team decided to go in a different direction on the wings, and I am intruiged by what Webster and Johnson can do in the role with more minutes. This is a good opportunity for them to shine. Someone did have to go and I think the loss would have been difficult no matter what.

-Brewer will probably prove to be a very difficult loss for us to stomach long term. I see many contending teams licking their chops for him in a Matt Barnes, Bruce Bowen, Raja Bell sort of way when he becomes a free agent. He has many years left in this league and I can see him flourishing on a contender. That situation would not have presented itself in Minnesota so crying over spilled milk later is difficult to justify.

On to the deal itself:

– Denver cashed in on an absolutely stellar package to start their rebuild. It is almost unfathomable why and how they were able to push the Knicks to give up 3 starters and multiple picks given the timing, and that Melo would have signed there anyways. Probably more than we know, I guess.

– Kahn, did not get a stellar package. As I said above AR for Brewer is an okay trade in and of itself, in a vacuum. This is relatively fair value. But then let’s go ahead and cancel those two out of the equation. Where I am baffled beyond recognition is why in God’s Green Earth did we take on Eddy Curry’s $11 million cap figure (what we actually pay him is irrelevant) to allow this to happen. With absolutely no compensation for doing so. This ‘gesture’ or whatever you want to call it is pretty much unforgivable. Is Kahn seriously trying to do someone a personal favor here? Does he not understand the dire need for the Knicks to move that contract off of their cap figure to get Billups and ‘Melo in uniform? Could you have not leveraged the situation to acquire Gallinari or Chandler perhaps in exchange for some light sweetener from our end? He was the gatekeeper, and he blew it.

I want to remind everyone again, as I did in the previous post, of a McHale trade not too long ago in which Philadelphia traded us a first round pick (now Martell Webster) and Rodney Carney for absolutely nothing. Carney and Booth’s salaries represented about $4 million dollars Philly needed to trim in order to sign Elton Brand. They HAD to free up cash to get their guy. Does this sound familiar yet in its application to this evening’s events?  The Curry cap figure is about $11 million, nearly 3 times as much as the aforementioned. The Knicks absolutely HAD to move this contract for the deal to go down, and the Wolves ended up with absolutely nothing in return for providing the Knicks the ability to solidify a contending roster and perhaps the start of SuperFriends East Part Deux. Unforgivable.

What will the justification be? That they were determined to get ‘Melo out of our division… or something? I’m sure Kahn will dwell on something while he is comparing Anthony Randolph to Mother Teresa in his next press conference.

I anticipate 2 polarizing reactions to this: 1. Horror and 2. The faction who will think of the Brewer for Randolph trade in a vacuum and, like Kahn, will fail to see the forest among the trees in this situation. Kahn was taken advantage of by his former colleagues. There is no doubt the Wolves should have received moderate to significant compensation for taking on Eddy Curry’s contract. They were the gatekeepers to this entire thing and Kahn laughed and played along with the big boys like a little brother tagging along with his older brother and buddies to Six Flags. And now, our cap space is tied until the offseason to a guy who was recently sued for, well, an interesting sexual situation involving his driver (look it up).  And as hopefully everyone knows, our cap space dwindles significantly the second the offseason hits. So, Eddy Curry is our use of cap space, even if we waive him. And we recieved nothing from the Knicks for this gesture, or for the opportunity costs of a better deal we could have pursued with our, seemingly meaningless, assets.

Again, the player we acquired, Anthony Randolph (Curry will probably be bought out), will be interesting to watch. We need a quality big off the bench. He has had some success in his career and will probably produce immediately. However, Kahn blew a major opportunity to get  involved in this situation and he blew it.