Trader Ed made an appearance on ESPN 950 today, here's
the audio.
It was a rambling conversation which covered everything from the NBA finals, to the draft to European players. A couple of things caught my attention.
First, Stefanski said the Sixers' cap space won't kick in until July 1, after the draft. This means they can't trade cap space to move up in the draft. This pretty much kills the Memphis trades we've been talking about. They can't take on Mike Miller's contract without sending out matching contracts. That's bad news. The good news is that Stefanski said the Zach Randolph rumors are completely, 100% false.
When asked about Brand, Stefanski said they were obviously interested, but the ball is in Brand's court. He has to opt out before June 30th, then negotiations can start. He also said it's very likely that Iguodala will be signed long term, but you never know what will happen in negotiations.
When they talked about the draft, Stefanski said the Sixers have 12 players targeted, but they don't have one guy they'd want to move up to get. A lot can change in the next 2 weeks or so, so we'll just have to wait and see.
It looks like we're going to have the draft and then things will get exciting after July 1st. Three more weeks, Sixers fans, then the games really begin.
This quote really disappoints me, "...but they don't have one guy they'd want to move up to get."
For a long time now I've been pulling for Kevin Love. It looks like it won't happen now.
I think that's exactly what he'd say even if they did have one guy they wanted to move up and get. He did say there is zero chance that Love will be there at #16. I think his exact quote was, "There's more of a chance of me waking up tomorrow with a full head of hair than Love being there at #16."
That's very true. You have to take everything anyone in the sports world with a grain of salt. Tonight I'll still go to bed praying for KLove and hopes he wears number 69 as a Sixer.
Noooooooo, we're keeping Iguodala. Or maybe that's a smokescreen to make other teams think they have to offer us something great in a sign-and-trade.
It seemed to me like he was saying, "We sure expect to bring him back, but we don't know what his demands are going to be." He left himself some wiggle room. The host tried to nail him down, get him to say 1-10, how likely is it that Iguodala will be a Sixer next year, but he wouldn't bite.