The Astonishing Bryan Colangelo

[Tool]

This thread was made just to inform and talk about passed Bryan Colangelo moves he has made in his General Managing career, not to rip or diss him, but just to think what if?

First off if you haven't read the book by Bill Simmons I suggest you go out and get it. It costs about 40 Canadian, so instead of getting a used game from EB games the next time your bored do yourself a favour and get this and read it till your eyes bleed. Its a great read for ball fans young and old plus its huge and its not a novel, so you can pick it back up anytime (like I have just done on the verge of a new NBA season) On to my post.

As we all know, Colangelo was the GM of the Phoenix Suns before being hired by Peddie and MLSE. So I'm just going to cut to the chase. I realize that Phoenix was within two wins of the 2005 finals, however in 2004 they traded away the 7th pick (a chance to take Iggy or Deng) to Chicago for 3 mill and a future first rounder.

A week after he goes on to sign Q-Rich to a six year contract worth over 40 mill. See where I'm getting at? But the worst has yet to come. He goes on to swap Q-Rich to the Knicks along with Nate Robinson for Kurt Thomas. I guess he really need a big man eh? Well that trade didn't work out, so in order to dump Thomas' contract Seattle takes 2 firsts with him. Lets recap - The suns lost 4 first round pick the potential of drafting Deng or Iggy and signed Q-Rich. I'm guessing no one is going to disagree on this one who would you rather have? The number 7 pick in 04', the 21st pick in 05' and first round picks in 2008 and 2010. Moving on

I'm no sold on a rookie Deng or Iggy putting them over to get to the finals in 2005, but after the season they go and lowball Joe Johnson and he asks them not to match ATL's offer. Just so we all know the Suns core could have been Nash-Johnson-Marion-Amar'e sounds like they could have been set for decades. Okay, where are we the core breaks up and they're left with Diaw coming off the bench and two future firsts. From there instead of drafting Rondo in the 06' draft they trade his rights away to Boston for the Cavs 2007 first rounder and cash. To top it all off heres my favourite one. They sign Marcus Banks to a 24 million dollar contract.

So what are you trying to say here? They could have paid Johnson the money they we're paying Banks and Diaw? Yess sir, but wait it doesn't stop there. In 2007 they sell their late first rounder (Rudy Fernandez) to Portland. Guess they never saw anything in him nor wanted to stash him in Europe. Well it must have lit a fire under Rudy because he gave the Redeem team a run for their money in the 08' Olympics.

[bada bing]

interesting post. Colangelo really got nash'd in phoenix. By that i mean he got very lucky to get nash who hit his prime at the right moment. All the bad moves that BC was making, were being overshadowed by Nash's amazingness. But when this guy came to a rebuilding franchise, his mistakes just couldn't be covered up.

[bokes15]

That would've been a very good core and all, but one that would've been ridiculously hard to maintain unless they started spending way over the cap. Not that i'm saying he made all the right moves there because he most certainly didn't. But I do remember that Marion was having a hard time co-existing with Amar'e because he was suffering from Scottie Pippen syndrome. Then there was Joe Johnson who was getting a ton of hype at the time so paying and keeping happy a Nash/Johnson/Amar'e/Marion core would've been hard. Especially when they seemed to be missing a post player with no maneuvering room to get one. Kurt Thomas was def not the right choice but a change needed to be made for sure.

[bballnoob]

It didn't help that his owner (Sarver) was a huge cheap skate and played a big role in wasting that window the Suns had. With that being said, the Banks signing and esp. the Thomas trade was ****ing inexcusable.

I do agree however with their decision to let Johnson go. At that contract size that Johnson had received, it wouldn't have been worth it especially with Amare/Nash/Marion still in the fold. The Suns had enough scoring and the extra playmaking aspect that Johnson brought was a luxury not worth that kind of a deal.

As well, before he got morbidly obese, Diaw helped salvage the season when Amare was out the whole year and was a key part of the Suns' deepest run in the playoffs IIRC.

[Skywalker]

he sucks