The guys Garnett Should be Playing With...

Looking at the history of NBA champions, it’s easy to see that there is a clear outline for how to win an NBA championship. First, you need to start with a superstar, and not a superstar in the way that Steve Francis or Paul Pierce are superstars, but a truly gifted player who understands the subtleties of when to take over a game, and when to kick it out to Steve Kerr for the win. I think that at any given time in the NBA there are 4 possibly five players who fill that role: Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett, Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe Bryant are those guys right now, with perhaps LeBron James (maybe another year or two of seasoning). Some would add Dirk Nowitzki and Jermaine O’Neal, but I think there are too many areas of their games which are just average (leadership primary among them). After choosing this superstar, you select an exceedingly good wingman, this player could be almost anyone else from the league’s “perceived” superstars (so, in theory it could be Francis or Pierce), however that player’s talents have to compliment your alpha star (the way Scottie Pippen complimented Jordan). Then you need a third star caliber player, usually, he is almost a superstar, but has holes in his game (the way Tony Parker is streaky, or Rodman couldn’t score). Finally, you complete your starting roster with two players who space the floor, defend well, and hopefully specialize in one aspect of the game (i.e., provide rebounding, above average defense, or knocking down the open J). This isn’t a hard fast rule, the Detroit Pistons have won 3 championships by putting 5 starters above average at their position on the floor, but that is less common than the above method. Obviously, since only 4 to 5 of these true “superstars” exist at any given time, very few teams actually have a chance to win a title in any given NBA season. Of course, this is why in 25 years only 7 different franchises have won championships (and the ’82 76ers are the only franchise during that stretch to win a single title). Usually when the iconic player comes along, everyone knows (LeBron in 2003, Duncan in 1997, Shaq in 1992), but sometimes the scouts miss them: Jordan went third, Garnett and Kobe were undervalued because they were high schoolers. Since iconic players are rarely traded, it means that for the most part, it’s the luck of the ping pong balls which determines whether your team will win a championship during any given generation of play (of course, every once in awhile you get a moronic decision like Jerry Buss trading Shaq, but you really cannot count on another owner having a complete lobotomy and returning to work the next day). The trick, is not blowing it once you find yourself bequeathed with basketball genius. This is the challenge facing Cleveland right now, are they making the right roster choices to put those two and three stars around LeBron for when he blossoms, or are they going to squander a good opportunity and weigh him down with deadweight the way Kevin McHale has surrounded Garnett with Mark Madsen, Joe Smith, and Troy Hudson.

Obviously there’s no point putting together a “fantasy’ team if you do not believe it can compete for championships, so when given the task of selecting a salary compliant team, I knew I needed one of my iconic players. Kobe was the first I rejected, frankly simply because I don’t like him. Shaq and LeBron are heading in the opposite directions. Shaq can lead a team to a championship this year, but soon he will have to hand off the alpha male title to Wade (who along with Amare Stoudemire would be my future choices to join that iconic group) and LeBron will be the top dog for a long time, but since he has yet to reach the playoffs we need baby steps. All of which leaves Duncan and Garnett. Either would be fine, because Garnett is the NBA’s best player, while Duncan is a three time playoff MVP. I’d select Garnett, partly because Duncan is a little older and his body has become less reliable (he’s only played 66 and 69 games the last two years), but mostly because Duncan has already won three championships, which makes Garnett a clean canvass or something asinine like that.

It would be easy to surround Garnett with young superstars like LeBron, Wade, Yao, or Dwight Howard, and given the NBA’s rookie pay scale it would make a lot of fiscal sense. However since Garnett’s team has only missed the playoffs once, it seems implausible that any team with him would have the opportunity for a top pick. As terrible as their roster is, Garnett is so good that the Wolves still went 44-38 last year and had only a 0.7% chance of winning the first pick. So I restricted myself when selecting players in their rookie contract to guys who were chosen in the 20s, believing that is near where my team would have been selecting and that we could have made minor trades to move up or down accordingly. The only exception to this rule is players who have been traded while in their rookie contract, because obviously they were available. For my number two I want someone who can take pressure off of Garnett late in the game, a scorer who brings defense, heady play, and leadership. When Manu Ginobili signed his 52 million, 6 year contract, a lot of pundits felt the Spurs overpaid, but then last year Ginobili joined that upper echelon of shooting guards and suddenly the 7.5 million he’s making this year looks like a steal. After him, I want a point guard, somebody who can make the team tick and wont fold under the pressure of bringing the ball up with the game on the line. Stevie Nash would be an obvious choice, but for four million less a year I’m going to take the slightly more acerbic --- but far better defensively --- Chauncey Billups. For all of the press about the Wallace’s in Detroit, Billups is the man that makes that team go. There’s a reason he won the NBA finals MVP, he steps up his game in the playoffs and takes (and more importantly makes) the big shots down the stretch. He might have been the best player in last year’s NBA finals and that includes Duncan and Ginobili. I would round out my starting roster with a young guy who is a rising star in the league. Tayshaun Prince was not selected until the 23rd pick in the 2002 draft, which is remarkable, because he brings an abundance of skills across the board (defense, rebounding, energy, and an improving, although bizarre jumper). Finally, I fill out my starters with the underrated Brendan Haywood. A solid defender and rebounder, Haywood would be the kind of center beside Garnett that Minnesota was looking for when they made the ill-advised decision to sign Michael Olowokwandi.

No team can compete in 82 games and then win 16 in the playoffs without a solid bench. When a coach glances down the pine he wants four factors: a steady pair of hands to protect the ball, a great shooter to knock down open treys in spot situations, a source of instant energy (often offence, but it could be diving for loose balls) to spark a lethargic team, and a defensive stopper. Given that skills in the NBA are expensive (particularly shooting), these attributes are best found amalgamated in a few players. My first player off the bench is the best bargain in basketball, Josh Howard. Howard defends well, scores, is an improving shooter and costs a pittance (873,830), remarkable given that he starts for economically the second worst roster in basketball. He needs to work on his turnovers and rebounding, but for under a million, he’s playing sooner than Christmas songs in November. Mike James is a shoot first point, but that’s fine, because he’s also savvy, experienced and reasonably priced. Caron Butler, Mike Sweetney, and Nenad Kristic all provide scoring, plus defense (Butler) and rebounding (Sweetney). It helps that each is gentle on my salary cap. I complete my bench with two recent draftees who wont produce abundantly, but should help occasionally, David Harrison and Salim Stoudemire.

All of which gives me:

C – B. Haywood, Wash (4,000,000)
PF – K. Garnett, Minn (18,000,000)
SF – T. Prince, Det (1,763,115)
SG – M. Ginobili, SA (7,425,000)
PG – C. Billups, Det (5,909,800)

G – M. James, Tor (3,410,000)
G – J. Howard, Dal (873,880)
G – S. Stoudemire, Atl (675,000)
F – C. Butler, Wash (2,448,714)
F – M. Sweetney, Chi (2,116,920)
F/C – N. Kristic, NJ (1,010,040)
C – D. Harrison, Ind (690,960)

Their total salary is 48,323,429 which comes in nicely under this year's 49.5 million salary cap. It also means the team has plenty of space before the luxury tax threshold (63 million) with which to resign its free agents (namely Prince, who recently signed a big extension with Detroit). I’d ask Mike D'Antoni to sit on the bench, because I'm impressed with how he's guided Phoenix "this" year, and given the age of the principle players, and their relative contract security, I’d expect him to bring home the title every year for the rest of the decade.