I watched the final few minutes of Philly’s win at Seattle late Wednesday night, and wondered, “where’s Chris Webber?” Turns out, he’s wondering the same thing. From the Sacramento Bee’s Scott Howard-Cooper.
Play him as Chris Webber or trade him.
“I’m not going to keep playing like this,” he said.
Like the way his 2006-07 season has started, with an average of just 30.6 minutes, each while starting at power forward but often without finishing. The season is only seven games old, and already he has spent the fourth quarter on the bench three times.
That was his Wednesday in Seattle. In a close game, and in an important game as the opener to a West Coast swing for a team that arrived with three consecutive losses, Webber went out with 3:45 left in the third quarter and did not return. Even as the scoreboard tilted from a cushy lead for the 76ers to a big SuperSonics rally that put the hosts within reach of a comeback, he was kept on the sideline.
Philadelphia won 96-90. Webber played just under 24 minutes.
“It is what it is,” he said afterward. “The thing is, I’ve still got a lot of great ball left. I feel better than last year, so hopefully something will happen and I won’t have to keep playing like that.”
How bad are things for Webber? Not only has he supplanted Stephon Marbury as the league’s most untradeable commodity, but even the coach he ran out of Oakland can afford to gloat about it (sort of).
Of the done and dusted K-Mart, the Post’s Peter Vescey muses,
Think the Nets haven’t rejoiced once or twice that owner Bruce Ratner declined to match Denver’s offer for Martin? Not only because Martin has been relatively inoperable (so to speak) the last two seasons, but also because his exodus provoked the Nets to pursue Vince Carter.
How many times are the best signings/trades the ones teams are lucky enough not to make? On second thought, in light of how much loot is owed Steve Francis, maybe the Knicks weren’t so lucky. You be the judge.
At first glance, the Blazers saved the Knicks from themselves last season shortly before the late February trade deadline. Isiah Thomas (or was this another one of the surreptitious concoctions he blamed on Larry Brown?) offered Penny Hardaway and his expiring contract, plus a No. 1 pick for Darius Miles and the chronically injured Theo Ratliff.
From what I’m told, the first-round slot was undetermined, either Denver’s or San Antonio’s. In other words, the cost would’ve been Renaldo Balkman or Mardy Collins.