leidout

Ya know, even though a bunch of people here are really high on ron artest's skills... i think he's declined quite a bit over the past couple of years to the point where Maggette is an equal overall basketball player. Statistically he appears the same, but he just doesn't seem like the same kind of impact player he was in Indiana.

Livingston is done as an NBA player. He may come back, but he'll get injured again, before he even got that horrible injury he was already approaching Bill Walton's level of "most injured player ever"

I really think the only thing to do is work out a sign & trade for Brand (for nothing less than 2 1st rounders and a quality young player). Ask Maggette if he'll stick around for roughly the same 8mil per year, if not try to work out another s&t rather than let him go for nothing.

Then with our 3 (or possibly 4 1st rounders if we're lucky) begin to rebuild the clippers... ideally, getting Arenas to be the new franchise player, or draft Rose/Mayo... hopefully bring over Sofo... it'll give us a core of:

PG: Arenas (or Rose/Mayo)
SG: ???
SF: Thornton
PF: ??? (or Sofo)
C: Kaman

We'll still have at least two 1st round picks to trade away, hopefully trading them away for a solid young SG/PF. Play as best as possible for 08-09, then see what we can get for Mobley's & Thomas's contracts in the future. In about 2-3 seasons with that group we should be able to contend for a championship, and the window for it will be much longer than the last clippers group. Of course the most important piece to the puzzle is firing dunleavy/baylor/medical staff for people who can utilize our talent to its fullest.