i don't know if 'genius' is the right word here but i agree- this team is looking better by the day primarily due to babcock's plan. it's just now starting to work itself out in front of all of us, the irony being that it's the "all of us" not including him.
it upsets me to see what's happened here, to be honest, because the critics and perimeter fans will not have learned their lesson. i mean, considering the headlines being published now, the public support of wayne embry and
his 'genius moves' to get us where we are, no one'll learn. no one'll learn at all.
the early criticisms of the babcock reign will appear justified now, no matter what happens in the future. we could start winning tomorrow and babcock would just become the forgotten piece. if anything, it'll be painted as success in spite of babcock's decisions, not because of them. there's virtually no way to redeem rob now. that's a shame. i was never his biggest fan but he certainly got a tough break here. the people (be it the fans, media, players, whoever) starved for patience just couldn't deal with their flaw- and in effect, they won out. he'll be forever remembered as the 'idiot' who: couldn't deal vince for anything ("we gave him away! we gave him away!" cries from the fans who have short memories and presumably huge accounts with the national tabloids); bought out alonzo at a ridiculous price (i could never really support this one myself- but i think it was more of a crime on the part of mourning than babcock); drafted araujo ahead of iguodala (this draft night hindsight garbage is so unfortunate. i just wish people would finally concede that humans can't tell the future, but what can you do); wouldn't deal jalen rose for antonio davis (just pretending that the first-round draft pick wasn't included in the deal... the "worthless" first round pick... just like the two firsts acquired for vince... they don't really exist because they don't have names on them... but wasn't iguodala a first rounder? oh, i see,
that pick mattered...).
i mean, the moves after it became apparent that the raps would no longer click with vince carter were consistent (imo). it became a chris bosh universe to rob. i think the "mistakes" made while vince was here were made because of vince- you could almost blame him for their failure (like hoffa, like rafer). once he was out of the picture, though, we understandably began dealing now for later- not now for now- but a lot of us didn't pick up on that: "what the hell you doing! you're crazy! letting donyell walk for nothing!", "picking guys and keeping them in europe! fire babcock!", "1-15! fire babcock!", "you think we're going to be worse this year than last year!"
like we were planning to make a run for the title this season.
the latest trade with new york has caused particular pain for me. wayne embry is actually getting
credit for making it. yeah, let's see how that pans out when the raptors find the free agent market relatively barren this summer, or when the denver first rounder results in a quality pro for the knicks. i obviously don't know whether it'll happen like that, but let's just see what people say if it does. contradiction in a bottle. embry'll become the foe: "you couldn't tell the future! moron!"
and what's more, some of us are acting like embry orchestrated the trade itself.
man, like babcock didn't have that offer sitting on his desk for months. like, why is wayne getting the credit? because he pulled the trigger? who's to say rob wouldn't have done the same thing once the deadline neared? and i mean, it becomes especially absurd when you consider what we're complaining about
: just pulling the trigger. like we're more qualified than rob babcock to assess the trade's value. we "knew" that it was a great deal for the team- and rob didn't. it's 'obviously a great trade'. yeah, if only it were that simple.
if i had to put an honest spin on it, i'd say we're giving embry credit solely for not being babcock. in other words, we criticized rob so mercifully while he was here that, now that we're finally seeing some fruits, we can't swallow our pride and admit that the man led a strong rebuilding plan. instead, we have to offer the credit to someone else because we can't handle the fact that we've been proven impatient, unfair, and wrong. we're almost pretending. we
are pretending.
put differently, it's become denial. and that denial will probably allow us to do it yet again in the future. we just can't handle having been wrong. we want to be 'successful critics'. we need to justify our criticism- for now and the future. babcock's clearly been hung out to dry- and that story hasn't been printed. hasn't even been
hinted.
it's really kind of alarming when you think about it.
peace
Babcock was Genius (after Drafting Hoffa)
