jazzy1

We should not in any way offer him 10 mill or more a season. He's not worth it, He's injury prone and selfish.

He'd be our new Allan Houston in a year or two. He also helps perpetuate the notion of the big 3. He must go.

Big 3 concept needs to die, we need more balanced with capaable inside scorers and a more shared ball mentality. We need better defense on the permeter as well.

Next season is gonna be a disaster wth the Big 3 concept.

1 of the big 3 MUST go and a defender added in its place.

f22egl

If he gets a medium ranged contract, I wouldn't be opposed to keeping him but a bigger one would be questionable. I first have to see who is going to offer Larry Hughes an outrageous deal to begin with.

Personally, Jamison will eventually have to go, not Hughes for now. If Hughes is not overpaid, he will be a good player to keep. I don't know if the WIzards will get any viable low post options though this offseason. I would consider Kwame but really, what else is there?

PartisanRanger

I would love to keep Hughes, but not for that stellar of a contract, since he doesn't deserve it. His play really broke down in the playoffs, I was kinda surprised. He kept taking ill-advised jumpers and shot a pretty low % while making Gilbert and Antawn do all the work. He'll probably go somewhere else, but I hope he stays so we can develop him further.

Shanghai Kid

Where ya been at Jazzy? This board has been pretty dead lately, nice to see some activity again.

I agree, I would like to see Hughes get 8-9 mill a year, 10 is pushing it. However, if we let Hughes go and don't get a suitable replacement we'll be back in the lottery next season. And not just because of that, I'm hearing Juan Dixon is a goner, and losing both Dixon/Hughes takes us from having one of the stronger SG spots in the league to the weakest. I don't trust Jarvis Hayes to be a good starter any time soon.

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SCREWED like Bret Hart!

BCH

My take on Hughes is that at $10 million a year, he is not quite at Alan Houston max level.

My concern is that if you let him walk, and don't replace him with a lockdown perimeter player, what are you left with?

Lockdown defenders are rare it seems, and lacking a better option, the Wizards can not afford to take a step backward.

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Where's the cake?

Moto

MJG has mentioned before, Larry should not get more than Arenas is getting.

Larry deserves that much though I wish had is not as easy to get hurt.

what I don't like Larry is sometimes he does not say the right things. For example he was pushing the big 3 thing and not wanting to feed the bigs.

ATLien

Did he play SG or point last year? Or a mixture?

f22egl

Mostly shooting guard.

HKF

I don't know how to feel about guys have career years in contract seasons.

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Coatesvillain

Larry Hughes is a lockdown defender? Have I missed something?

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Phinally!

BCH

Yeah the part about getting rid of Larry to obtain a lockdown defender necessitates a lockdown defender being obtainable. In the event a lockdown defender is unavailable, which is the case, the Wizards might as well keep Hughes, who at the very least was a 1st team All NBA defender.

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Where's the cake?

Ramos32

all i know is that Larry is our best defender and he contained Ray Allen..not many people can say they stopped ray allen from doing what he wants to do...he even stopped him from making the game winning shot...thats called skills on the defensive side!

in other words, LARRY NEEDS TO STAY

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The Future Is NowPeter John Ramos

MJG

Hughes is definitely not a lockdown defender in the normal sense -- we can't just throw him on the other team's top player and expect that player to have a worse game than usual. What he does lock down, so to speak, is passing lanes. A really unique trait he showed last year was the ability to gamble for steals, especially on weak passes, and still be able to get back to his man if he didn't nab the ball. Granted, not all the time; we still got burned plenty of times when he gambled too hard. However, compared to guys like Arenas and Dixon and most other gamblers in the league, I thought he did an amazing job covering himself when he didn't get the steal.

In a more traditional sense, Hughes occasionally locks someone down, more often then not in one or two short six minute bursts. Really, the whole team was like that though -- we showed all the time that we are capable of some great defense, but it seemed as though we could never sustain it for more than a few minutes at best.

The team could really use a traditional lockdown defender, someone who focuses their game on that (Hughes, despite the accolades, still values the offensive side of the court), plays tough on his man the entire time he's in the game. Doesn't have to be a Bowen or Artest either, just someone who doesn't mind getting gritty on defense. Maybe we could look at the often mentioned-by-jazzy Ruben Patterson? I've read enough Kwame-Portland chatter that perhaps we could do that swap? I'm sure there are others, but that's one idea.

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As for the topic, as I've talked about elsewhere, I'm willing to bite the bullet and pay up to an Arenas contract for Hughes. I don't think he's worth kind of money in the general sense, but the team can't drop back and let him walk just like that. However, I just can't give him more than Arenas. There needs to be some semblance of a pecking order when handing out salaries, and I can't accept Hughes and Jamison both making more than our best player. If it gets to the point where he can make $65+ million somewhere else, and he expects us to match or even go higher, I just let him go.

Depending on what happens with Kwame, if Hughes leaves, we could get ourselves some $9-10 million under the projected cap. At that point, it might be too late in the summer to really do much with the money, but it shows that we do have some flexability. It hurts to say, but if it gets to the point where we have to give Hughes $75 or $80 million to keep him, I'd rather just see what we can do with without him this season.

f22egl

He's not going to stop Dwayne Wade anytime soon though. Although I don't know if anyone can.

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