But I also think the constant shuffling of rotations didn’t help Garcia’s defensive rating either. After all he and Salmons both were asked to defend almost as much of a range as Artest is capable of. That’s not a fair thing to ask out of 3 guys who are tailor made to defend a 2 or 3.

Good points on things changing (international teams), as well as things staying the same (market size bias).

Many people think Kobe Bryant is the best player in the league for instance. Many others think LeBron James is. How many people think the same thing of Daniel Gibson? Or Sasha Vujacic? (I think they’re both valuable within their skill sets.)

In otherwords taking one guy’s opinion at face value isn’t worth alot. A sample size of other stuff he wrote in that column:

Sammy Mejia, former draft pick of the Pistons, has signed for a Greek team named AEL 1964 Larissa, whose name derives from a joyous union of some opticians, the seminal Beatles smash “I Want To Hold Your Hand”, and a 6’4 black transexual hooker. Sounds like a good night in.

I don’t think this guy is a moron, but I think the guy didn’t see the number justification with what he checked to justify what Garcia “got” as far as money goes.

I do think he isn’t an idiot. And I still love his salary info more than just about anywhere else too.

That by my off-the-cuff calculation the Kings could easily have an extra $10 mil as early as next season to sign a free agent if the rookies look slow to develop.

If the Kings did overpay for Garcia, it was by no more than about a million a year (that would bring in him line with the comparable Salmons, right?). So, is it bad for a team that is going to have considerable cap room in the near future to slightly overpay for a glue guy that can fill a number of roles and positions? No way. If Garcia never starts, he can fill at least two roles off the bench better than paying two individual contracts to do the same.

The comments regarding his comments on FG put you in the same place you claim him to be, folks.

I’d like to take a moment to thank you for stopping by and continuing the discussion.

It says a lot about how you take your writing when you’re willing to jump into the fire of the (most likely biased) hometown fanbase to further explain your reasoning. Regardless of where we each stand at the end of the conversation . . . I respect that.

And I must say that your “sham” comment made me laugh, as we’ve seen the same thing from outsiders repeating the classic “Queens” rip on the Sacramento franchise, and are similarly bored with it. Pots, Kettles, and all that. Good times all around.

Pithy me, this whole time I thought it was called Sham sports because of the implications of proffesional sports beign a Sham, and not actually the person behind the blog is named Sham-something-I-assume-is-possibly-onna. Weird.

Okay, with that straightened out, back to a question. You say that he is “paid like a starter.” This is not the only time I’ve seen you use this expression. What do you mean by that? Specifically, what qualifies someone to be paid “as a starter” – clearly you view 6 million as the magic number. Why? Is it because it is 1/10th the salary cap? What counts as a “starter”? Mo Pete, Rafer Alston, Jerry Stackhouse, Drew Gooden, Bruce Bowen, Shane Battier, … are they overpaid/underpaid? If 6 million is a starter, how much is a superstar? What should a sixth-man-of-the-year get paid? What should a 15-minute-a-night guy earn? What are your thoughts on rookie contracts?
I’m not querying for any sort of Cisco reasons. I am curious as to what someone who spends so much time looking at salaries considers “NBA value” at the starter level. I’d love it if you do a blog post about it, though I’m guessing now your busy with the “previews,” but if you wouldn’t mind throwing out some thoughts, I’d appreciate it.

Finally, let me add my hat-tip to the hat-tippings for coming here and defending your point against what could be a bunch of people that want to be right and wouldn’t care for your opinion even though they’re all riled up about your opinion in the first place. What? Thank-you, come again.

Also, your site is ugly. I was going to link to the articles that used the “paid like a starter” term, but I can’t go to specific articles. Painful. It really sucks, because there is a ton of useful stuff on there that if more accessible I’m sure would garner more hits. Maybe make a pro… ok, I’m just going to stop myself there.

then my question would be, Is it better to slightly overpay and lock up a deal now or is it better to wait, negotiate tough and end up with a situation similar to Varejao’s last season or Gordon, Childress this season?