Tuesday, February 19, 2008
The Nets’ Jason Kidd could have a new team by Friday.
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Only a few days left in the NBA’s version of “Let’s Make a Deal.”
The Lakers were already winners, and the Suns and Mavericks could start playing with their new toys Wednesday.
Now it’s up to teams like San Antonio and New Orleans to see if they want to make a trade to help put them over the top in the loaded Western Conference.
They have until Thursday afternoon to decide, and with nine teams separated by fewer than five games in the standings, standing pat could mean standing still.
“We’ve never had a race that close at this point in the season,” commissioner David Stern said. “The trades seem to have piqued interest.”
So who’s next? And who’s left?
The big deals involving Shaquille O’Neal and Pau Gasol and the expected trade of Jason Kidd have swung the attention to Phoenix, Los Angeles and Dallas.
Largely forgotten is that the Hornets came out of the All-Star break with the best winning percentage in the West.
New Orleans finally got some attention by hosting a successful All-Star weekend, which ended with MVP LeBron James leading the Eastern Conference to a 134-128 victory over the West on Sunday night.
The Hornets have been largely overlooked, but there is some thought the NBA be right back here in the same building in mid-June.
“I think we feel pretty good about the way we played so far,” Hornets coach Byron Scott said. “Obviously, we haven’t made any move like a few teams around us have. But we feel we have a very good basketball team. When it’s all said and done, we feel we’re going to have something to do with it.”
The unofficial second half starts with 10 games tonight.
Much of the attention, however, will be saved for the next night, when O’Neal could make his Phoenix debut — against Kobe Bryant and the Lakers, no less — Kidd might suit up for Dallas, and Mike Bibby makes an immediate return to his old home when Atlanta visits Sacramento.
The trade deadline comes the following afternoon, but it’s clear many teams aren’t interested in waiting until the last minute.
The Lakers kicked off shopping season by acquiring former All-Star Pau Gasol from Memphis. Phoenix went even bigger by bringing O’Neal from South Beach to the Southwest, and the Mavs were hoping their deal to bring Kidd back to his original team would go through Monday.
Any one of those moves could make the difference in a conference where Houston has won eight straight games and was 32-20, and that was still only good enough for a tie with Golden State and Denver for the final two playoff spots. They would be tied for fourth place and home-court advantage in the first round if they resided in the East.
Yet, the West being powerful is nothing new, which is why the defending champion Spurs don’t think they have to react to the moves made around them.
“It’s going to be tough and people are going to have be playing well at the right time,” All-Star forward Tim Duncan said. “It doesn’t matter what moves you make, if they’re not playing well for you, if you’re not jelling, if you don’t find the right rhythm or the right people to put on the court at the same time, it’s not going to work for you.”
The Gasol deal has worked so far for the Lakers, who won the final four games of their road trip leading into the break despite a torn ligament in Bryant’s right pinkie finger. If center Andrew Bynum’s knee injury heals and he returns at full strength, Los Angeles could be the favorite to reach the NBA finals.