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Are The Lakers Kidd-ing?
At the heart of the swirling vortex of NBA trade rumors this week is a whopper involving the Lakers -- the chance to bring in All-Star point guard Jason Kidd. It’s the big topic on local and national sports talk radio, basketball message boards and barstool conversations. It’s the sports talk equivalent of Anna Nicole this week.
You probably don’t want to be Kidd’s wife, but being his teammate makes a lot of sense for the Lakers. Their weakest position is point guard, and Kidd would be an instant and huge upgrade. The Lakers would quickly vault to potential contenders for the title, if not this spring than certainly next season.
Ah, but the real world is never really that simple, is it? There are a couple big hurdles -- starting with the fact a deal would need to be done by Thursday’s trading deadline.
Next, the Lakers run the complex triangle offense, and the inventor of that offense -- Laker consultant Tex Winter -- told the brillant Laker writer Roland Lazenby he’s not sure Kidd is a good fit. Winter wondered if Kidd might become what Gary Payton was to the 2004 Laker squad — a distraction that turns the triangle into a rhombus.
That’s part of the hesitation over Nets guard Jason Kidd. He rebelled mightily against the triangle when (current Laker assistant) Jim Cleamons tried to run it as coach of the Dallas Mavericks in the 1990s.“Kidd does like to have the ball in his hands an awful lot,” triangle guru Tex Winter observed.
But even if Kidd is okay with the geometry, there is another issue — he’s still got a big contract with the New Jersey Nets.
The challenge for the Lakers is finding a deal the Nets want -- and what the Nets want is to be good in 2009-10 season, when they move into the new building In Brooklyn.
Kidd, at age 34 now, doesn’t give them that. The problem is neither does the scraps the Lakers of offering for Kidd -- underachieving center Kwame Brown, injured center Chris Mihm, rookie Jordan Farmar and washed up Aaron McKie. The Lakers are offering some draft picks as well, but as Kidd would make the Lakers good those picks are at the bottom of the draft and not all that helpful.
There are almost as many rumors floating around about this trade as there are about Anna Nicole -- maybe the Lakers take on Nets’ Center Jason Collin’s oversized contract, maybe a third team gets involved — but those things make completing a deal exponentially more difficult.
All of which is makes it unlikely anything will happen. But it’s fun to talk about.
By the way, so is Scottie Pippen, the legendary sidekick to Michael Jordan who said he’d like to make a comeback at age 41, maybe with the Lakers. The good news is he knows the triangle offense as well as any player walking the earth. The bad news is he looked washed up when he stopped playing ball two years ago.
Look for the Lakers to make some inquiries, maybe even schedule a workout. But don’t hold your breath that he will look like the vintage Scottie if he puts on a Laker jersey.
AP photo by George Widman