The Chicago Bulls, if media reports are to be believed, beat out Detroit in signing Ben Wallace. There offer is estimated at 4 years and $60 million, which is said to be $10 million more than Detroit was willing to offer the aging center.

To afford the price, the Chicago Bulls will trade away Tyson Chandler and his large multi-year contract to the New Orleans Hornets in exchange for J.R. Smith and P.J. Brown and their substantially smaller contracts.

Was it a good move?

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The Toronto Raptors traded their 7th pick in last year’s draft for the Milwaukee Bucks’ quick point guard T.J. Ford.

The Toronto Raptors have been hearing quite a bit that they were going to lose last year’s point guard Mike James to free agency, with most rumors having the Los Angeles Lakers acquiring his services.  They didn’t wait to see if it would happen, although I’m not sure how interested they were in keeping James with how quickly they had him replaced.  T.J. Ford might be the fastest point guard in the league which fits Bryan Colengelo’s vision of creating another Phoenix Suns team.  Charlie Villanueva’s pick in last year’s draft was criticized until he actually began playing.  He made the All NBA Rookie first team, and some say that he was even the second best rookie in a group where only rookie Chris Paul didn’t have any struggles fitting into the NBA.  He will most likely be replaced in the starting lineup by Kris Humphries, who the Raptors picked up last month in the trade where they gave up the disappointing Rafael Araujo.

Milwaukee will play Charlie Villanueva at power forward, his natural position, which will allow last year’s #1 pick Andrew Bogut to slide over and start at center.  T.J. Ford will certainly be missed, but if they don’t find another point guard, it is likely that Mo Williams, who at times has played brilliantly, will step into his spot.  The trade for Villanueva will likely continue to spur rumors that Jamaal Magloire , who the Bucks picked up in a trade with the Hornets last year, will definitely be traded.  Most rumors had him being traded to the Toronto Raptors because Toronto is Magloire’s home town, but that didn’t happen in this trade.

Everybody has the opportunity every year of trading draft picks and/or players before and during the NBA Draft, but most often all of the rumors never come to fruition.

If I had to make a guess on this year, however, I would guess that there will be lots of trading.

Call it a gut instinct, but it doesn’t seem that anyone this year is happy where they are drafting.

The Toronto Raptors seemed like it would be plenty happy picking 5th since the guy they wanted to pick would be available with the 5th pick.  Suddenly awarded the 1st pick in the lottery, Toronto doesn’t seem any too happy to have the pick.  They don’t want to pick Bargnani at #1, but they really don’t want to pick anybody else but Bargnani.  You’d think they would be in an enviable position, but it seems like now they have more choices than they want and if they go with their gut, their #1 pick could go down in the history books as one of the worst #1 picks.  Add to that the fact that high picks are more pressured (e.g. Kwame Brown, Darko Milicic) to perform right away, and Toronto seems like they are in a hurry to trade back down to where they wanted to pick to begin with.  Unfortunately, but they also don’t want the deal to go down in history as a poor choice trading down (e.g. Portland trading away the pick that could have gotten them Chris Paul).

Most other teams seem to be in similar boats.

The Boston Celtics realize that they need to get a little more experience, and adding another youngster is hardly the way to do that.  None of their guys are developing very well because none of them have any role models, except for Paul Pierce.

The Chicago Bulls are in the same boat, with too many youngsters, but they just don’t realize it.  And two picks in the top 16 certainly isn’t going to help them get more experienced.  I think they do actually realize it, but, like Toronto, they have a similarly difficult time justifying trading the #2 pick away.

I don’t know what the Portland Trailblazers should really do.  Drafting the ‘stache probably won’t save them, but what they really need to do, cutting and/or trading every player on the team, probably isn’t feasible.  Can they get Adam Morrison with the fourth pick?  Maybe.  Will he sell tickets?  Probably.  Will they be able to save the team?  Not without some significant off-season trading and free agent signings.  I’m glad the Portland fans are riled up about the draft because without significant changes, the current team isn’t going very far.

All the other lottery teams, lumped together, seem like they are collectively uneasy with their picks as well.

Teams selecting players in the top seven want to trade into the 8 to 14 range, perhaps to save themselves from having to pick from the crapshoot at the top.  At least, in the 8 to 14 range or 8 to 20 range, a bad pick would be excusable.  Another obvious reason would be that those teams have been picking in the lottery for the past decade anyway, and the last thing that some of those teams need is another talented 20 year old with no one to teach them.
People in the 8 to 20 range are trying to get into the 1 to 7 range, because those players at the top fit more of what they need.  They also know that those top 7 players are unlikely to drop much below 10 because even though they don’t know who to pick, they have to pick somebody and they won’t dare pick someone too out of the norm (e.g. Charlie Villanueva ended up being a great pick, but Toronto was hounded about it for the whole summer).
The teams beyond 20 know that they really can’t get anything that will help them right away (if ever) and hate to even have a guaranteed first round contract if they really don’t want to pick from among those players to begin with.  Most of those teams have multiple picks beyond 20, which makes it even worse.  Add to that the fact that NEXT year’s draft promises to be a real winner, and you see a bunch of teams hoping to translate their pick into one at the same spot in the next year.  To solve that dilemma they are trying to trade out of the first round, out of this year, or into the lottery.
Pile on all of the big names rumored to be on the trading block, and I think this draft promises to be one of the more noteworthy drafts in recent memory, if only for the trades.

If Mock Drafts are to be believed, which they aren’t, then the consensus picks for the Utah Jazz appear to be sharpshooting guard J.J. Redick or Senegal Center Saer Sene.

J.J. Redick’s recent DWI and bad back have certain hurt his stock with some of the higher teams that were rumored to be interested in him, namely Houston and Orlando.  I don’t think the DWI will hurt his chances of being drafted by the Jazz, but with Utah’s recent problems with drafting injury-prone players, you’ve got to wonder if they should take a chance on Redick’s back.

Saer Sene, on the other hand, is raw, but appears to be very talented.  He is seven feet, and could be a legitimate center in the league for many years to come.  The Jazz recently brought him back for a second workout, which is usually a good sign that they are interested.

If I had the choice of either one of them, I might regret it later on, but I would probably go for Saer Sene just because of Redick’s back.  Then, as I would have enough larger players, and a huge hole at shooting guard, I would trade Carlos Boozer for the best shooting guard I could get, which in my opinion would be Ben Gordon of the Chicago Bulls.

A starting 5 of Deron Williams, Ben Gordon, Andre Kirilenko, Mehmet Okur, and Rafael Araujo could be very productive the first year, and with C.J. Miles, Matt Harpring (if he could be re-signed), and Saer Sene coming off of the bench, they could probably make it into the playoffs.  Obviously, the Jazz would have to hope that in three or four years, Saer Sene would become a top tier center, in the which case, Deron, Ben, Andre, Memo, and Saer Sene would be a monster starting five.

Picking at #4, Portland may be out of luck.  A lot of teams are trying to make their way up to the #1 pick to draft Adam Morrison, and Toronto, who prefers Andrea Bargnani to Adam Morrison, if the NBA Draft Rumors are to be believed, and Bargnani is believed to be available at a lower pick, though probably not too low.  And if they keep the pick, Toronto might just choose Morrison over Bargnani, though most rumors have the choice between Aldridge and Bargnani.

At #2, it is unlikely that the Chicago Bulls will pick Morrison.  It also seems unlikely that they would trade the pick, although, in my opinion, they should trade the pick for a veteran that can help them right away.  They have plenty of young players trying to develop, as it is, and they need another young talented player who needs to learn his way around the NBA just about as much as they need a hole in the head.

The biggest problem that Portland might have is that Bernie Bickerstaff of the Charlotte Bobcats appears to like Morrison, though by the sound of it, Michael Jordan actually has the final say in who they draft.  Jordan appears to have had his eye on Brandon Roy, but Roy has dissed Jordan twice rather than try out for his Airness.  After only a few minutes in front of the Bobcats, it is hard to say whether Jordan would pull the trigger on a guy who clearly isn’t interested in being the third pick in the draft.  That might leave them to select the best scorer in the NCAA last year.  It is also likely that Morrison would bring with him a good amount of publicity, and the Bobcats could certainly use that.

The good news for Portland is that at least they have a chance at him, and even if they don’t get him, LaMarcus Aldridge, Andrea Bargnani, or Tyrus Thomas have to be available, and all of them are very likely to become good NBA players, most likely even better than the ‘Stache.

But don’t tell Portland fans that I said that.