To Mamba or not to Mamba?

Kobe Bean Bryant aka The Black Mamba is on the market. After demanding a trade on Stephen A. Smith's radio show and then reiterating his desire to be traded on his website (kb24.com) GM's around the league are scrambling to put together their best packages to make a run at the most talented player on the planet.

Undoubtedly Kobe will not want to go to a team that cannot compete right away, and the teams that have quality spare parts and draft picks to offer are in the best position to deal with the Lakers. So who better than the Chicago Bulls to put together an offer that would appeal to Kobe [who has a no-trade clause and could veto any trade to a small market team that didn't appeal to him] and the Laker front-office as well?

Chicago and Kobe seem like a great fit; it's a major market, the team would be able to compete right away, and the weak Eastern Conference would seemingly be there for the taking. But who to give up in order to get The Mamba? I believe that Ben Gordon is a nice player, but he gives very little on the defensive end and he is undersized to begin with [listed at 6'3'' but probably smaller]--so pairing him with 6'3'' PG Kirk Hinrich is asking for trouble from the teams that have big guards at the 2 [Detroit-Rip, Cleveland-Larry Hugues, Miami- D-wade, etc]. Unlike Kobe, who is not only a great size for 2 [6'6''], not only the greatest scorer on the planet, not only the most competitive, driven player in the league, but do you realize he has been elected to First Team All-Defensive honors 5 times? and second team twice? Sounds like another 6'6'' 2-guard that used to play in Chicago.

So Ben Gordon is expendable. I love Luol Deng. I think he is a sure-fire future All-Star with a great mid-range game, he's athletic, he can get to the basket, he's great in transition, and he has a chance to be a top-notch defensive guy with his quickness and length. Not to mention the fact that he is only 21 years old! This is where it gets tricky...Luol Deng is the type of player who would make this deal work, but do you really want to trade him and effectively blow up the nucleus of a young, still-developing team to trade for Kobe--who for all his talents will be 29 on August 23rd and has already been in the league for 10 years? How long is Kobe going to play for? I could see him playing for another 6 years, before one of two things happens. 1) He becomes mentally fatigued after 15-16 NBA seasons and doesn't want to go through the grind of preparing for and executing a long 82 game schedule. Or the less likely but still probable 2) At 35 Kobe will not be your average 35 year old. He will have endured the highest level of competition for 16 years. With today's training regiments and the level of attention elite athletes pay to their diet I'm not saying Kobe's body will be in some sort of advanced deterioration, but his body may just simply wear out.

If you are John Paxson are you willing to give up on the current team for a probable window of 5-6 years with Kobe to make a run at a championship? To best answer this question let's look at the roster if the Bulls/Lakers pull the trigger on a Gordon-Deng-Ben Wallace [for cap purposes]-9th pick in 07 draft for Kobe-Radmanovic-19th pick in 07 draft trade. Starters: Hinrich, Kobe, Nocioni, Ty Thomas, any one of a few guys [draft pick--take a flyer on Aaron Gray or Josh McRoberts or someone like Thaddeus Young if he's still there at 19, PJ Brown, Malik Allen, a guy from Lithuania with an absolutely unpronounceable name--Martynas Andriuskevicius]. I know this leaves them woefully inept at C, but in the Eastern Conference that really doesn't matter. The Bench: Radmonavic, Duhon, Sefolosha, any of the big men who don't start, Adrian Griffin, Victor Kryhapa, 19th draft pick.

Another option: Lets look at the roster w/o Kobe, but instead what if they traded Gordon and 9-pick for a big guard like Jason Richardson or crunch-time scorer with size like Paul Pierce? I like a Ben Gordan-9th pick-cash for Paul Pierce deal; here's the roster--Starters: Hinrich, Pierce, Deng, Ty Thomas, Wallace. Bench: Nocioni, Thabo, Duhon, PJ Brown, Malik Allen, Sweetney, Griffin.

One other thing factoring into this equation before I make my decision; Ben Wallace is clearly already on the decline. He'll be 33 in September and he averaged 6.4pts, 10.7rbs, and 2blks per game and was voted All-Defensive second team. Good but not worth 60 million/4 years. Wallace will be gone in 3 seasons after his contract expires, but by then another center may already be lined up-we can't know.

Drum roll pleeeeeease...ok Johnny Pax, let's roll the dice. Gordon-Deng-Wallace-9th pick for Kobe-Radmonovic-19th pick. I'm not fluent enough with the NBA salary cap rules to know if this is even possible, maybe one of my more informed readers can do the math. Let's get Kobe, pick up a center and a SF in the draft or through free agency and put out Hinrich, Kobe, Nocioni, Ty Thomas, and whoever, with Radmonovic, Thabo, Duhon, and PJ Brown, and draft picks on the bench. Let's get the most exciting, dominant player in the game and let's win a championship [or two or three]. Let's bring Kobe to Chicago.

One more thought: In 3 years when Wallace's contract is up and he retires I would rather go to war with Hinrich, Kobe, Noc, Ty Thomas, and the new center and virtually the same bench; as opposed to Hinrich, Gordan, Deng, Ty Thomas, and the new center.