Yeah, according to the always-reliable NY Post (motto: "Throw sh*t on paper, see what sticks"): Stephen Jackson ("one of Jermaine O'Neal's buddies") says that Jermaine wants to be traded to the Knicks and Isiah:
"Warriors guard Stephen Jackson said O'Neal is angry at the midseason trade that sent Jackson and Al Harrington to Golden State. Jackson added if the Knicks did get him, they would be dangerous."
Okay, let's get to it. If you are a Knicks fan, this is both your best and worst case scenerio. Yes, you want to add an All-Star, and O'Neal is the best player likely to move teams this offseason (assuming KG stays put, which I do). He's better than Vince Carter, if you are trying to build a winning team. Only Jason Kidd, who might be traded, is a better player in terms of possible acquistions any team can make. So the Knicks landing Jermaine is the equivalent of grabbing the biggest name out there.
Jermaine is also just hitting his peak - he's 28 going on 29, same as Kobe. He doesn't have the mileage on him that Kobe does, though Jermaine does have some injury history. But he's definitely the right age - not over the hill yet, but old enough to know what he's doing (unlike Curry, who is still too young for a big, and hasn't yet figured out a lot of the finer points of the game).
Then there is the Curry factor - O'Neal instantly takes pressure of Curry, both defensively (O'Neal can block a shot) and rebounding-wise (O'Neal is a good rebounder). Though we've always argued that Curry's low rebounding doesn't matter, because unlike, say, 7'0 Andrea Bargnini, who doesn't rebound any better, and shoots his shots from the outside and over single defenders (thus putting extra pressure on Bosh to grab boards, as evidenced by the fact that the Raptors were outrebounded by the Nets team in the playoffs... the same Nets team whose leading rebounder in the playoffs by far is their point guard!), Curry often has two or more defenders in his area, and shoots so close to the paint that his rebounds are cleaned up as easy baskets by other Knicks (see: David Lee, Renaldo Balkman). What If Sports calls this "The Iverson Factor".
Oh, and about those double-teams Curry saw a lot? Yeah, O'Neal will make it less likely. In fact, if anything, O'Neal is more likely to get double teamed than Curry.
So, with those two down low, it seems to open up the outside for such players as... Q-Rich. Crawford. Marbury. Yeah, this Knick team seems to be built around an imaginary big PF who can block and post... maybe if he wasn't imaginary to this point, the Knicks might make sense. Sort of like how we argue that the Bulls are built around a missing PF/C with a low post presence, and how it doesn't make sense that they don't have one (Gasol)....
Sounds great, right? Well, one semi-big issue: O'Neal price tag. First off, his impossible-large contract (only KG gets paid more, and barely) extends through 2010, clogging the salary cap. Now, normally I would say "big deal, the Knicks are over the cap forever", but you may have noticed that, in fact, the current Knicks roster is such that 2009 is the season of cap relief, with only $41 million committed. That's the year Francis and Marbury and Rose's combined $45 million contracts all expire. O'Neal puts the Knicks over the cap for one more year, until at least 2010.
F*ck it. What's one more year? He's a winner - he's carried his crappy team to mediocrity for the past three years. Mediocrity is the next big step for the Knicks. If O'Neal can win 41 games with Tinsley at point and little other help, then given Curry, Crawford, Lee, Balkman, Q-Rich, Marbury... the Knicks should be able to win at least 45.
But what is the price? Can Isiah negogiate a deal with Bird and the Pacers? What do the Knicks have to offer? David Lee and Channing Frye would seem to be givens, plus a high salary player (Francis seems to make the most sense). But that can't be enough, and we doubt the Knicks can make the best offer.
These stupid articles always get me excited for no f*cking reason. The only way the Knicks even have a chance for O'Neal is if: 1) Jermaine refuses to be traded anywhere else or/and 2) no other team makes a decent offer.
We saw in the Iverson situation that a lot of teams failed to mount good offers for Iverson. Denver basically got him for very little. The reality is that NBA GM's tend to be satisfied with their teams' rosters. Maybe we should stay optimistic....
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When I moved to my current location nearly 4 years ago I was able to watch Jermaine O'Neal play nearly every night. Since, at the time, he was on the Bulls radar I started to break down his game and see how he would fit in with the Bulls (who had Curry at the time). My conclusion was that O'Neal and Curry, although both talented scorers, may actually hurt each other's game offensively because they both require posting up and getting the ball on the low block all the time. They aren't so much dump and dish guys either (look at Curry/O'Neals asst/to ratio's) as much as they dump and watch them try to score. On defense, he may be able to help Curry but I think he would be extremely frustrated by the lack of rebounding help from Curry. Now, if Q was able to stay healthy and play the 3 next year.....he's actually a good rebounder for a 3, so that would be interesting. I didn't think O'Neal would fit in with the Bulls, but he might with the Knicks because of his relationship with Isiah. He's seems to be a player who would excel in a #2 scoring option role because he wears down (hence the injuries) over the course of a season because of the pounding his defenders put on him. I wonder what this would do though for the careers of Lee and Frye as O'Neal would move over to the 4 and take up at least 36-38 mins per game at that spot.