Butler Still Not Available

"I've heard multiple rumblings in the past month that Washington has made rugged forward Caron Butler available. But our research disputes that.

Teams are certainly inquiring about Butler, but sources with knowledge of the Wizards' thinking insist that it's a misstatement to say that they're shopping him.

You'd figure that a team mired at 10-39 would consider moving anyone on its roster. The Wiz, though, are telling teams that they'd expect a lot in return for Butler, believing that they're poised for a jump back up the standings by keeping him and adding a high draft pick along with a new coach next season.

Such a stance obviously assumes that Gilbert Arenas can make something close to a full recovery from his three knee surgeries in an 18-month span. The Wiz contend that their situation is not nearly as bleak as it appears looking at their record because they already know that they're going to be adding so much next season, but let's be blunt: How Arenas rebounds is bigger than anything else."

-via Mark Stein, ESPN.com

over 3 years ago Kyle Weidie 5 comments 0 recs |

Story-email Email Printer Print

Comments

I was just about to post this

I’ll just re-hash what I was going to say:

While I agree that Butler shouldn’t be considered unmovable, I doubt that anyone will have the right pieces to make a move that would make the team better any better in the short or long term. Having a guy signed to a contract for less than his market value is great, but it does complicate things if you’re trying to trade him.

At the end of the day, I’d say there’s a 95% chance Butler is staying in Washington. Someone would really have to knock Ernie Grunfeld’s socks off to get him to consider a move, but we’ll see what happens. If you think there’s a deal that could work, feel free to post it in the comments. We’ll probably shoot it down, but we’re open to ideas.

Bullets Forever: A blog dedicated to the Washington Wizards with analysis, commentary, and more YouTube videos than your eyes can handle.

by Jake Whitacre on Feb 6, 2009 9:57 AM EST reply actions