Unless it convinces him that Lee is the next Swen Nater!

http://www.basketball-reference.com/fc/pcm_finder.cgi?request=1&sum=1&p1=leeda02&y1=2009&p2=natersw01&y2=1977

and this from Wikipedia:

“[Nater] built the basketball program Christian Heritage College in San Diego, California and coached from 1985 to 1995.[5] He left the position because it “was high on work and low on pay” for employment at Costco. As of 2008 he still works there.”

That could be you David if you don’t take the 5 year deal from Donnie!

The players on the list in the original post are not comparable players; each of them simply had a somewhat comparable season.

It might make more sense to compare Lee’s first four years in the league to the first few years played by other players. Win Share is a solid, pretty all-encompassing stat to compare the players with.

Player – Minutes(Years) – WS

David Lee – 8040(4) – 26.4
J Whitehead – 7967(7) – 13.1
C Wilcox – 8678(6) – 18.6
L Vaught – 6636(4) – 16.5
AC Green – 8928(4) – 28.2
M Cage – 8758(4) – 19.1
T Hill – 8992(5) – 23.8
T Owens – stats not available
B Daugherty – 8473(3) – 21.9
K Carr – 8261(5) – 13.7
C Natt – 7567(3) – 20.6

So if you look at each player’s performance in his first few years, it’s clear that few of these players were close to as good as Lee early in their careers. In fact, Jerome Whitehead and Kenny Carr produced roughly half as many wins as Lee at the start of their careers. The only guy on the list who is pretty close to Lee is A.C. Green.

How about comparing him to some better power forwards? I killed a couple of hours and went through the top 250 players (by career Win Shares) and collected the same numbers for the power forwards as for the guys in the above list. Here are, in rough order, the top 20 by WS/minute early in their careers:

Player – Minutes(Years) – WS

Tim Duncan – 8042(3) – 33.9
Cedric Maxwell – 6926(3) – 28.1
Bobby Jones – 7970(3) – 32.4
Charles Barkley – 8039(3) – 29.7
Brad Miller – 7397(5) – 27.3
Amare Stoudemire – 7534(4) – 26.2
Kevin McHale – 8889(4) – 30.2
Dirk Nowitzki – 7021(3) – 23.9
Dennis Rodman – 7887(4) – 26.3
DAVID LEE – 8040(4) – 26.4
Terry Cummings – 8160(3) – 26.4
Buck Williams – 8789(3) – 28.3
A.C. Green – 8928(4) – 28.2
Larry Nance – 6999(3) – 22.5
Swen Nater – 8838(4) – 27.9
Mehmet Okur – 8195(4) – 25.2
Chris Webber – 7879(4) – 23.7
Elton Brand – 8926(3) – 26.7
Shawn Kemp – 7952(4) – 23.7
Pau Gasol – 8440(3) – 24.5
Alvan Adams – 9212(4) – 26.4
Larry Johnson – 8127(3) – 23.4

This isn’t a list of average-to-above-average role player power forwards. These guys range from All Stars to Hall of Famers.

Who is taking a bigger risk if he signs for one year?

The Knicks could lose him for nothing, but Lee could have a disappointing year or even get hurt.

If they sign him for one year they can still trade him later this year can’t they?

If he really thinks he’s worth 10m-12m we have a problem. It’s hard to negotiate with delusional people.

Anyway, what ever happened to the NY discount?

this is far from a certainty, FWIW. remember how pissed Varejao was the year before last? he sat out half a season because Cleveland wouldn’t give him what he thought he was worth, then he signed a deal for a year and a half and said he’d leave after that. well, that year and a half is now up and he just resigned with the Cavs.

According to San Antonio paper:

The Bucks are shopping Bruce Bowen, according to a number of leagues sources.

Milwaukee acquired Bowen in the trade that sent Richard Jefferson to San Antonio last month.

Bowen could be an attractive option for some teams because his contract is only partially guaranteed.

What exactly is the “mess”. Lee’s agent said his client was worth $10-12 mil a year. Walsh said to go out and find that money in the open market. His agent tried and failed.

Lee can be frustrated that the economy stinks, and that guys he thinks he’s better than are getting offers while he’s not, but it’s the fault of the system, not the fault of the Knicks.

The option still exists for him to take a one-year, $7 million dollar contract and then go to unrestricted free agency next year.

It’s less of a financial risk for him than taking the qualifying offer and it is a smaller cap hold for the Knicks.

At this point, I think that is a very possible resolution to this mess (with Robinson doing a similar move, only for less money).

It’s bad for the Knicks, because it likely means no more David Lee after this upcoming season, but it is better than no David Lee at all.

Miller gets $7M per from POR, which means 2 things: 1. The Knix are down to Sessions, Tinsley or Duhon; 2. David Lee is down to S&Ts.