Letter to Roger Brown

Saturday, August 13, 2005 1:28 AM

Roger,

I was disappointed at what a one-sided view you took on the Cavaliers efforts to sign a point guard. You used the "average salary" to make a point regarding Damon Jones' free agent value. The average salary is irrelevant, because it skews toward the high end because of a few star (often overpaid) players (this would be like using the average salary of all MLB shortstops after A-Rod signed his historic deal. Who cares what the AVERAGE salary is?). Perhaps the MEDIAN salary would have have been a better statistic? You're better than this, man.

I happen to think that Damon Jones would be a nice fit in a Cavaliers uniform, but at what cost? Any objective measure shows Jones to be a similar caliber player to last year's Cavaliers point man, Jeff McInnis (Jones averaged slightly fewer points and assists in about 3 less minutes per game). Like McInnis, Jones is consider a suspect defender, and both are considered to be 2nd tier (at best) starting NBA point guards. McInnis just signed a contract for two years and 7 million with the Nets. Assuming that the Cavaliers offered the full 3.7 million available under the cap, it seems that the Cavaliers made a fair offer. Granted, McInnis is a few years older, but at 29, Jones is no spring chicken. Along those lines, I have also heard that a major sticking point for the Cavaliers and Jones is the length of the contract, not just the annual salary demand. It should also be noted that Sarunas Jasikevicious (also 29), a more highly sought-after player, signed a deal for 3 years at 4 million per year. Again, this puts DJ's appropriate value in perspective. While a desperate team might offer a player like Antonio Daniels 6 million per year, and the top-rated free agent point guard, Jaric, may ASK for the mid-level, that doesn't mean they are worth the money in the long run. And it certainly doesn't mean that Jones is worth more than 3.7 million. Jones may get mid-level type money to play for a non-contender, but I credit Ferry for not risking the team's future on a non-premier player.

Perhaps your real point is that the Cavaliers clearly did not save enough money after signing Z, Hughes, and Marshall, to land a top-level PG. In truth, this was a very thin year at the point guard position, so there wasn't much quality to choose from anyway (the best proven player was an aging Stoudamire!). I think this is why Ferry was willing to spend at the other positions first and hope that one of the second tier guys would look at coming this way as a good opportunity to start on a playoff caliber team and advance their careers. Or, perhaps Ferry looked at the free-agent talent and decided that our best shot at a quality point guard was through a trade (hence the Jaric meeting).