Quest Club of Arizona

The latest hot rumor concerning the Suns never-ending search to unload Amare Stoudemire has them trading their power forward to the Philadelphia 76ers in exchange for Andre Iguodala and Samuel Dalembert. Supposedly the Suns are initiating the conversation and the “Sixers are the side holding up the deal.” You can read the story here.

If there is any truth to the rumor, then Suns GM Steve Kerr and majority owner Robert Sarver truly are incapable of running a winning NBA franchise.

Here’s the 5-cent rundown on why this proposed trade is a loser.

Iguodala is either a small forward or shooting guard. With Amare gone, the Suns would have no replacement at power forward. Channing Frye is an even lesser rebounder and defender than Stoudemire and has a non-existent inside game. With his great perimeter shooting, Frye could serve as a “stretch 4″ but this would be useless without a power game.

Believe it or not, Robin Lopez would be thrust into the role as the Suns primary low post threat. There’s a lot to like about Lopez right now, but it would be premature and poor career management to make him “The Man” during the 2009-10 season.

Speaking of Lopez, his emergence would be put into limbo with the addition of Dalembert. As a true center, Dalembert is known mostly for his defense, shot blocking and rebounding. Sounds a lot like what the Suns want from Lopez, right? On top of that, Dalembert’s $12.3 million contract next season would make it difficult to justify bringing him off the bench. For this very reason, the 76ers are trying to trade Dalembert and are finding the market to be very limited.

Back to Iguodala, his place in the Suns starting lineup would come at the expense of either Jason Richardson or Grant Hill. Richardson is scheduled to make $14.4 million next season, so benching him would make as much sense as benching Dalembert.

Grant Hill is one of the classiest players in the NBA. He re-signed with the Suns only after they convinced him that their future plans actually pointed towards building a winning team (not “rebuilding”) and that Hill would play a major role in helping to bring along the younger players.

Trading for Iguodala and then immediately benching Hill would be a slap in the face for Hill, not because anyone is arguing that Hill is better than Iguodala right now, but because it would be symbolic of relegating Hill to a lesser role within the team.

In the end, the Suns would have a gaping hole in the low post. It would make the opponent’s job of shutting down the Suns perimeter shooters even easier. They would have to bench Grant Hill at the expense of losing his leadership. They would be taking on Dalembert’s hefty contact at the expense of Robin Lopez’s development. And the Suns would still have no draft picks for this coming offseason, having traded away all their picks already. This trade is clearly a loser.

Therefore, it’s all the more reason for the national press to insist that Suns management are the ones pursuing the deal. What an insult.

Today in Springfield, Illinois, the junior senator from that state declared his intention to run for the President of the United States. Barack Hussein Obama announced his candidacy for the Presidency. Obama is not the first black man to run for the office of President. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton were a couple of recent black candidates for the office, but Obama appears to be the first one to have a legitimate chance to win, not only the Democrartic Primary, but the general election.

Obama has a very tough road ahead facing some formitable candidates in both his own party and in a general election. Hillary Clinton must now be considered the front runner and John Edwards another strong candidate for the Democrats, who may be fielding their strongest field of candidates in many years. If he survives the terrific battle in the primaries he must face the well funded Republican candidate who will come from a field that includes John McCain, Rudy Guiliani, and Mitt Romney. And these are not the only candidates on each side.

I am a liberal Democrat and have been all my life. What sets Obama apart I’ve asked myself since I first became aware of him when he was running for office in Illinois. Later I heard him in person at a book signing at the Orpheum Theater. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. I knew he reminded me of John Kennedy. I have lived through all the Presidents from Franklin Roosevelt to George Bush. Some I liked, and some I wasn’t too happy with, but no one excited me the way John Kennedy did. In my adult life time the most exciting period was 1960-1963 when Kennedy was President. It seemed we were going somewhere. The President was playing touch football on the lawn of the White House. He was going to get us to the moon, and he made the Russian Bear back down. What was it about Kennedy and Obama that seemed the same?

Charlie Rose was interviewing George Clooney, the actor, a few weeks ago on his show. After they had discussed Clooney’s latest movie, Rose asked, “Who are you backing in the Democartic primaries for President?” Clooney is an political activist in addition to being a very successful actor and director.
“Barack Obama,” he answered.

“Why?”

“There is something special about him. When he enters a room, even one full of politicians, everyone stops and gets quiet. There is only one other man I know who can do that, Bill Clinton. I’ve thought about this a lot and I finally decided it’s leadership. I would follow this guy off a cliff.”

That was it. It was leadership. He is a born leader. I don’t think you can learn to be a leader. You either are one or not. I know all the negatives: he’s black. Can a black man be elected President of the United States? In recent days only one other had that potential, Colin Powell, but he didn’t run. Obama is inexperienced. Who is experienced? There is no other job in the world that can get you ready to be President. The closest thing would be a governor, but even that does not. So how do you know how he’ll do?

Character is the only measure I can think of. And maybe intelligence. Does he have the intelligence and the judgement to lead this nation. Does he have the vision and the drive to take the country where it wants to go and where it needs to go. Can he bring us together as a nation. Is he tough enough to be the leader of the free world? No one knows if any of the candidates is that man or woman, but I think Obama is up to the task.
He gave a terrific speech today and if you’re for him or against him you might want to listen and watch what he had to say. Try this website to see the video of his speech: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17079682/

Yesterday I watched as American Floyd Landis, the leader of this years Tour de France, crack over the last 8-10 miles of hard mountin road. I saw him finish 8 minutes behind the new leader of the tour and lose any hope of winning this years race with only one more mountain stage and one time trial to try and recover and get back into the race. It was painful to watch and seemed hopeless. Landis looked like a beaten man when he finally crossed the finish line. Could any athlete so badly beaten recover?
For Landis this is a one and done Tour because he has to have hip replacement surgery immediately after the race is over. He is in effect riding on a dead hip, a painful dead hip. That alone makes his ride an incredibly courageous act. But now it was over. He was beaten.

But somehow someone forgot to tell Landis it was over, and this morning he performed a miraculous performance. He attacked in the mountains early in the stage and without any help rode to a stage win and gained back 7:30 of the 8 minutes he was behind. In two days comes his last chance to regain his lead and win the Tour. He is currently in third place 30 seconds behind the leader, and Landis is a very good time trialer, which means he has a chance to win. But after today could anyone bet against him.

This is not riding on a well oiled machine like Captain Lance Armstrong led. This is a really tough guy pretty much doing this on his own. He had gotten some help from his team but not so much, and none today. For some of us it may have been one of the great moments in sports. GO FLOYD!!! You have a lot of fans behind you.

Okay, if you’re like me, you like chatting it up with Coach Moore, but rarely have the time to check in and see if the “wise one” has spoken. One way around that is to either subscribe to the RSS feed of the Quest Club Blog or sign up for an email subscription. Most people don’t understand RSS feeds and how useful they can be, but everyone understands email and subscriptions.

Here’s how it works. Click the link below and type in your email address in the form that loads. Whenever the wise one speaks on the Quest Club Blog, you’ll get an email notification with the actual post in the email. If you want to add your own comments, just click the link in the email and off you go to the actual blog site. Sounds good to me. Be sure to check your in box or even your bulk mail/spam box for your verification email. You have to verify your address before the subscription takes effect. It’s really cool. Give it a try. You can always unsubscribe later.

http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=36058 Powered by FeedBlitz