Rantings of an Insane Platypus - 17th April 2004 (draft day!)

Saturday 17 April 2004

The Seattle/Minnesota trade

Sam/Lassiter is an offense/defense trade-off. Sam is a solid offensive player who can shoot, drive, pass and rebound. Lassiter is a good defensive player with limited offensive upside. She has an inconsistent jumper and isn't much of an offensive thread all-round. A worthy trade-off especially with Adia's defensive versatility. Burse is a pure centre who will be Anne's new "development" player. She's raw but has good potential and we all know what Anne can do with posts. Burse sounds keen to work with Donovan and she won't have any undue pressure on her because she has two good, experienced posts ahead of her who she can learn from. Burse could be the real gem in this trade.

There is a question about whether Sam can be effective as a supporting offensive player. She was in the top 20 FG attempts/40 minutes last season at a sub-40% FG clip. With Betty Lennox also being on the team, it's possible the two of them will take shots away from the efficient inside players. This will be an interesting coaching challenge for Anne Donovan but I think she'll be able to make it work. Sam is definitely an upgrade over any 2/3 Seattle currently has.

I can understand Minnesota offloading Sam (also clears up some cap room) but not too sure about Burse. There are a fair amount of decent post prospects in the draft this season but most of them have a significant question mark or two while Burse has shown good potential and Minnesota really do need a good 5 (Tamika Williams is a 4 and Van Gorp is a backup at best). Speculation about deals to move up aside, it's likely Minnesota will take a perimeter player and a post with their two picks. Christon could be a nice pick for the Lynx as Svetlana Abrosimova has been erratic and injury-plagued throughout her WNBA career. Lassiter is a solid defensive presence but will only provide bench minutes at best.

This is a trade that can benefit both teams but essentially Minnesota gave up two starter-types for one. They may regret giving up Burse but moving Sam was a good move to clear up salary space and they can move Abrosimova back to the 3. This is a great trade for Seattle.

The other trade

So there's been a bit of fuss on the ESPN board about this other trade. Yes, it *does* exist. Yes, the trade is one player for one first-round pick. Why isn't it up? Several ideas - the WNBA has gotten its paperwork muddled up, the WNBA is lazy, the player in the trade vetoed it (I don't know whether she has veto power over trades she is in - some players do), platypuses stole the paperwork because they don't like this trade...

Yes, I think this trade isn't a particularly good one as it doesn't fit the needs of the team getting the player. I can see why this team wants to do such a trade (the "win now!" mentality at work) but I don't think it's the right direction to go in. The player involved is not a player I am high on but she's a decent enough player.

Anyways we shall wait and see. I sure hope the player involved vetoed it or the trade has somehow "collapsed". However this could just be a WNBA stuff-up...

My final mock draft

To come later on!