Trading for the sake of trading

Apparently, the Indiana Pacers’ “white boy” quota is not being reached, what with Pacers stalwart Austin Croshere being shipped off this past summer.

Taking that into consideration, the Pacers have made a trade with the Golden State Warriors, effectively swapping our set of underachieving small forwards with a new group of underachieving small forwards (and one underachieving center).

The full deal: Indiana trades Stephen Jackson, Al Harrington, Sarunas Jasikevicius and Josh Powell to Golden State for Mike Dunleavy, Troy Murphy, Ike Diogu and Keith McLeod.

Why?

I applaud the decision to get rid of Stephen Jackson, a player that takes too many shots, both on and off the court. I am fine losing Al Harrington, even though he was heralded as the missing piece in the Pacers lineup all summer – for the second time in his career, mind you. Jasikevicius was supposed to be a star – the best player in Europe before coming to the Pacers. He failed, never cracking the starting lineup even as Jamaal Tinsley slowly declined into mediocrity. Josh Powell – who?

But to get Mike Dunleavy? Troy Murphy? Two players that are as likely to change the outcome of a game as Jermaine O’Neal is of leading a team? Does anyone else understand this? Is there something about these four former Warriors that I should be knowing?

Maybe the talent ends up being even. Is that enough to warrant taking on Mike Dunleavy’s contract and a new mix-up in team chemistry? The loss of distraction is nice, granted, but I don’t usually believe in addition by subtraction.

The only thing I can think if is that General Manager Larry Bird wanted more white guys on the team. What other explanation is there, aside from executing trades for the sake of trading?

That’s all. I just wanted to see if anyone else could figure this out. My hits are going down, now that Patrick Lalley and I have apparently buried the hatchet (much to Todd Epp’s disappointment).

This was lovingly handwritten on January 17th, 2007