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Forget the poll - Jazz just DID sign Raja Bell

I dont think I could be more excited about this. I was telling someone the other day that if Raja Bell signed with the lakers I would have to rename my dog from "Raja" to "Deron". He brings exactly what we need, toughness, three point shooter, good wing defender and a great locker room presence.

KOC is definitely earning his paycheck.
 
Not to toot my own horn (and yes I would like a cookie) I was the first and about only person who thought we might bring Bell in. Second of all if Sloan and O'Connor thought all of the below quote is true do you think they would have brought him back? He brings shooting, defense, and veteran leadership for half the cost per year than Matthews. It is such a horrible thing that Bell wants to win!


tatermoog said:
I can't stop remembering.

It's just frickin' lovely to hear everyone reminiscing over Bell's toughness and leadership. The former generally manifested itself in him picking up a retarded technical foul any time he got beat late in the game, which crippled the team in several games over the course of a season. And his leadership was a combination of yelling at other players to get him the ball for an idiotic jumper during the game and calling the team out for not running "the system" and "passing" afterwards.

He's going to go into full-on schmooze mode now that he's back, talking about how much he missed playing in "the system" and for "Coach Sloan," but he wasn't that concerned with that when he left the team, leaving for another opportunity as quickly as possible and throwing the team under the bus when he was with Phoenix.

The most important thing to Raja Bell is not the team or winning. It's Raja Bell.

****.
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I apologize for my outburts last night. Im sorry YB, Im sorry Moog.

That said, Im very glad that Bell is back. Those that aren't...cry harder. Please.
 
The only question about this signing is Bell's age. I love(d) Raja Bell, and if he's savvy enough, his age won't be a huge detractor.

Summary, pretty into this signing. And surprised. Jazz will have to dump some salary somewhere, though.
 
NUMBERICA said:
The only question about this signing is Bell's age. I love(d) Raja Bell, and if he's savvy enough, his age won't be a huge detractor.

Summary, pretty into this signing. And surprised. Jazz will have to dump some salary somewhere, though.
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As long as the Jazz arent expecting him to play huge minutes, I think his age wont be a huge deal at least for the first two seasons.
 
And why are people opposed to signing Brown? He's a supreme athlete with good measurements, heady, can hit the open 3, handle the ball, make plays inside, and defend.
 
Sirkickyass said:
Source was Mark Stein on Twitter by the way.

Don't like the move. Bell is old, broken down, and coming off significant wrist surgery. Three years/$10 million, would have preferred Ronnie Brewer.
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An injury to his non-shooting wrist. That's certainly less risky and a shorter recovery time than coming back from a hamstring tear.

I'm on board with the move. Raja certainly isn't the palyer he once was, but he can give Utah 10-15 mins at SG and is still a decent outside shooter.
 
NotDeadYet said:
OK; is Raja replacing Matthews or Korver? If Matthews is gone, we still need another SG.
At Bells's age, I'm not sure how many minutes he can play over the course of an 82 game season, plus playoffs...
I'm greedy; I want Raja AND Wes Matthews; they'd be a great duo defensively!!
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Why do you say, we have to replace this guy with this one, etc.
CJ is replacing Matthews, just like Millsap is replacing Boozer.
AS for Korver, he averaged 7/2/2. Hayward easily gets those numbers as a rookie.

And add Raja to the list of guys who RESPECT Jerry Sloan and don't mind playing in Utah. I'm not bitter about Raja leaving for Phoenix. He was friends with Nash and Phoenuix called him at 12:01 with a fantastic deal. They also wanted an answer immediately (i.e. diodn;t want him going back to KOC and saying, will you give me the same amount).

I'm also not bitter about Matthews. He deserves nothing but the best. I hope fans give him a nice ovation when he conmes back.
 
GlassEater said:
Why do you say, we have to replace this guy with this one, etc.
CJ is replacing Matthews, just like Millsap is replacing Boozer.
AS for Korver, he averaged 7/2/2. Hayward easily gets those numbers as a rookie.

And add Raja to the list of guys who RESPECT Jerry Sloan and don't mind playing in Utah. I'm not bitter about Raja leaving for Phoenix. He was friends with Nash and Phoenuix called him at 12:01 with a fantastic deal. They also wanted an answer immediately (i.e. diodn;t want him going back to KOC and saying, will you give me the same amount).

I'm also not bitter about Matthews. He deserves nothing but the best. I hope fans give him a nice ovation when he conmes back.
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Dont think anybody could blame him for signing that contract! Sure Lebron left a little money on the table but it is still over 100 million plus his millions in endosrements. For Matthews though, unless Roy is injured he will be seeing a lot of the pine. Would have played more here. I guess he will count his moola while on the bench :)
 
NCJazz said:
Dont think anybody could blame him for signing that contract! Sure Lebron left a little money on the table but it is still over 100 million plus his millions in endosrements. For Matthews though, unless Roy is injured he will be seeing a lot of the pine. Would have played more here. I guess he will count his moola while on the bench :)
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I'll bet he was really, really hoping the Jazz would match. Matthews can still get 10-15 mins/per in Portland. And it's not like he's going to a losing team or needs to play for his next contract. Matthews was set, either way. Still, I'm sad to see him go. If I were at a Jazz/Portland game, I'd give him standing "O" when he came into the game for the 1st time. These are the playes who desverve it. Oh, and the same goes for Raja. Yes, he's a bit of a punk. But he was a scrub and just worked his butt off to develop his game, hoping for a shot. And KOC and Sloan gave that to him. For 15 mins/per in a backup role to CJ at SG...$3M isn't a bad deal.
 
IIRC, Bell was totally interested in staying in Utah way back when. However, at the first moment of free-agency, Phoenix threw a full mid-level at him. Raja spoke to KOC, who had no intention of matching because the Millers were more committed to saving money. Was that the same summer they let Mo Williams walk and allowed Sasha Pavlovic to be picked up in the expansion draft (Sasha was left unprotected instead of Jarron Collins)?

There were some moves back then that I wasn't too happy with. A year or two later, they signed Harpring to a long, expensive deal (I think it was done out of fear of losing Matt the way they lost Raja - who went on to be a stud for the Suns).
 
Fakers Luck said:
IIRC, Bell was totally interested in staying in Utah way back when. However, at the first moment of free-agency, Phoenix threw a full mid-level at him. Raja spoke to KOC, who had no intention of matching because the Millers were more committed to saving money. Was that the same summer they let Mo Williams walk and allowed Sasha Pavlovic to be picked up in the expansion draft (Sasha was left unprotected instead of Jarron Collins)?

There were some moves back then that I wasn't too happy with. A year or two later, they signed Harpring to a long, expensive deal (I think it was done out of fear of losing Matt the way they lost Raja - who went on to be a stud for the Suns).
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A liitle off on the timing. Mo was let go the year before because the Jazz didn't want to spend $3M on an undersized 3rd-string combo guard, not with Arroyo and Lopez at the point. It was a decent decision. Mo can score, that's for sure, but he averages less than 5 assists - and that was true in Milwaukee as well as in Cleveland. The Jazz actually left Pavlovic unprotected becasue they hoped Borchardt would recover from his injury. That wasn't bad thinking. A healthy 7'0" Borchardt would certainly be more valuable than a shot-chucking guy named Sasha who only hit 39% of his FG's and 27% of his 3's.

As for Bell, he wanted the full MLE. The Jazz expected him to shop the market and then get back to them. I remember the Suns swooped in and wanted him right off the bat. He agreed to the deal during his first call with them, citing his friendship with Nash. IIRC, he didn't let KOC match. And I don't think the Jazz would have. Bell was a good player, but only a part-time starter who averaged 12 pts/per with a career shooting percentage in the low 40's. Kind of like the Matthews situation, except Wesley was a much better shooter (albeit with a very small sample size).
 
GlassEater said:
An injury to his non-shooting wrist. That's certainly less risky and a shorter recovery time than coming back from a hamstring tear.

I'm on board with the move. Raja certainly isn't the palyer he once was, but he can give Utah 10-15 mins at SG and is still a decent outside shooter.
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10-15 mins? I was expecting 25-30. He hasn't played under 30 MPG since he was a youngster.
 
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