Spurs Get Home Sick Spanoulis In Three Man Deal
July 13, 2007 by Angelo Fernandez
Filed under Player Movement
The Spurs made a deal that makes sense one way you look at it and doesn’t another way. The question is which way is it really.
The NBA champion San Antonio Spurs acquired guard Vassilis Spanoulis from the Houston Rockets for center Jackie Butler and the draft rights to Luis Scola.
The Spurs will also get the Rockets’ second-round pick in 2009, San Antonio said in a statement Thursday night.
The Spurs had Argentinean forward Luis Scola’s draft rights for quite a while now and the question was whether or not he was really coming over. The year there was a lot of hope of him coming over, the Spurs instead brought over another Argentinean in Fabricio Oberto. Looks like now Scola will never be a Spur.
They have a pretty good front court with Duncan, Oberto, Horry and Elson and Matt Bonner if you count him. I guess they thought it was worth parting with Jackie Butler (who didn’t play much) and the rights to Scola to add to the back court for the future. Spanoulis could be a great complement to Tony Parker in the future. Just ask the US team what he did for his Greek squad about how he torched them. This is a great move assuming he comes over. The Greek guard is homesick and wants to play in Europe. Ok the Spurs have nothing against keeping players abroad but assuming this keeps up he might not come back at all since he could get homesick again.
What this does for the Rockets is help them in the front court where they seriously need help. Yao Ming is just one man and Mutombo is playing his last year this coming season I heard. Juwan Howard got traded away too. This could be Butler’s chance to shine and Scola could give them some low post scoring and rebounding if he comes over.
I give the Rockets the upside here for now since the Spanoulis homesick issue is still a question mark.
