Time for Us to Make Another City Freak Out

OK, so I saw Cavs-Hornets at the Q last night, and damn . . . CP3 is outstanding. Anyone who can make Tyson Chandler and David West look that good is insane. So I got to thinking.

1.) LeBron has always wanted a sick PG.

2.) Chris Paul and LeBron James are "like brothers" -- quote from LeBron. Also, CP3 was apparently there for the birth of LeBron's kid.

3.) New Orleans is in the West, which is by far the more difficult conference.

4.) The Cavs are in the East, which is by far the easier conference.

5.) New Orleans is having trouble filling seats in its arena.

6.) CP3 is a free agent in 2009.

7.) The Cavs have 30M coming off the cap in 2009.

What does this add up to? It's time for us to talk about stealing someone else's best player. CP3 in Cleveland in 2009!

How does this happen? Well, the best part is we don't even have to kick the tires around for a year before we can improve the team. Our current roster just isn't good enough to win a title (I think). But we have plenty of assets. So here's how you do it.

THIS OFFSEASON:

1.) Draft Robin Lopez (if possible). He's basically Andy Varejao, and he has equally good hair.

2.) This, of course, makes Varejao tradeable (as does his expiring contract). So be ready to trade that + Eric Snow's expiring (together, I think they come to 13M). Maybe offer those two plus some draft picks during the offseason to Milwaukee for Redd? That's a fairly enticing package (though teams don't trade within divisions) similar to the LA package that got Gasol (young player + pick + expiring contract). Plus we get similar production to Andy in Robin, while also picking up an outstanding shooter who loves LeBron.

2a.) Alternatively, we could just trade Wally's fat expiring this offseason, plus some draft picks, for Redd or a similar player.

3.) Re-sign Daniel Gibson.

OFFSEASON 2009:

4.) Let Wally's contract (if his is the expiring we keep) or Andy's and Eric's (if we keep them) expire in 2009, along with the expiring of Joe Smith (good vet who'll be good to have around next year) and Damon Jones. That frees up roughly 22M of cap space (probably a bit more).

5.) Max out CP3. That's about 14M a year (I think) which means we inexplicably save 8M while adding one of the top three players in the league.

6.) Kick the tires around on trades for Ben Wallace and possibly Z (30M in expiring contracts the next year).

2009-2010 REGULAR SEASON

7.) Win NBA Championship with impossible-to-defend trifecta of CP3-Redd-LeBron.

2010 OFFSEASON

8.) Re-up LeBron.

9.) Retire Zydrunas Ilgauskas's number.

10.) Laugh as 30M in Z and Ben's contracts (if not already traded) come off the books, while the Cavs retain their dominant core.

This would be the best team in basketball, hands down. Think Pierce-Allen-Garnett is a big three? Try on CP3-LeBron-Redd. I think I just peed a little in excitement.

So now, I'm going to cross my fingers for Danny Ferry to read this and do the right thing (after the Cavs lose to the Pistons or Celtics this year, which I think might happen given what I saw last night.)