Will Posey help bring a ring to New Orleans?
With all the commotion surrounding James Posey, sixth man for the champion Boston Celtics, you'd think he was Robert Horry or someone of that vein.
Indeed, the "Horry Aura" surrounding Posey is palpable, and to a certain extent, accurate on the way to Posey signing a four-year, $25 million deal with the New Orleans Hornets on Thursday. Obviously, the Hornets provided the 31-year-old with the security of a long-term deal that the Celtics, Lakers, Cavaliers, Wizards and Pistons weren't willing to concede.
And that takes us back to the summer of 2007, when Posey was just one year removed from being the vital defender/clutch shooter for the 2006 champion Miami Heat.
The Heat didn't seem particularly eager to keep Posey either, so the wiry 6-foot-8 small forward managed to get himself gobbled up by the Celtics in the spectacular offseason gold rush that made Celtics general manager Danny Ainge the NBA executive of the year. Very few would argue that the two-year, $7.5 million deal for Posey was a major coup for Ainge — not compared to the magnitude of the trades that brought Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen to Boston.
Nonetheless, Posey was huge in his own way. And that explains why the Celtics and the rest were apparently more than willing to give up their entire $5.585 million mid-level exception to keep him around. Still, with all the noise that Posey was making and the excitement he basked in while hanging around Boston in the aftermath of the title, he couldn't get more than three years out of the Celtics.
So it's on to New Orleans, with Chris Paul, David West and Tyson Chandler ruling the roost for reigning NBA Coach of the Year Byron Scott. The curious point will come with the minutes he's able to draw from Peja Stojakovic, who really is the diametrically opposite kind of player. Stojakovic is one of the top five pure shooters in the game from anywhere on the floor, but he characteristically tightens up as the games grow in importance, particularly in the playoffs. He doesn't defend with any fervor, and he runs to spots on the floor as opposed to finishing the break.
On the flip side, Posey gets better as the plot thickens. He has made himself into a 3-point shooter, more clutch than consistently accurate. Posey is one of the original "Tenacious D" guys in the game the way he attacks players on the defensive end, and he finishes strong at the basket on the break.
The question is, are the Hornets just caught up in the "Horry Aura," or will Posey really be worth the third and fourth years of his contract when he's 34 and 35?
First of all, he's not Horry, who has seven championship rings to Posey's two. Horry earned two in Houston, three with the Lakers and two in San Antonio. He and John Salley are the only two players in NBA history to earn championship rings with three different franchises. Besides, his clutch 3-pointers are legendary and at 6-foot-10 with uncommon quickness when he was younger, Horry was eminently capable of guarding bigs and smalls with excellent shot-blocking ability.
More to the point, it isn't as if Horry has been getting huge, multiyear contracts along the way. He's just showed up for 16 seasons since coming out of Alabama as a first-round draft choice for the Rockets in 1992 and established himself as a superior winner. And in the process, he's been signing those mid-level exceptions just like Posey.
This is what happens when you're a role player coming off the bench, regardless of your impact. Nobody has done this job better than the soon-to-be 38-year-old Horry, who has averaged 24.5 minutes a game for his career — a little misleading considering the minutes have dwindled to about 16.5 minutes the past five seasons due to age and added weight. He spent his first six years as a starter for the Rockets, Suns and Lakers.
Whereas Horry had four teams, the Hornets are the sixth team for Posey, a 1999 first-round pick by the Denver Nuggets out of Xavier. His career numbers of 9.2 points and 4.9 rebounds in nine seasons belie his productivity in a similar manner to Horry's 7.0 points and 4.8 boards.
Right or wrong, there is the perception that guys like these are gems that provide that extra toughness, focus or just plain savoir faire it requires to fill in the blanks when the starters are injured, tired or just plain out of sync.
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| James Posey's defense on Kobe Bryant should come in handy for the Hornets. (Elsa / Getty Images) |
To be sure, Ainge understands that better than most. As his career progressed, he was very much that kind of player as well, although smaller and less versatile. There are never too many energy guys for a coach to have at his disposal and certainly not with the résumé that Posey has built in recent years. Evidently, it just wasn't enough for the Celtics to give him that extra year and he took it as a slight when compared to the Big Easy. And considering the Hornets were just a game away and one more experienced player removed from reaching the conference finals, it's quite clear that they figured this is a sound enough investment to justify those final two years if Posey's athleticism has begun to wane.
Posey carried a bit of whine with his toughness early in his career for Denver, Houston and Memphis, and a lot of coaches didn't know how to take him. He has always been a rugged and instinctive defender, with his shot selection often becoming his worst enemy. But he outgrew that with the Heat because Pat Riley made it clear as long as he defended, he'd play. As a result, he became the kind of player coaches love and grew in stature as a hard-nosed perimeter defender during the Heat's 2006 title run.
If anything, he proved to be even smarter and more distinctive this season — especially by gaining the rep as a clutch 3-point shooter on top of his defense. So that's why all these teams were anxious to make their mid-level exception look more attractive than the next guy's. He doesn't make a lot of sense for young teams trying to reach the postseason, but for a final piece to a championship puzzle, Posey is a prize.
All things being equal, Posey will be a factor for the Hornets because of his experience and ability to maximize his impact in a limited amount of minutes. And unlike what happened to the Hornets in Games 6 and 7 against the Spurs in the West semifinals, he'll help minimize the wilting factor.
But he won't be the difference. So the rest of the Hornets better had better grow up over the next two seasons, or they'll regret those third and fourth years of the contract sooner than later.
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