The Two Sams

About a month ago, I pulled off a trade in my league in which I acquired Sam Cassell and Sam Dalembert in exchange for Manu Ginobili and Damon Stoudamire. My league squawked, saying that I had gotten the better end of the deal, and my entreaties for them to observe the rankings and be reasonable were largely ignored. Nevertheless, the trade was executed, and I was excited at the prospect of acquiring two fantasy players who I would have picked before the sixth round for two players I selected in the sixth and twelfth rounds, respectively.

Cassell's early returns were good, and he looked like he was emerging from his early slump to get back to doing his 18 points, 7 assists, .480 FG .880 FT thang. I was also pleased to have added Dalembert, who looked, pre-season, like a good bet to start putting up Ben Wallace type numbers... except with scoring and FG percentages that were respectable. That sounded like a pretty intriguing player with great upside.

The ensuing time has done much to make me look like a fool.

Sam Cassell just finished sitting out his ninth game in a row due to a "tweaked hamstring" that all we know about is, "may be much more severe than originally thought." He still hasn't come back. Enough to give a manager the willies.

In the meantime, of course, the entire Blazers frontcourt went out with an assortment of injuries, and they decided to go with the tiny backcourt of Nick Van Exel and Damon Stoudamire, with both playing huge minutes. This was after they had already announced that they were bringing Stoudamire back into the starting role that he had lost when I traded him. Arrrghhh... The rest is history, as Damon proceeded to blow up and be incredibly valuable, once again proving his annual haters and naysayers wrong.

Meanwhile, Ginobili continued to do the little things that had made him highly ranked, and his rank remained very nice. Not crushing, but nice. That was until last night's 48 point performance. Ouch.

Then, of course, there's Dalembert, who hadn't done one damn thing on my squad since I acquired him. Sure, he was on my bench, but it's painful watching those pathetic numbers stack up every night when there are so many intriguing waiver wire prospects on the board. This guy looked when I acquired him like he was about to start plaing some serious minutes in a starting role. Right after I traded for him, Mark Jackson started playing huge minutes. Yikes. And Sam continued to unimpress for so incredibly long that I dropped him this afternoon, and picked up Jason Hart, to take him for a spin tomorrow night in what may be his last night of starting before Brevin gets back.

It's just one night, I told myself... What's Dalembert going to do? Right now he's trash and no one is going to pick him up. He'll be safe, waiting for you on the wire in a couple of days... That was until tonight, when Dalembert finally picked his time to BLOW UP RIDICULOUS right in my face, scoring 24 points and grabbing 16 rebounds on .846 1.000 shooting, adding 4 blocks, and doing it all at the small price of two turnovers. Can you fucking believe it?

Maybe he won't do it again for two months, but I would give almost anything right now to own Sam Dalembert instead of Jason Hart. I can't even use my [2] waiver priority to pick him back up, because I'm the one who dropped him. Unbelievable. Let's just hope that no one notices he's gone until Monday at midnight. I'm not holding my breath.

Jason Hart, anyone?