In one of the threads from a couple of days ago, I responded to someone's comments about trade possibilities and the potential for the free agent market to provide some improvement to our team. I also mentioned that our biggest problem is that we have virtually no inside game (nobody cutting in the lanes and especially nobody able to consitently post up under the rim) and we need a real option in the paint aside from Wallace. Since that thread had largely played out already (and nobody jumped on my request for someone with better knowledge of the Cats contract restrictions to start a new discussion) I wanted to open the discussion under its own header.

 Is it premature to be thinking about roster changes or is the problem already so glaringly obvious that we can see we're risking the entire season if we don't make moves soon? Can we expect Tyson Chandler to shake off his horrible slump as he gets in better condition or will we be looking at more of the same in December that we saw in the early days of the season in October? Who is out there in even the restricted agent market that we might be able to bring to Charlotte? I believe we need to be realistic about the fact that we don't have the ideal sales pitch to lure a quality player into town. "Come to the Queen City where you can play in front of a whopping 8 thousand drowsing fans! We're optimistically dreaming that we have an outside chance of snagging the 8 seed for the playoffs and proudly sit as the 48th largest television market in the United States. Did we mention that we're only 3 thousand miles from the partying nightlife of L.A.? Don't forget - here in Charlotte you can count on owners who need to pinch a dollar hard enough to make George Washington crap dimes. Just IMAGINE what that means for your wallet come extension/renewal time!" It isn't exactly the stuff that dreams are made of. About the only real plus is that anyone coming into town is almost guaranteed a chance to showcase their skills as a starter. We might be able to attract hungry players that are stuck in the shadow of a major star. The Cats represent a serious opportunity for an underused bench player to get into the spotlight in a hurry. The problem there is that we have to rely on our scouts and decision makers to pick the right diamond-in-the-rough and our track record on that is a HUGE question mark. The odds are good that our best option will wind up being a player past his prime just looking to eke out another year or two in the league before surrendering to the inevitable. In fact, that may just be what Johnson will be attracted to - a former "name player" that might fill a few seats with fans that want to be able to say, "Oh yeah, I saw so-and-so play back in the day."

Unless we can find a way to throw Augustin on the rack and stretch him up to about 6' 10" so he can play power forward, we appear to have a massive depth problem in the forward positions. We can try to rush our development of Derrick Brown, but once again we run into that whole "Coach won't give the rookies court time" situation before we even consider whether he has the innate skills to handle serious NBA minutes.

The sad truth is, that Chandler, VladRad, and Ajinca simply aren't producing to this point. We either play the cards we've been dealt this season and hope our hand winds up being strong enough to make enough teams fold, or we try to improve by drawing from the deck. In just a couple of weeks the whole "it's too early in the season to judge" argument will be moot. We can't be saying, "it's only been 13 games, there's still hope" without deluding ourselves that a 4-9 start is just bad luck.

Oh, and if you think I'm being too pessimistic, stop for a moment and think about what this team will look like if Gerald Wallace sacrifices his body once too often and end up on the injured list for a number of games. God forbid it happen, because it's almost unthinkable. But let's be honest - each and every time the man slams into the floor under the bucket the heart of almost every Bobcat fan skips a fearful beat.

So let's get it out in the open. What ARE our options now that we have Chandler and Diaw soaking up almost 20 million dollars of our salary this year alone?