FanHouse David Falk

You know, Billy Knight may have gotten a bad rap. We'll need to reassess his Atlanta legacy at some point. Among other solid draft picks (Josh Smith, Al Horford) and signings (Joe Johnson), the 2008 trade for Mike Bibby -- Knight's final move at the helm of the Hawks -- looks pretty good right now.

Bibby will ink a three-year, $18 million deal with Atlanta, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, leaving the Hawks backcourt in decent shape for the next few seasons.

Consider it a case of the rich getting richer: Dikembe Mutombo has decided to play this season and the Celtics are high on his list of teams. Doc Rivers, who's friends with Mutombo and talks with him frequently, confirmed that the C's would like to sign him -- and he's not the only one applying the pressure:

Yesterday, Mutombo attended a United Nations presentation of a Ben Affleck-directed film about refugees in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mutombo's home country.

"I told [Affleck] that I might play in his hometown," Mutombo said in a telephone interview. "He said, 'Come, we'd love to have you.' He's a really nice guy."

Mutombo confirmed that his agent, David Falk, has been in touch with Boston's front office, though he added he's received interest from several other teams, as well. The Celtics are over the salary cap but have $2.3 million remaining from their mid-level exception to offer. It'd mean paying a little extra luxury tax, but they were going to have to do that anyway, so that probably won't be a deterrent.

If you thought Boston was good already, putting Mutombo on the bench would be downright unfair. The Celtics' defense is already smothering, and that's without the second-all-time leader in blocked shots anchoring the bench. The Celtics are already too good to say Mutombo could be the proverbial "missing piece," but it'd certainly help their chances in the race for 70 wins.

Elton Brand's Philadelphia press conference shed a little light on why he chose to leave the Clippers for the Sixers, but not too much. There were still the questions of David Falk (Brand's agent) being out for revenge, the Clippers giving Brand some sort of ultimatum, etc. When you hear what Mike Dunleavy and Falk have to say about it, things seem to be as confusing as ever.

Falk expressed his surprise at the so-called "take it or leave it" offer that Brand received from the Clippers, and Dunleavy denies that ever existed.

"I wasn't angry, but I was surprised. You don't expect a team to give a franchise player an ultimatum. You wouldn't expect the Lakers to do that with Kobe Bryant. You wouldn't expect the Heat to do that with Dwyane Wade," Falk said.

Countered Clippers Coach Mike Dunleavy:

"After I supposedly gave him a take-it-or-leave-it offer, we raised the offer to $75 million and $81 million. They can spin this thing any way they want to try and spin it. The bottom line is, anything Elton ever wanted I did it for him. They stopped having communication with us more than a week ago."

To Dunleavy's assertion that the offer was raised a couple of times, Falk responded that "You don't have time to play ping-pong. When they said $70 [million], I took it for face value. It was too much of a sacrifice, that's all." Obviously there were some serious communication issues here, which probably were ultimately the reason that the deal fell apart.

Initially it was believed that Donald Sterling was free and clear of any blame here, but it's rumored that his unavailability to approve an early termination option that Brand was requesting was what sent Falk and Brand out shopping around. Whatever the combination of reasons, it's likely that we'll never know exactly why Elton Brand chose to leave the Clippers. But the toxic combination of David Falk and the Clippers' organization likely had more than a little to do with it.

UPDATE: Both Falk and Dunleavy were interviewed (separately) on ESPN radio in Los Angeles today, you can listen to their different sides of the story here.

There's all kinds of rumors swirling around the Elton Brand to Philly deal right now. Did he dogpile Baron? Did the Clips issue an ultimatum? Is David Falk power hungry? Or does he just want his new baby to move closer to home? Lots of questions and very few answers exist at this moment too.

Which makes the following press conference -- a most outright, open and funny affair -- all the more bizarre. Highlights: Santa didn't bring "no gifts" (1:02), his "intention was to try and work out something with the Clippers ..." (1:30), the "Philly-max" (2:35) and Shaq as a "top five forward in the game" (4:00).



What's not mentioned though, and what you can see on the full press conference vid at Philly.com (scroll down) is Brand stating that he had no under the table handshake with Baron Davis to go to the Clippers, and that LA gave him an ultimatum and he didn't exactly dig that.

In other words, if you're willing to believe Elton Brand, this wasn't so much about external factors as it was a perfect storm of incompetence (Clipjoint), great marketing (Philly) and a personal attitude (Brand).

Via The700Level