Tough Day for Detroit Fans

If I had a list of my favorite athletes of all time, the top tier would be, in no particular order, Joe Dumars, Wayne Gretzky, Brett Favre, and Steve Yzerman. The next tier would include Kirk Gibson, Zeke, Nick Lidstrom, and Ben Wallace, among maybe a couple of others. Some will note the absence of Chris Webber and Dennis Rodman, whose exploits went from truly transgressive to absolutely abominable, once he stopped rebounding for a living.

Anyway, the point is that one top guys retired today and it looks like a second tier guy may be taking his afros, great defense, extreme rebounding, clanking free throws, and true heart elsewhere next season. The funny thing is that as much as I want Ben to retire a Piston, I can't blame Joe for not offering him anything more than he has. Ben may be worth 11 million for one or two seasons, but he's not the player he was even a year or two ago. He hasn't slipped much, but I sense a trend, and I think he'll be very overpaid at the end of even a four year deal.

Still, how depressing for me (not for HP or his bro) to think about Ben in a Bulls jersey next year, particularly since we traded Darko away in what now looks like as bad a move as drafting him in the first place.

Sigh