You could argue about the quality of Bill Simmons' writing. You could point out that his opinions are often founded more on obvious biases than rational thought. But everyone has to admit nobody is better at coming up with genius ideas for articles. He's developed quite the product line and if we were to compare him to Apple the NBA trade value column would certainly be his iPod.
I don't have any complaints about his placement of The Big Three:
- Tony Parker
- Manu Ginobili
- Tim Duncan
The thesis for Simmons' article basically goes to shit when it comes to Steve Nash, who's ranked 6th. In one sense he's right, the Suns wouldn't change Nash form, say, Yao Ming (9th). The Suns have built their entire team around Nash and without him the efficacy of most of their players takes a giant hit. However, the premise of his article states the Rockets would trade Ming for Nash, which, of course, is absolute horse shit. They need a point guard, sure, but not a 32 year old PG who can't play a shit's worth of defense and needs the ball in his hands constantly to derive the most from his talents (I'm not saying he's selfish, but what's the point of having Steve Nash on your team if you're going to run your offense through Tracy McGrady?). Similarly, the Celtics would NEVER trade Garnett (7th) for Nash. In fact, none of the teams would trade the following players for Nash:
- Carmelo
- Durant
- Nowitzki
- Boozer
- Bryant
- Wade