Looking good, Rudy.

I’m starting to hate the Rudy Fernandez watch. I really am. I feel obligated to report all the news regarding his situation, but nothing too new has come out in years. Today I have to report that the Blazers are still attempting to trade him and won’t even consider releasing him, although I feel like both of those “news” items have been common knowledge for weeks. (Blazer’s Edge)

Are you still looking into trades for Rudy Fernandez?

“I’ve talked to a lot of teams. I don’t want to get into specific trade talks. The whole Rudy issue is out there so I will speak to it a little bit. I have been active in talking to a lot of teams.”

The process with Rudy has turned a little ugly, hasn’t it? 

“Well, I have been in the league since 1995 and I’ve been in situations where other players have wanted out. This isn’t the first time this has happened and it probably won’t be the last time. I’ve been in these types of situation before. This one is very vocal unfortunately and hopefully it won’t be as vocal going forward.” 

Does a situation like this make it difficult to work with an agent regarding other players in the future?

“It certainly doesn’t help. You try to look at each transaction or each incident by itself and each negotiation by itself and then move forward. It’s a business so you try to isolate it and move forward. Start with a clean slate with the next player.”

Would you consider releasing Rudy Fernandez’s rights?

“We won’t release his rights.”

Not even an option?

“No, that’s not an option right now.”

At this point, I don’t really care whether Rudy comes to the Celtics or not. I just want the goddamn Rudy watch to be done with. It’s starting to feel like the Matt freaking Barnes watch. And you guys know how that one ended.

Rudy isn’t good enough to hijack the news like this. He’s slated to be a 10th or 11th man in Portland. He can’t really create a shot and “defense” isn’t exactly in his vocabulary. Rudy would help the Celtics, don’t get me wrong, but he has really looked like a huge ass this summer and I’m not sure he’s any better than Von Wafer.

Not that this should shock anyone, but the Celtics’ offer for Rudy Fernandez was a first round draft pick. If I’m reading this right, that offer is still on the table. (ESPN)

I mentioned this in my report yesterday on the feud/pending divorce between Rudy Fernandez and the Portland Trail Blazers, but it belongs in the lead paragraph for this site: The Knicks are among the teams trying to acquire the Spanish shooting guard, and they have offered Wilson Chandler.

Other offers on the table include the Boston Celtics and Chicago Bulls each offering a No. 1 draft pick in 2011, a league source told ESPN.com.

But after the Blazers turned down several offers of first-round picks in the teens on draft night when the team was still being run by former general manager Kevin Pritchard, they are looking to see if they can get a similar offer from a team they believe will finish in the middle of the pack next season.

It looks to me like the Blazers are still determined to trade Fernandez, Europe demands be damned. If so, they’d have to take Chicago’s offer for a first rounder ahead of the Celtics’, no? That would only make sense. Wilson Chandler is a pretty intriguing offer too, even though he smoked a little ganja this offseason. If these offers are correct, I’d have to say the Celtics’ chance of acquiring Rudy is slim, at best. Which is okay, because I’ve moved on. I’m now fully aboard the Xavier Henry train. Danny, if you’re reading, you’ve gotta make a run at the X Man. Please.

Rudy Fernandez’s agent said he thinks that his client would prefer to return to Europe rather than continuing to play in the NBA. (HoopsHype)

“The impression I’m getting more and more is that he’s lost interest in playing in the NBA, quite frankly,” Miller said. “It’s my impression that Rudy would prefer to be in Europe rather than the NBA at this point.”

Read more »

(Broken wings, get it? Get it??? By the way, I’ve been using a lot of Tupac lately.)

Paul Pierce is like the rest of us. He thinks the Celtics need one more piece and, specifically, a wing. (Boston Globe)

“I think we’re right there at top,” he said. “I think we’re one of the top four or five teams in all of basketball. I still like we need another piece. I think we could use another wingman off the bench after losing Tony Allen. I think he was real valuable what he brought in the playoffs so for the most part of I love our team. I think we’re better now that we were in June. But also I still think we need another piece if we’re going to win it all and not just get there.”

Sorry guys, but Pierce is absolutely right: Von Wafer as the only backup two just isn’t going to cut it. The Celtics still need someone else, even if it’s just as insurance in case Wafer decides to be a pain in Doc Rivers’s ass. Pause. If Wafer falters and/or Marquis Daniels either disappears like last season or gets injured (like he does every year), the C’s are absolutely going to need another reliable wing off the bench.

Just to let you know, Rudy Fernandez is still out there. I’m just saying.

He still LOOKS happy.

So, um, I guess Delonte West isn’t the only guy with psychological issues who Celtics fans desperately want. Sick.

Rudy Fernandez was so effed up last season in Portland that there were night he didn’t even want to go in the game. Seriously. (Don’t bother with the link. Translation from HoopsHype.)

If I could return to Europe I’d be thrilled. But, at the same time, if I could decide my future and some NBA team could assure me some minutes and the team played a way that fits my game, then I’d like to continue playing in the States. Right now it’s 50-50.

“It’s more like we’re trying to talk with (the Blazers) and make them understand my position. And let’s make clear I understand theirs too. We have to come to an agreement and find a way out as soon as possible. I made a great effort going to the States, making less money that I would in Europe. This season, I decided with my agents that the best thing was to try to get traded so I could be on another team with more playing time.

“Not to the point of being depressed, but I’ve been pretty fucked up psychologically . I didn’t feel comfortable on the court and sometimes I preferred to stay on the bench. I didn’t feel capable of helping the team and that’s very tough to handle for any player.”

I don’t know about you guys, but the second I hear a prospective Celtic utter the words “Not to the point of being depressed, but I’ve been pretty fucked up psychologically” is when I start to think about other options. Right now, Larry Hughes is looking great.

… Just kidding, guys. I haven’t completely lost my mind. Larry Hughes is still looking like, well, like Larry Hughes. And call me crazy, but I’d take the “pretty fucked up psychological mess who prefers staying on the bench to going in the game” over Larry Hughes any day of the week and twice on Sundays.

Still, Rudy wouldn’t be swimming in playing time in Boston and you have to wonder whether he’s mentally strong enough to play a bench role. I have this saying about bench players. It goes a little something like this: They have to be confident enough to think they should be playing more minutes but team-oriented enough not to care. It takes a seriously confident dude to thrive in a bench role, knowing his minutes aren’t guaranteed from game to game. It seems like Rudy isn’t that type of guy.

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I don't even care where Rudy ends up anymore. I just want to be able to stop writing about the damn guy. He's not even that good.

Just because the Chicago Bulls signed Keith Bogans doesn’t mean they’re done trying to bring Rudy Fernandez to the squad. It still remains to be seen whether the Knicks’ signing of Roger Mason takes them out of the running. (Quick interlude: Mason and Bogans both took the minimum. Am I wrong, or would either of them have helped in Boston?)

Remember, it has been reported that the Bulls and Trail Blazers are very close on a trade that would send Rudy to Chicago and James Johnson (and perhaps a draft pick) to Portland. Marc Stein refutes that rumor, but says the possibility still exists that Rudy will end up in Chi-Town. (ESPN)

Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau hinted at that thinking Friday in a radio interview with ESPN 1000′s “Waddle & Silvy Show” in Chicago before TNT’s David Aldridge broke the Bogans news on NBA.com. When asked about McGrady, Thibodeau confirmed that the Bulls hadn’t ruled him out completely but made it clear that acquiring a proven shooter was their priority.

Hours later, Chicago clinched Bogans’ signature, which doesn’t conclusively fill that void … but also doesn’t affect the salary-cap space needed to acquire Fernandez and might just convey to the Blazers that the Bulls aren’t going to keep waiting around.

In one of its proposals to Portland, sources said, Chicago has offered to absorb Fernandez’s modest $1.25 million salary for next season with cap space in exchange for a future first-round pick.

Sources say Portland, however, has believed that it can do better in a Fernandez deal and is holding out for more, even though New York also balked at the Blazers’ demands this week and elected to sign Roger Mason to a bargain one-year deal at the veteran minimum of $1.4 million.

It’s widely assumed that the Blazers want Taj Gibson back from the Bulls, but sources say Chicago is not about to include Gibson in Fernandez talks. James Johnson is the best young player Chicago has made available.

Even though ESPN refutes the claim that Rudy-to-Chicago is pretty much a done deal… If Portland thinks it can do better than a future first-round pick, the Celtics are unlikely to get him. After all, the only other asset the Celtics would be likely to include would be the contracts of either Tony Gaffney or Oliver Lafayette, both of whom the Bulls would be likely to waive before their fans could say, “Who the hell are Tony Gaffney and Oliver Lafayette?”

For all those still hoping for a Sheed/Gaffney/Lafayette trade for Przybilla/Fernandez, methinks that boat sailed away when the C’s signed Shaq. Even if it was only a pipe dream when we discussed it.

P.S. – According to Steiny Mo, T-Mac has approximately zero suitors. I don’t think I’d mind if he signed with the Celtics fo’ free.But the sad thing is, I might.