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I have been trying to wrap my head around the NBA mega deal that went down yesterday. The only way I can really think about it clearly at this early stage it to look at it team by team.

Here goes:

The Boston Celtics
The Celtics were going to lose Antoine Walker anyway, because he wanted a long-term deal and they weren't going to give it to him, because as Danny Ainge explains to Steve Bulpett in the Boston Herald, they are committed to Al Jefferson as their power forward of the future. So instead of letting Walker walk to sign for Miami's mid-level exception, they got two second-round picks, a player who is in Spain (Albert Miralles), and a serviceable backup in Curtis Borchardt. The news that will interest Portland fans: the rumor is that Qyntel Woods, who was also traded to Boston yesterday, will be waived. Boston also gets a trade exception. When packaged with the two second round picks, that all translates to salary cap flexibility which is gold these days. This trade will look better down the road when we find out who they net with that cap space and those picks.

The Miami Heat
The concerns here are that they are losing some key backcourt players--possibly Damon Jones and certainly Keyon Dooling--while Eddie Jones plays the same position as Dwyane Wade. They also need to have balance and potency when Shaquille O'Neal is on the bench, something that seems to be happening more and more these days. And because of that very fact--O'Neal's health--the Heat can't afford to wait for a very young player to develop. So they need an established, playmaking point guard, of which there are about 15 in the whole league, very few of whom are available. Jason Williams was one of the few.

The good news for the Heat is that Williams knows he plays better within the system--Hubie Brown proved it to him--and his assist/turnover ratio has dramatically improve since his young and wild days in Sacramento (when, incidentally, O'Neal told me he would have Williams as point guard on his best starting five of the "digital era"). Williams still jacks up too many threes for my liking, and he can't or won't defend. (One eastern conference team executive, speaking on condition of anonymity, told me that he wouldn't have Jason Williams on his team at any price. Even if you paid him. He couldn't envision winning with that guy.)

Miami makes a second gamble with Antoine Walker, who also has been known to be an unsettling force. But he's in much better condition than he was last time Boston shipped him out of town, and now he knows the value of getting in the lane, drawing fouls, and getting triple-doubles--instead of just jacking threes. Walker plays the same position as Udonis Haslem, but Walker's agent tells Michael Cunningham of the Sun-Sentinel there won't be any trouble from his client: "He is amenable to winning," Bartelstein said. "Whatever the coaches want, he will do."

The Heat's surest thing out of this big trade is James Posey, assuming his agent is telling the truth when he says Posey is now 100% healthy, unlike he was last year. He can defend and finish at the hoop and make the game fun to watch. Posey was the spark plug back when Memphis was shocking good teams. Miami also picked up Andre Emmitt from Memphis (who some scouts think will be great one day)and the rights to Roberto Duenas from the Hornets (about whom scouts are more vague.)

The New Orleans Hornets
The Hornets were in the right place at the right time to get some so-so players for nothing. They traded away only Duenas, who has never played in the NBA, for Kirk Snyder who was a lottery pick a year ago, and Rasual Butler who showed flashes of greatness as a livewire in Miami. As GM Allan Bristow explains to Jimmy Smith of the Times-Picayune, the Hornets now have five young wing players some of whom might turn out to be good. Or not.

The Utah Jazz
The Jazz needed to get rid of Snyder, who was never happy there. After losing Raja Bell to Phoenix, the problem became even more acute, because keeping him would have meant having to play him, and they don't think he's ready. So the Jazz get some size they need from a supposedly older and wiser Ostertag, without having to give up too much. I'm not sure if that means the Jazz are happy with Gordan Giricek at the "two" or will be shopping for someone else to fill the minutes that belonged to Bell and Snyder.

The Memphis Grizzlies
The Grizzlies got Eddie Jones. That's it. They gave up Jason Williams, James Posey, and Andre Emmitt. Whew! But here's how Geoff Calkins of the Commercial Appeal explains it:

The Grizzlies got rid of the three players most responsible for running Hubie Brown out of town, J-Will, Bonzi Wells and Posey.

They added Jones, Bobby Jackson (in a previous trade for Wells) and Damon Stoudamire (who they will sign as a free agent as early as today).

Not so bad in that light.