The Bratwurst – Milwaukee Bucks Blog

Thanks to the folks at Brew Hoop I learned that Charlie Villanueva has been writing a blog at nba.com.

You know what? He feels the same way about his role with the Bucks as I do; namely that he doesn’t play enough and he’s likely to be somewhere else next season.

“Looking at my situation overall, I ask myself at times, do I see myself here long-term? I must say the answer to that question doesn’t sit to comfortable with me. I don’t know what the future holds. Anything can happen in this business. I would really like to make Milwaukee a part of my future, but it doesn’t seem realistic at this point in time unless something changes. The moves made by management in the last few months indicate to me that I’m not as important as I once was to this team.”

It seems like he understands the Bucks’ salary cap issues better than management — he’s the only expendable part who would have any value around the league.

He also seems to realize that he is one of the Bucks’ five best players and, as such, should see the court more.

“Yi has earned his minutes and is playing solid overall in his first year in the NBA. He deserves to be out there and has helped us out tremendously throughout this season thus far. I just feel that I can provide much more value to this team and I’m eager to delivery. Maybe we can see more combinations of me & Yi out in the floor, I don’t know exactly what the solution is, but I know how I feel.”

He also said that some teams that he has heard have had interest in him include New York, Houston, Cleveland, Miami, New Jersey and Golden State. What are some potential deals that may have been thrown around?

We already know that the Knicks deal was part of the Zach Randolph proposal.

Mickael Pietrus would probably be the centerpiece of a Golden State deal, possibly something like Villanueva and Storey for Pietrus. Golden State has a large trade exception from the Jason Richardson trade so they could make that deal work. I don’t know if that’s such a good trade, though. I think Pietrus is getting by more on reputation than ability — Don Nelson uses a deep bench, yet every time I look at a Golden State box score Pietrus has played 4 minutes. If he was good than Nelson would use him more.

If New Jersey wants to rebuild would they do Simmons and Villanueva for Richard Jefferson? New Jersey would save about $15 million.

Would Villanueva and Gadzuric get Jason Williams’ expiring contract to the Bucks? Would Miami find Villanueva’s potential tantalizing enough that they would take on Gadzuric’s remaining 3/$19 million? The Bucks would save $22 million and almost get under the salary cap this offseason.

I can’t see trading Villanueva within the division to Cleveland, and the only player they have that I’d want (besides LeBron, of course) is Varejao.

I can’t figure out what Houston would want with Villanueva, unless they were going to make a major philosophical shift. I can’t see them really being interested in an offense-minded power forward.

It seems that everyone knows — Villanueva included — that Charlie V’s future is elsewhere. But probably not with the teams I’ve just mentioned. It’s hard to come up with a good trade.