Like many of us who have been hit by the latest in a series of ridiculous snowstorms, the general managers of those respective teams don’t have anything better to do right now than feverishly work the phones.

If Tracy McGrady was ever destined to be traded to Philly, as has been rumored, the time is now. The Wizards and Knicks showed they were serious about making something out of their cabin fever with a report that they were considering a three-team deal with Houston.

That’s what I’m talking about. No way, no how should these guys be outworked right now by executives from warmer climates.

• Chris Wallace has no excuse not to make a deal happen for that backup point guard the Celtics so desperately need (although he should not get carried away and ship out Ray Allen).
• The time is ripe for Knicks GM Donnie Walsh to shed even more cap space for the upcoming offseason, to free up the team to throw everything, INCLUDING the kitchen sink, at LeBron James in an effort to get him to sign.
• If Sixers president and general manager Ed Stefanski really wants to pull a deal (which I’m not convinced he really does, and would likely not improve the team much anyway), he might as well grab his cell. Public transportation is shut down. Most non-essential employees have been told to stay home. Even if he wanted to drive somewhere, he couldn’t; I-76 has been closed.
• Again, credit Ernie Grunfeld for grabbing the snow-covered bull by the horns and getting us rolling today. The Wizards-Knicks-Rockets deal isn’t going to change the direction of any of the three franchises involved, but it’s gotten me sufficiently intrigued to spend 10 minutes researching how the deal makes sense and interested you enough to read my blog post. Mission accomplished.

If I have to be glued to a seat all day watching TV and my computer screen, I want some breaking NBA trade news to follow. The least you front office guys can do is give us that.

It ain’t like you’ve got anywhere else to go.

The hype machines of ESPN and NBA TV predictably made all the talking head speculation today, wondering, is Kobe the greatest Laker ever? Where does he fit in the list of all-time shooting guards? Has he surpassed Michael Jordan? Will he ever surpass Jordan? Is he the greatest NBA player ever? Is he even the greatest player in the NBA right now?

It was funny to watch this while running on a treadmill in the City of Brotherly Love. Kobe visited his home city last Friday, and one columnist wondered how the Sixers and Lakers franchises might have developed had Philadelphia chosen Kobe No. 1 overall, rather than Iverson, in 1996.

Perhaps the Sixers would have won a championship, rather than come up just short with AI & Co. (against Kobe and the Lakers) in 2001.

I’m betting most Philly fans would rather have it the way it is.

Ask any native, diehard Philadelphia sports fan, even one who only casually watches basketball, if they would do it all over again with Iverson or trade it all in for Kobe and a title or two, and I’m guessing the majority wouldn’t change a thing.

That’s the funny thing about northeast cities. Some might say it’s a fault of blue collar cities, that we reward effort too easily and don’t demand excellence.

In Los Angeles, where the famous and talented flock, trying hard isn’t enough. Here where the weather’s cold and the people are hardened, however, it’s all we ask.

In the South, Miami happily welcomed Shaq for a few years in exchange for a championship run. The Magic bid farewell to Tracy McGrady, who played his butt off in Orlando for four painful years, in exchange for the bug-eyed Steve Francis, because they were sick of T-Mac leading the Magic to playoff disappointment.

On the West Coast, post too many consecutive losing seasons and they’ll send you to Oklahoma City (sorry, Sonics fans).

So while national broadcasters debated, in Philadelphia, instead of pondering what might have been, many of the Sixers fans I spoke to shrugged.

Kobe’s a great player and we know that, the attitude seems to be, and maybe he would have taken us farther than AI. But the way Iverson played, the way he put it all on the line every night, was enough for us. We’ll take that.

Congrats, Kobe. LA is lucky to have you. But Philly is happy with the guy it has.

Mensah-Bonsu, a native of Ghana who grew up in Great Britian, played briefly for the Raptors, Spurs, Rockets and Mavericks, and is believed to be the first Ghanaian-born player in the NBA.

He first impressed me in 2006 (I think?), when he and the Colonials came to Philadelphia to play St. Joseph’s. We had an interview scheduled, but because a walkthrough and team meeting took longer than expected, Mensah-Bonsu didn’t make it back to the hotel where we were supposed to meet until almost 10:30 p.m.

I expected him to blow off the interview. With a game the following afternoon, he would have been justified in claiming he needed rest.

But no, Pops was ready to talk, and talk he did. For more than an hour, he spoke about his still-developing skills, the adjustments he made coming to this country for an education, and how his teammates have gotten overlooked because he happened to have the funny name everyone loved to say.

His self-awareness and booming baritone were impressive.

As one of the all-around good guys in professional sports, Pops made another gracious gesture when he tweeted that he will donate $1 to the Haiti relief effort for every follower on his Twitter account.

Here is his tweet Wednesday, from LondonsFINE5t:

so like i stated before i am donating $1 for everyone of my followers to help those less fortunate in Haiti. i just hope u guys do the same!

As of 11:30 p.m. Wednesday, Mensah-Bonsu had 2,878 followers. While $2,878 might not seem like much compared to the hundreds of thousands raised by some charities and the $100 million donated by the United States government, it was a statement from a person with no connection to Haiti (that I am aware of–I may be mistaken) other than a concern for the people.

And the beauty of the amount is that it’s a number that is real to most of us. Many of us cannot fathom $100 million dollars. But $2,000 is an amount we can comprehend, and maybe realize that every little part can make a difference.

Good stuff, Pops. I’m not surprised, coming from you.

And he just keeps going.

Ryan stayed in character when he said he would be “shocked” if the Jets lose to the Colts on Sunday. Even a Patriots or Giants fan has to appreciate such a candid comment.

As Ryan was quoted as saying in the Daily News:

“I’m confident. There is no question about it,” he said. “We’re going into the game expecting to win. I’d be shocked if we don’t. Absolutely would be.”

Sports fell victim to a political correctness bomb sometimes around the mid-1990s. It stopped being cool for Dr. J and Larry Bird to go at each other’s throats, literally. Intentionally beaning a baseball batter became unacceptable, even if it was a simple tit-for-tat for Cadillacking after a home run. Predicting victories became bulletin-board material.

Crazy thing is, what is today considered traditional sportsmanship is not the way it was back in the good ol’ days that we harken back to.

As Colts quarterback John Unitas once remarked, “There’s a big difference between confidence and conceit.”

Get that? Johnny U didn’t say there was a “fine line” between the two, he said there was  ”big difference.”

No one would begrudge an elite athlete being confident, but when said athlete voices that confidence, it is frowned upon. Well, that’s our loss as fans. If we can’t tell the difference between honest confidence and misplaced arrogance, that’s on us. Not the guy doing the talking.

How statements are interpreted over time depends heavily on whether those statements are fulfilled. If the Jets win it all, Ryan’s blustery comments will be recalled as predictions of greatness. If they lose, he’ll be ridiculed on the back page of the Daily News and Post.

The performance shouldn’t make a difference. Ryan’s stated confidence reveals a man who is preparing what he believes is a winning gameplan and a belief that his players will be ready, too.

Ted Williams, the greatest hitter that ever lived, once said, ”If there was ever a man born to be a hitter it was me.”

I’m pretty sure Rex Ryan would say something similar, substituting “coach” for “hitter.” That’s the sweater-vested beauty of the man.

When 76ers fans threw up their arms in disbelief that Dalembert, who stands 6-foot-11 and has the wingspan of a California condor, still did not seem to grasp simple concepts of the game such as traveling and goaltending, we assumed Dalembert was unwilling to learn. That it was a lack of effort, not a lack of ability, that held him back from being a Hakeem Olajuwon-esque force in the middle. That he didn’t care.

If Dalembert has shown one thing over the past week, it is that he absolutely, positively does care. He cares so much, in fact, that his internal desire may challenge Allen Iverson’s for the team lead.

In serving as the NBA’s de facto spokesman for the Haiti relief effort, Dalembert has proved he is a passionate man. As the single NBA player from Haiti, he has walked the walk by donating $100,o00 of his own money, plus matching $23,000 donated by Sixers fans. He has tried to go to Haiti and help, but told his presence would not be helpful unless he were a doctor, he has wisely stayed away.

In the meantime, Dalembert has played the greatest basketball of his career.

A man like this would not let a lack of heart hold him back from being as good as he can be at his profession. What we may have been witnessing the first seven years of Dalembert’s NBA career was a raw talent trying his damndest to develop into a star. What a coincidence that he may be emerging as one of the players of the future at the exact moment the future of his homeland is in doubt.

Dalembert may never become another Olajuwon, the top example of foreign-born talent to develop late into one of the all-time greats. But after Dalembert’s 20-point, 20-rebound performance that highlighted an NBA Player of the Week award performance, he showed he won’t be a one-dimensional liability like Manute Bol, either.

Word is the Sixers have made Dalembert a permanent fixture on the trading block. So far, they are 0-for-29 in attempts to trade him to another team. With Dalembert’s recent improved play, a team looking for a big man whose contract expires at the end of next season might take the bait.

Here’s hoping they don’t. If you had told me a month ago that I would soon type that sentence, I would have called you crazy.

But Dalembert is currently the Sixer with the longest continuous tenure on the team. I am happy to have him as the elder statesman of the home team.

He has presided over the league during a lockout that led to a 50-game season, five relocated NBA franchises and the addition of seven mostly-superfluous expansion teams. Most of all, he’s done it all with a smug self-satisfaction that is downright infuriating.

But the players hold no small blame for the league’s shrinking appeal since it’s heyday in the mid-1990s. Since Michael Jordan’s squeaky clean image retired for a second time, the league tried to make equally squeaky-clean stars out of Grant Hill, Anfernee Hardaway, Tim Duncan, Steve Nash and LeBron James.

But the names many people associate with the league now are Latrell Sprewell, Ron Artest and Gilbert Arenas.

For a good long time, NBA fans could take pride in the fact that most of the adversity experienced by NBA players was not of the players’ own making. Players who come from disadvantaged backgrounds with heart-wrenching stories proliferate in the NBA unlike any other league. Most of the circumstances are ones for which the players themselves are blameless: absentee or abusive parents, poverty, predatory “friends,” naivete.

One bad banana can spoil the whole bunch (or however that saying goes). All it takes in most Americans’ eyes is one tiny choking incident, one little rumble with fans, one teensy-weensy case of bringing guns into the locker room to convince them the league is full of thugs, felons and meanies.

Each time, defending the great game gets a little harder.

A well-played basketball game remains the single most enjoyable sporting event to watch, hands down. As excited as most people get about March Madness, I get more excited about the NBA Playoffs because unlike the NCAA Tournament, you can watch every NBA Playoff game in its entirety, from the feeling-out phase in the first and second quarters to the brutal physicality of the third quarter to the who-wants-it-more moments of truth in the fourth quarter. Those who say they “only need to see the last two minutes” of a basketball game don’t get what the game is all about.

But it’s tough to make that argument to a person who has already decided basketball is the realm of gun-toting stiffs with anger management problems. Gilbert didn’t just harm himself; he harmed the entire game and those of us who still thinks it’s the greatest game there is.

The timing of the incident was perfect, however, in a week in which sports-related controversy got plenty of attention in the form of Agent Zero.

But by the time everyone stops yelling about Gilbert Arenas’ gun fiasco, Tiger Woods’ reported dalliances and Spadaro defacing a symbol of America’s team, the question is, should any of this matter?

Since so much has already been said about Woods, and since new facts are still coming to light in the Arenas situation, let’s stick with Spadaro for now. What Spadaro did — spitting on the Cowboys star in a video he posted on philadelphiaeagles.com — was immature and unnecessary. He admitted that in his letter of apology Wednesday.

But let’s think about whether it was anything more than that.

It’s not like Spadaro spit on a country’s flag. He spit on the logo of a sports team. Was that professional? This is the Internet. Infantile behavior, rampant innuendo and inappropriate videos own this joint.

As Bethlehem Shoals wrote on his Sporting News blog Wednesday, sports aren’t morality. People who expect the same behavior out of Arenas that they expect out of elected leaders are looking for heroes in all the wrong places.

So forget Spadaro. What if Asante Samuel had spit on the star? ESPN would have the Cowboys complex staked out, asking every player the same question from 17 different angles about the “disrespect” shown. That would have been a story.

But in the big scheme of things, would it have deserved the attention? You’ve still got a case in which a man spits on the brand of a professional sports franchise, not a Star of David or a Koran.

More sports fans should be spitting on things left and right, even the things depicting teams they root for. Hell, as a Boston native, sometimes I want to spit on the Red Sox insignia for having the gall to force us to pay $35 to STAND on the Green Monster and watch a game. You’re telling me a savvy Eagles fan would be wrong to huck a loogie on the field at the Linc for all the tax money the team has stolen from the city?

Mmmmm. I’m salivating already.

Listening to the logic of Philadelphia Eagles fans following any sort of loss, it’s impossible not to think of Catch-22, the novel by Joseph Heller. Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb is cast as Yossarian, the main character.

In the novel, military regulations stipulated that a pilot could be freed from duty if he was crazy and unfit to fly.

But …

There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one’s safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. ‘Orr’ was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn’t, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn’t have to; but if he didn’t want to he was sane and had to. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a respectful whistle.
“That’s some catch, that Catch-22,” Yossarian observed.
“It’s the best there is,” Doc Daneeka agreed.

McNabb is stuck in a similar conundrum. He is an outstanding quarterback, and makes the Eagles a contender every year. Yet to win a championship, many fans believe they need to get rid of McNabb. If they were to get rid of McNabb, the Eagles wouldn’t be a contender anymore and would have no chance at winning a title, so they have to keep McNabb to contend, but can never win with him.

If you haven’t read Catch-22, believe me when I say that was a fair representation of the way the whole book goes.

On the eve of their first round playoff showdown with the Cowboys, it should be  stated that the Eagles are not a good team. They are, in all likelihood, a bad team.

• The linebackers, sans Stewart Bradley, are below average.
• The cornerbacks are above average, but with a bad set of safeties, Sheldon Brown and Asante Samuel get exposed whenever they make the slightest misstep.
• The defensive line is effective but takes on the personality of its leader, Trent Cole; hard-working but ultimately too flawed to be considered elite.
• The offensive line has been a patchwork all year.
• The running game is, as usual, non-existent.
• The receiving corps is young, electrifying and athletic, yet inexperienced and prone to some of the most basic mistakes of youth.

Taking all this into account, it is amazing what McNabb has accomplished with this group. Without No. 5, this is a 4-12 football team. It’s hard for anyone in Philly to believe that, since it’s been so long since their team was that bad. And McNabb is largely responsible for that.

Here is where McNabb goes from being Yossarian to being the economic stimulus bill.

(I’m milking the metaphors today, aren’t I?)

McNabb has gotten the Eagles to an 11-5 record and a postseason berth that could lead to a championship, yet many insist they’d be better off without him. Similarly, the economic stimulus bill has only barely propped up the flagging economy, and many insist it enabled the perpetrators of the downturn to continue their misguided ways.

Yet economists almost universally agree that without the stimulus, we’d be in an all-out depression. Without McNabb, the Eagles would be in the same situation.

The problem is, neither case is provable. There is no way to prove that something that didn’t happen would have happened if people had acted differently.  It’s the post-Y2K effect: We successfully corrected the problem, and now all the money we spent fixing the problem looks like a waste, because there was no problem.

See what I’m getting at?

To completely mix the metaphors, McNabb has boosted the Eagles to contention, but has not completely succeeded because the Eagles have not won a title.* He allows the Eagles to contend every year, but to win it all they need to get rid of him. If they get rid of him, they no longer have a chance to win it all, and therefore need to keep him to contend every year.**

*Using the economic stimulus comparison here

**Now we’re back to the Catch-22 comparison

Does anyone else’s brain hurt yet?

Sports fans love to say it’s all about the play on the field, not what is said off of it. Then, when an athlete or coach says something, fans do backflips criticizing and dissecting each syllable. When the speaker in question is McNabb, multiple this phenomenon to the nth degree.

I guess it should be no surprise, then, that McNabb’s rather cliche and boring comment about his teammates’ youth has become the latest example of No. 5′s alleged immaturity/stupidity/wimpyness/evil.

Here is what he said in Sunday’s postgame press conference:

“We showed our youth in situations where everyone began to look around to see who was going to make the play instead of stepping up and making that play,” McNabb said. “And that’s something that comes with the territory when you have a young group. And I think at this time, after discussing it with the guys, everybody understands that. All throughout the year we’ve had guys step up and make big plays for us when their name’s called. Today it just didn’t happen. And when you lose the way we did today in this fashion, obviously it is a humbling experience and we have to bounce back strong.”

Whoop dee frickin’ doo.

Let me get this straight: McNabb said the team is young: Accurate. He said the young players have performed well all year: Pat on the back. He said the young players, in a loss, did not play well: Hard to argue that. He said they discussed it as a team: Good, that’s what teams are supposed to do. He said they would have to bounce back: Of course they’ll have to.

The one thing McNabb did not do in that passage is take full responsibility for the loss. That’s the thing he’s getting absolutely killed for now, because the quarterback and coach are supposed to take all the blame when things go bad.

Except…

“I take full blame for it,” McNabb said at numerous points during the same press conference.

As a comparison, the following comments come from two prominent NFL quarterbacks. After you read them, try to guess who the speaker is and what the public reaction was.

1. “I think we’ve got to find a way to play better football for 60 minutes, in all phases, and everyone has got to focus on what they need to do better. I think that’s the most important thing:  being mentally tough to overcome adversity.  When things don’t go your way, you have to fight back.  That’s a challenge for all of us.  I think at times we do, and at times I don’t think we fight very hard. We have leads in the second half and leads in the fourth quarter and we’re just not closing the game out when we have the opportunity to.”
2. “I’ve never asked for a call, I’ve never clapped when they’ve made a call. I clap when we get the yards because of execution. The first one, I’ve had that hit before to the knee. I don’t know if I have to validate it or not, but I’ve got to see the doctor after this and get treatment. Obviously when you plant that left knee it’s in a vulnerable position, I wear that brace for that reason alone, hopefully it protects me there.”

The first quote is uncannily similar to McNabb’s quote, isn’t it? It’s about the whole team having to play together, make plays and overcome adversity. And it goes even farther than McNabb, claiming some teammates don’t always try hard. The speaker was Patriots quarterback Tom Brady in December following a loss to Miami.

The following reader summed up the reaction of fans, posting on the web story about Brady’s comments:

“Wow, you’re just begging for attention now, aren’t you? Way to make something out of nothing. The guy is speaking in total cliches and you want to make it out like he’s calling his team out? Really? Grow up.”

(It’s also uncanny how close this reaction is to my own over the McNabb “showed our youth” dustup. But moving on…)

The second speaker was Colts quarterback Peyton Manning, perfecting the time-honored practice of pot calling the kettle black by criticizing Brady’s on-field demeanor. In this instance, Manning is not hiding his thoughts at all. He’s blatantly, clearly calling out Brady for schmoozing with refs.

The reaction to this comment? Let’s see the first comment posted by a reader when this story ran in October:

“There’s nothing controversial about acting like a football player, and calling out people who don’t but play one on TV. If you are afraid to call out a colleague for acting out of his profession, then you are a coward. Notice that he was classy in the fact that he mentioned no names, but let the facts speak for themselves. There is a huge difference between professional and being a coward. He stepped up and in the classiest way possible, let his friend know to suck it up.”

That’s right, folks. Manning was “classy.”

Obviously, the fact that Brady and Manning have Super Bowl rings changes things. And it should — a little. Maybe it’s not AS BIG a deal when a champ calls out his teammates, but the difference should not go from HUGE DEAL (McNabb) to NON-ISSUE (Brady or Manning).

Next time anyone is about the get worked up over some banal comment by McNabb, maybe he should stop and consider the context. Was what was said really that bad, or did it just seem bad because it came out the mouth of Philadelphia’s favorite whipping boy?

That the Tracy McGrady sweepstakes threatens to overshadow the freaky Gilbert Arenas situation illustrates perfectly how salary structure overrides everything in the NBA — even alleged gun incidents inside the locker room.

It’s the nature of the business that T-Mac’s $23 million contract is viewed not as an albatross, but as a valuable bargaining chip for the Houston Rockets, who are six years and zero first-round playoff victories (with McGrady in the lineup) in their T-Mac era.

The one team the Rockets should give the longest, hardest look is the one that is in the worst spot in terms of the salary cap. The 76ers are so bad financially, they’re willing to give a roster spot to Royal Ivey simply because Ivey’s contract is negligible towards the cap. That’s what longterm deals with Elton Brand, Samuel Dalembert and Andre Iguodala will do.

The Sixers possess a commodity that should be valuable to the Rockets, however: Young talent, contender-ready talent, and contracts whose expiration would line up perfectly with the Rockets’ own personnel plans.

With Yao Ming sidelined until next season, many believe the Rockets should simply eat McGrady’s contract, let him go at the end of the year and sign a useful replacement for T-Mac in the offseason.

The list of free agents at the end of the 2009-10 season is intriguing. Joe Johnson,  Chris Bosh and Carlos Boozer are the only players of comparable age, star quality and talent level to McGrady, without the injury problems. LeBron James is available, of course, but with Ming’s contract set the expire at the end of 2010-11, the Rockets would like to save its major money to re-sign the best true center of his era.

The draft is looking less and less like a viable path for the Rockets. They’re playing too good with a patchwork lineup, and regardless of who they draft this summer, it’s doubtful that player would develop in time for the Rockets to contend with Ming — which should be the entire goal of their proceedings.

Trading McGrady to the Sixers for Iguodala and Dalembert would clear the picture substantially for the Rockets.

It’s immediate impact would be to help the Rockets with an All-Star caliber wing and a serviceable shot-blocker. The Rockets would actually be able to put together a real lineup and not be a Chuck Hayes injury away from disaster (has that sentence ever been uttered before?).

The long-term impact would be to give Ming a new second fiddle in Iggy who is more durable and, by nature of a deal that still has three years remaining, cheaper than Johnson, Bosh or Boozer would be. And unlike a drafted college player, Iggy would be ready to play for a title immediately.

Why would the Rockets want to include Dalembert? Simple: Expiring contract. Sammy’s $12 million annual deal expires after the 2010-11 season — right when the Rockets will be looking to clear money to re-sign Ming, plus any complementary pieces they may want to add.

The Rockets are rumored to want Lou Williams, although it’s hard to understand why. Lou Williams is a poor man’s poor man’s Monta Ellis, who is himself a poor man’s Gilbert Arenas, who is himself a poor man’s Nate Archibald. For $4 million to $6 million per year, he’s hardly worth either team’s time. But if the Rockets want him, the Sixers should throw him in, too.

In fact, it’s hard to say what the Sixers shouldn’t do to acquire McGrady’s contract somehow.