… or so thinks "a prominent Western Conference assistant coach [who] was into IMG this month and said that Daniel was a better player than any big they had on their roster, and this team sports a former NBA All-Star and Olympian in their front court, and has two lottery pick front court players," according to Steve Kyler of HOOPSWORLD.

HighTops did the P.I. work so you don't have to in this FanPost thread. But it wasn't Kenny Natt, as HT states — it was, by the grace of Sam Amick …

I question Kyler's reference to Hammbone as "prominent" in any context other than "Jason Hamm's hair sticks prominently out of his Fedora" or "Jason Hamm's voice chops figured prominently in the sock puppet rendition of The Merchant of Venice at the Maloof Sports & Entertainment Christmas party last year." But "former NBA All-Star/Olympian/lottery pick front court players" nonsense is dead-ass giveaway, unless Joel Pryzbilla or Nick Collison made a February classic I forgot about.

So, is Santiago really better than Mikki Moore and Spencer Hawes and <gasp!> Brad Miller? I remain dubious. Just look at the one year with some minutes — '03-04 with Milwaukee, where he had 23 starts. Rebound rate of 10.6 for a 7'1 center? Jason Kidd has a higher rebound rate than that last season. So did Moore. So did Hawes. So did Miller. So did K-9 (woof!). So did Shelden Williams.

No points, bad shooting (for a big), no blocks, an enormous amount of fouls (five per 36 minutes). He turned 32 this summer. You know, maybe my gut instinct was wrong. Really, what's not to like?

You go to the corner, Jason Hamm, and you stay there until I tell you that you can come out. Bad Hamm!