Hark, 2009 Becoming the New 2010

In retrospect, I jumped on that Stephen A. Smith rumor a little too eagerly. Not because I’m a fan of The Screamer -- although I have parked in front of his house -- but for what a Chris Bosh early exit would mean for 2010.
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↵Like the possibility of LeBron signing an extension this summer, it has the possibility to warp, or at least greatly accelerate, some of the earth-ending events expected to go down at that time. To recap: If some team lands Bosh, they have a better chance of luring Wade away from Miami; if Miami got Bosh, they’d definitely lock up Wade; if Cleveland somehow got Bosh before 2010, everyone should be scared. And that doesn’t even take into account other free agents like Amare Stoudemire, Dirk Nowitzki, Steve Nash, Michael Redd, and one no one’s talking about (as usual), Joe Johnson.
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↵With everyone eager to get on with this 2010 stuff already, we shouldn’t be surprised that rumors about these players are popping up left and right. Check out these recent bits from a Chad Ford chat. The chances of Amare Stoudemire being moved?:

↵↵⇥Last week I said 10 percent. But I think that was low. The more people I talk to in the league, the more I think it’s something in the neighborhood of 30 to 40 percent. Steve Kerr and Robert Sarver are taking a hard look at the team right now. If they decide to blow it up, Stoudemire will be the first to go. ↵↵And what about these Bosh rumors? ↵↵⇥I can’t speak to the veracity of Stephen A. Smith’s report. However, the word around the league is that Bosh wants to leave ... The question is, is Colangelo better off doing something now or waiting until this summer. There’s an argument for both approaches. It sounds pretty strongly that Colangelo is taking the latter approach. I’ve heard from a couple of NBA teams that he’s been pretty strong in telling them he’s not trading Bosh right now. But if the right offer came along ... wouldn’t he have to look at it? ↵↵Think of 2010 as an domino effect, or chain reaction. So far, we’ve been looking to LeBron as the first piece to fall, or sign, or whatever. But if Bosh or Amare were to change teams ahead of time, that alters the entire landscape ahead of schedule. I’m going on the good faith assumption that all these free agents are after rings. Thus, the possibility of two (or more?) of them joining forces is in the best interest of all parties. The “where doth head LeBron?” model pretty much figured that teams with cap space would each get a prize. Recent developments in the Bosh and Amare situations may have some teams thinking a little more ambitious, or greedy, than that.↵