I wondered what you thought about trading Andrei Kirilenko for Seattle's Wally Szczerbiak and Robert Swift or Sene? It would give the Jazz a guy who will work well with Carlos Boozer -- given how Wally likes sit on the perimeter and shoot -- plus another big man to develop? -- Kevin Trusty

Answer:

Both of your proposed trades adhere to NBA salary cap rules, Kevin, so let's take a closer look.

You are right about Szczerbiak being a perimeter player. He has been one of the game's most dangerous long-range shooters during his eight-year career. He's made 40.4 percent of his three-point attempts.

In an era of the disappearing jump shot, Szczerbiak has an extremely marketable skill, even if he does turn 31 during the coming season.

Wally's biggest problems has been injuries. Over the past four seasons, he has missed 152 out of a possible 328 regular-season games. He has played more than 40 games just once since 2003-04.

Bottom line?

If you trade for Szczerbiak, who is coming off ankle surgery, you are rolling the dice on his ability to play an 82-game schedule.

As far as Swift or Sene being the included in such a deal, I know the Jazz liked both of them before to their respective drafts. But both were gone by the time Utah picked.

Swift was the No. 12 pick in 2004, when Utah ended up with Kris Humphries at No. 14 and Kirk Snyder at No. 16. Sene was the No. 10 pick in 2006, when Utah ended up taking Ronnie Brewer at No. 14.

At this point, neither Swift nor Sene have established themselves as bona fide NBA players. Of course, the Sonics have been such a guard-oriented team in recent years that most young low-post players would have had trouble making an impact.

In my opinion, it's too early to give up on Swift or Sene, which would make taking them in this proposed trade a decent gamble by the Jazz.

The bottom line, however, is that I don't think Kirilenko is going anywhere -- at least until the trade deadline in February.

Kirilenko's offseason outbursts aside, I think its safe to say the Jazz explored some trade possibilities before the start of training camp, but they didn't feel a great urgency to make a deal.

As one NBA executive told me, Utah seems "married" to Kirilenko despite his criticism of coach Jerry Sloan and his methods.

With the start of the regular season just two weeks away, I think it's clear the Jazz are going to try make Kirilenko comfortable and any trade will be a last-resort solution to a problem that, right now, everybody seems to be downplaying.

I believe the only way the Jazz trade Kirilenko is if they struggle during the first half of the season, if his unhappiness resurfaces and negatively impacts his performance, if his teammates sour on him and if another team improves the offers the Jazz have already gotten for him.