TFD: In honor of the Brandon Roy press conference, here is the Roy/Foye draft night story

Can one day undo so many unpleasant memories? Well, Brandon Roy is here now, so the draft night wrong of six years ago is partially undone. And he is wearing No. 3, perhaps bringing some good grace to the number that Stephon Marbury once wore. It all depends, at this point, on whether his knees -- made of carbon fiber, peanut butter and shredded pieces of Darko Milicic's old contract, we are told -- can hold up.

Before we usher in all the new, though, would you care to revisit the old one more time? Sure you would. Here are the first several paragraphs of the draft night story from 2006, written by ex-Strib writer Steve Aschburner, on the whole Roy/Foye madness. You can decide for yourself if the move was primarily a cash grab or if Kevin McHale trumped Dwane Casey. Either way, it did not work out well. Until Friday:

Brandon Roy, a ready-made player considered by many NBA scouts to have 2007 Rookie of the Year potential, heard his named called at Madison Square Garden on Wednesday night, tugged on a Minnesota cap and smiled broadly as the Timberwolves' newly drafted rookie.

For all of 25 minutes.

Within the next five picks after the Wolves' selection of the University of Washington shooting guard, the news broke that Roy had been swapped to the Portland Trail Blazers for Villanova combo guard Randy Foye, who immediately took over for Roy as Minnesota's new ready-made rookie in the backcourt.

The two even swapped caps on the spot. Wolves head coach Dwane Casey admitted the team's personnel staff
flip-flopped a few times before accepting Portland's offer of "cash considerations" to make the move. "We were split," Casey said. "We'd been up there arguing all day."

But the coach quickly added: "There's no buyer's remorse. We're excited about getting Randy Foye."

"Hopefully down the line that will turn into players," Casey said.

Also, by ending up with the No. 7 pick rather than No. 6, the Wolves could save another million dollars on their first-rounder's salary. Foye will receive a three-year guaranteed contract worth between $6.34 million and $7.61 million, according to NBA rookie guidelines. Roy is eligible to sign for as much as $8.65 million.

The deal, talked about before the event began, was triggered when both players still were on the board at the Wolves' spot. The arrangement was facilitated by Boston, which owned the No. 7 pick until trading it to Portland earlier Wednesday in a multi-player transaction.

Consider Foye among the confused. "It was just nerve-wracking," he told reporters in New York. "Then, like two picks before me, my agent and Brandon's agent was making eye contact and I didn't know what was going on at the time. And once I saw my agent's face light up, he was like `Yeah, Boston is going to take you.'

"And then, `Portland is going to take you.' And then when they said Minnesota, I was like, `OK, good, yeah, bring it on.'-"