Guidelines to Deadline Trading

This is an original work so please do not use without my consent. Warning: it is long.

Why 'tanking' is not an ideal policy to pursue this season (which might not be the case next season), and guidelines to deadline trading

Several key pieces of background information:

1. The 2011 Draft will be a weak draft. Kyrie Irving and Harrison Barnes, two prospects widely perceived to have star potential, will likely not declare for this draft (Irving because of his severe toe injury, Barnes because of overall underperformance). Other underclassmen with high potential will also be deterred from declaring for the draft due to the impending lockout. Who will be prompted to declare for the draft: international prospects (since they will be able to land a guaranteed contract at a high pay level and still be able to play overseas) and NCAA seniors. Overall quality of the draft will be low, and although it might still produce stars, seems to bolster no apparent franchise players. Although some quality prospects will still end up declaring, this Draft will likely not be a realistic rebuilding solution. This is due to several reasons. One, many of the top prospects have obvious flaws, even those boasting strong seasons who are likely to declare to secure a high pick. For example, Perry Jones’ attitude and defense are both highly suspect. Derrick Williams doesn’t have the ideal size for a big man in the NBA. Secondly, even to secure an international prospect such as Kanter, one would need a very high draft pick that seems unattainable to a middle-of-the-pack borderline lottery team like us. Think about it this way – even if we lose all of our remaining games, we will still have 26 wins. By comparison, with around 25 games left, Minny & Sacramento each have 13 wins. Cleveland has a whopping 10 wins. Toronto and Washington, 15. New Jersey, 17. Our chances of getting a top pick, enough to get one of the good players in the draft (obviously, there are no Blake Griffins or John Walls), are slim at best.

2. The 2012 Draft, by comparison, would be a much better draft to shoot for. Due to the stockpile of talent that will be carried over (since many top prospects this year will choose to declare a year later), the 2012 draft will be relatively deep. Not only will current prospects like Irving and Barnes likely be available, excellent high school prospects now, college freshmen in 2012, such as Austin Rivers, Marquis Teague and Anthony Davis, for example, could all possibly be had.

3. One reason against tanking that is often ignored is that losing constantly reflects poorly on the value of the current players on a team’s roster. This may not be a concern for a very young team that is obviously rebuilding like the Timberwolves or the Clippers, since rookies have more marginal for error, but for the Rockets, which boasts plenty of grizzled veterans and experienced young players, continuous losing either means bad play on the part of veterans or a bottleneck in development of youth. The team relies both kinds of assets to trade either for a key piece, or for a high draft pick.

4. With the impending lockout and renegotiation of the CBA, the likely outcome will be that the teams gain leverage, reducing the percentage of profits that’s allocated to players (currently at 57%), and working out a mechanism that help teams retain star players and undercuts players’ freedom in free agency. In this case, cap space becomes less important as free agency will cease to become the foremost method to attract a star player. The draft will become increasingly important, as will trade, though to a lesser extent. This situation is ideal to teams that have already assembled a horde of star players, especially if they are in or before their primes (Miami, New York, OKC and Chicago come to mind). For a team that does not currently boast an outstanding star player, the outlook is rather bleak, as they will now have to resort almost exclusively to the draft to gain stars. On the flipside, they will have a greater ability to retain those star players once they have drafted them. However, overall, it will be difficult to contend for a championship, at least for the foreseeable future (~5 years) for teams currently without an outstanding young star player.

Now a few of guiding principles to the trade deadline in my opinion:

1. Unless it means getting a legitimate All-Star or guaranteed high draft pick in the 2012 draft or later (the Timberwolves’ unprotected 2012 draft pick, currently held by the Clippers, comes to mind), avoid taking on high salary, long term contracts at all costs. Since the salary cap under the new CBA, soft or hard, will likely be significantly less than the current cap ($58,044,000, with luxury tax at $70,307,000), a large contract will take up a much larger portion of the cap, thus becoming more “poisonous” if the player’s performance deteriorates. A good example is Al Harrington’s 5 year, $33 million contract signed last summer. A salary of $7 -8 million might not sound too bad today, but down the road when we might possibly have a $45 million hard cap, would spell all sorts of trouble and wreck havoc on cap flexibility.

2. As far as the strategy of “reloading” goes, target All-Star caliber players first. No solid NBA starter or good role layer will change the future of this franchise and suddenly make us contenders. As I have laid out, unless we are able to suddenly acquire an all-world talent through the draft, our chances of contending for championship in the next 5 years will unfortunately be small.

3. As far as this season goes, we should target the playoffs. Immediate help will be welcome only if they come in the form of very short or small contracts. Making the playoffs not only raise the value of our players, but also provide good experience for our prospects, paving the way for a potential trade. Also, playoff games make good profit for teams, and from a managerial standpoint, an increase in revenue, as well as higher franchise value (which is set to drop with the potentially career injury of Yao and loss of a significant portion of Houston’s international fan base), is always welcome.

4. Avoid paying the luxury tax this year, unless it means acquiring legitimate All-Star caliber talent or a high 2012 (or later) draft pick. Since this season is going no where, it makes no sense to waste money on the luxury tax, and make it harder for us to lower our payroll once the new CBA rolls around.

5. Why does Morey not go on a fire sale and trade all of our veterans for picks right now, if the draft is the most realistic way to acquire that all-world talent that is necessary to building a championship team, which is our obvious goal? We must remember that the current NBA trade market is a buyers’ market. There are more teams willing to “sell” than there are willing to buy, exactly because of the above illustrated mentality – with the impending lockout, new CBA and small cluster of elite, big market teams hoarding the best talent, most teams know they aren’t going to win with their current lineup and are thus more inclined to trade good veteran players on their rosters for immediate payroll relief. “Supply” outweighs than “demand.” Therefore, since it is difficult to get equal value if we, say, trade Martin or Scola (whose value will be limited due to his long and rather large contract) for picks. It makes more sense to be a prey in the market and try to take advantage of a small market team desperate to relieve payroll and try our best to a) acquire an All-Star, putting us back in contention or b) notch a high draft pick in 2012 or later as compensation for taking on a large contract.

6. Now let us separate NBA teams into 3 categories:

a) Contenders: Boston, Miami, Orlando, Chicago, New York (with their new dual core), San Antonio, Dallas, LA Lakers, and Oklahoma City, plus New Orleans, although its status as a contender is dubious (NOH is completely uninteresting as a potential trade partner. Chris Paul is going nowhere, and neither is David West or Okafor as long as they are on pace to win 50 games under NBA ownership, and although they want to lower the payroll, all they are willing to do is trade Marcus Thornton for a draft pick). These teams will be unwilling to supply either star players or high potential youngsters for what we have to offer, and do not possess guaranteed high draft picks for 2012 or later (if any of them do, please enlighten me, as my knowledge of draft picks aren’t the strongest).

b) Young teams with clear-cut young stars: Sacramento (Demarcus Cousins & Tyreke Evans), Minnesota (Kevin Love & Michael Beasley), LA Clippers (Blake Griffin), Memphis (Marc Gasol & Rudy Gay), Washington (John Wall). These teams would be foolish to trade their centerpiece, and even if they were willing to trade secondary young stars (Beasley and the underperforming Evans, for example), they will only be willing to do so unload huge long term contracts if they have any, and these players will probably not have the ability to turn around the fortunes of a franchise.

c) Borderline playoff teams, or young teams without clear-cut future franchise players: Atlanta (Joe Johnson, although an All-Star, cannot be considered a franchise player and has a horrendous contract; Al Horford is not going anywhere), Philadelphia, Indiana, Charlotte, Milwaukee, Detroit, New Jersey, Toronto, Cleveland, Portland (since the unfortunate demise of Roy), Denver, Utah (Utah is the only team on this list with a potentially franchise changing All-Star in Deron Williams and is very interesting), Phoenix and Golden State. These teams will be our potential trade partners, especially those with financial worries. However, it is important to note that in most cases, the best pieces on that team are strictly off-limits to us: Atlanta (Al Horford), Indiana (Roy Hibbert), Milwaukee (Andre Bogut & Brandon Jennings), New Jersey (Brook Lopez & Derrick Favors, who might be available but not for what we have to offer), Toronto (Bargnani), Portland (LaMarcus Aldridge), Utah (Deron Williams will not go, since if Utah has made the decision to choose Deron over even Sloan, then Deron is surely going nowhere), and Golden State (Stephen Curry should not go anywhere). It is difficult to find star talent, even on these teams, that remain available.

7. Possible candidates to target:

a) Stars: few star players are on the market right now. An interesting target would be Steve Nash, who is in the twilight of career, and is questionable to return to Phoenix after the lockout (the lockout is really key here – a year away from the NBA could dramatically affect players’ career decisions). Phoenix is also known for its frugal ways, and could possibly consider trading their face of the franchise. Another possible target would be Monta Ellis, but his status as a franchise star is dubious at best. I do not consider Josh Smith, Andre Iguodala, Stephen Jackson, Gerald Wallace, Ben Gordon, Tayshaun Prince, Antawn Jamison, Mo Williams, Devin Harris, Vince Carter, or David Lee as worth building around. Nene is an interesting target because he is a star center (which we lack) in many ways, though not an All-Star, and is on an expiring contract, so his cap impact will be small. However I would object against taking him with a contract as bad as Al Harrington’s, for the reasons illustrated above. Chris Andersen, maybe, but Al Harrington, no way.

b) Young players with potential: OJ Mayo would be a good prospect with room to develop, and it seems like the Grizzlies aren’t asking for the world for Mayo. It is highly doubtful that Stephen Curry would be available – the Warriors would be highly foolish if he were. Hasheem Thabeet can quite safely now be labeled a bust, and we will be hard pressed to out-bid Oklahoma City.

c) 2012 (or later) high draft picks: now here is where it gets interesting. Besides the T-Wolves’ unprotected 2012 first held by the Clippers, which I’m salivating over right now (will the Clippers consider giving us that pick for a good young point guard in Brooks to form a one-two punch with Eric Bledsoe and Jordan Hill, if we take Kaman’s contract off their hands?), New Jersey has a plethora of draft picks that they have assembled for the intended Carmelo trade (including our own), and they have openly expressed interest in Brooks. I would very much prefer more input from the BBS on high 2012 or later draft picks as potential assets to aim for.

Whew… I did not originally intend to write so much on the topic and I hope you all find it helpful. Hey – it’s almost the deadline are we’re blessed to have a trusty GM in Morey, and a reliable owner in Les. I trust that they will make the right decisions for this franchise moving forward, and let’s see what they have in store for us in the next few days. Thank you all for reading and I have to go do my reading now! ☺

 

Oh crap. Original title was too long. Did not notice that. I originally titled it "Why 'tanking' is not an ideal policy to pursue this season (which might not be the case next season), and guidelines to deadline trading." Can one of the mods just change the title to "Guidelines to Deadline Trading," please? Thanks!

 

Thank you - the entire article is actually a cleverly disguised tanking thread - it's tanking this season that I object to. And the title is messed up - it should be "Guidelines to Deadline Trading."

 

Thank you mods! Title right now!

btw Patrick Patterson is our most valuable young player besides Aaron. By far. And Austin Daye is a great prospect.

 

I divided everything up into easy to read paragraphs an italicized all my theses... I thought it would be relatively easy to read... Sorry, my bad

 

＊facepalm*

Long article = fail

 

Thanks for the advice and this is all true... But I thought some people would want a good read...

 

Last season he averaged 19.6 ppg and was arguably our best player. He was our closer (and still is the only player with the potential to single handedly close out a game for us), and at his best, is a semi-star player. Patterson has extremely high potential, and can one day be perhaps a Millsap-type player, but he is not a superstar in the making and will be 22 in two weeks.