Rockets trade D-Mo, Thornton to Pistons for first round pick

Can't believe our Rockets are so dumb right now...

 

Playbook? :grin:

 

Anyone got this article?:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Grades up for the Donatas Motiejunas trade: <a href="https://t.co/ofSpZCqrQK">https://t.co/ofSpZCqrQK</a> (In)</p>&mdash; Kevin Pelton (@kpelton) <a href="https://twitter.com/kpelton/status/700386999383912448">February 18, 2016</a></blockquote>
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Huh? No it doesn't it tells you that Morey wasn't willing to gamble on DMO's health going forward and SVG was. Morey took the more liquid asset with lower risk/questionable reward while SVG has a less liquid asset with higher risk/reward.

I am still not sure how I feel about this since it all hinges on DMO's ability to get back to the potential he showed last season. Even if healthy, it will be tough for him to be the same player which is what people don't understand.

I know Morey and the FO think very highly of DMO so I am sure they had a price in mind and weighed all the risks. While I understand the fury it is DMO's body/back that has failed him/us as it is very unlikely he will be the same player even if he stays on the floor consistently enough.

 

Percentage of back injury recoveries = 25% = 1/4
Percentage of Morey draft picks in the teens working out = 0/5

 

Weren't we supposedly showcasing Jones and hiding DMo?

 

So you can dump them like garbage???

 

Pelton also thinks that Isaiah Thomas is an MVP candidate.

 

How is this a bad trade? U cant even argue that the Rox would keep DMo at end of season. Stuff like "Morey isnt a good drafter" is just a strawman argument and has no relation to the trade.

No pick<mid first round pick

This is the actual trade being done. And DD I used to like you but lately I think u got so old you became senile your arguments dont make sense from saying Dwight is done right after he put up double double in playoffs to how he is entitled and a deviant after 1 day suspension to how Morey sucks for doing his job and actually making trades to now accusing the rox for being cheap disregarding stuff like salary cap and wanting to chase a max fa next year.

Tell u and malakas what, lets look at DMo contract next season and look back on this trade. If he gets more than 6M (his salary+Tjones salary) this means rox would have lost him for nothing and this trade is value as it got a pick for something they would have lost anyway. If DMo costs less than it was a horrible trade because we could have kept him and still gotten a max fa.

 

I love how people still think this team had a shot at contending. I love D-Mo but we gotta blow it up.

 

Teams dont win by getting draft picks!

GSW: comprised with draft picks ranging from first and second round)
Spurs: Mixed with Draft picks from first and second round
Thunder: Guess what?


smh. People really think Morey is a terrible drafter because of Sam Dekker and.... Royce White? Ok lets forget almost everyone else he has drafted lol.

 

#Pedastool

 

such a low pick in such a bad draft has much lower probabillity to even be one half of the player DMO is.

And DMO has already been cleared to play. Even if he doesn't play the rest of the year..he will get a small contract. More win for Detroit.

 

The Deal

Pistons get: Center Donatas Motiejunas, guard Marcus Thornton

Rockets get: Center Joel Anthony, 2016 Detroit first-round pick (top-8 protected in 2016, top-10 protected in 2017 and 2018)

Detroit Pistons: C-


In an unexpected turn of events, the Pistons look like the most aggressive buyers at the trade deadline. Days after adding Tobias Harris from the Orlando Magic, Detroit has now added Motiejunas to its young core.

While the Harris trade was a slam dunk, there's a lot more risk here for the Pistons. Unlike Harris, Motiejunas isn't under contract for next season. He'll be a restricted free agent, and it's difficult to forecast the market for a player coming off serious back surgery.

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After undergoing surgery last spring, keeping him out of Houston's playoff run, Motiejunas missed the season's first 20 games. He returned in early December, was ineffective, and has sat out since New Year's Eve due to lingering back pain.

Presumably, Detroit wouldn't make this trade without confidence that Motiejunas will be healthy for the stretch run. The long-term implications are more difficult to predict. If this is a temporary setback, the Pistons might be able to re-sign Motiejunas at a good price because of his lost season. If the back continues to bother him, Detroit might have paid a high price for damaged goods.

Even when healthy, it's not clear how effective Motiejunas really is. Most of his value is based on 2014-15, when Motiejunas started 62 games and showed ability inside (his 53.4 percent shooting on post-ups led all players with at least 100 attempts, per Synergy Sports tracking) and out (he made 36.8 percent of his 3-point attempts after shooting worse than 30 percent beyond the arc his first two seasons). However, Motiejunas still struggled to protect the rim as a center and wasn't especially efficient overall.

The good news is the Pistons don't need Motiejunas to be a star, merely a solid reserve. Presumably he'll replace Aron Baynes as Detroit's backup to (and hacking insurance for) center Andre Drummond, with the ability to occasionally play alongside Drummond depending on matchups. Motiejunas' ability to stretch the floor enables him to play with Drummond offensively so long as there's a bigger power forward he can defend at the other end. Thornton also has some short-term value to Detroit, which was in the market for a veteran wing stopgap with starting shooting guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and backup Jodie Meeks both sidelined by injuries.

Still, a first-round pick that could be in the lottery is a lot to give up for the right to match any offer to Motiejunas. If he's healthy and plays well down the stretch, the Pistons could find themselves having to choose between letting Motiejunas walk and overpaying a player who doesn't appear to have a starting role at any point down the road.

Houston Rockets: A


A few hours before the deadline, the Rockets' big-picture strategy remains unclear. Whatever direction they go, however, dealing Motiejunas for this kind of value makes sense. As important a piece as he was to Houston's 2014-15 regular season, Motiejunas got usurped in the frontcourt pecking order this season by younger Clint Capela, who has also shown the ability to play alongside starting center Dwight Howard in addition to backing him up.

Given how much Rockets GM Daryl Morey prizes flexibility, re-signing Motiejunas to a big contract this summer seemed unlikely. So Houston has to be elated to get a pick likely to land in the middle of the first round in return.

The protections on the pick Detroit is sending the Rockets are worth noting. According to ESPN's Brian Windhorst, the selection is top-8 protected this season and protected in the top 10 each of the next two years.

Realistically, barring unprecedented injuries, the 2016 protection basically amounts to the Pistons keeping the pick if they land one of the top three spots in the lottery. Otherwise, even if Detroit misses the playoffs -- a reasonable possibility given that the Pistons are currently a half-game out of eighth and weakened themselves in the short term by trading backup point guard Brandon Jennings to get Harris -- Houston is almost certainly getting this pick.

Swapping 30 games of an injury-limited Motiejunas plus his matching rights for a four-year rookie contract of a player drafted around 15th is terrific from a value standpoint.

There's another small, ancillary benefit to this trade for the Rockets, who shed about $700,000 in salary taking back Anthony's $2.5 million deal. That either translates into luxury-tax savings for Houston, currently over the tax line, or makes it easier for the Rockets to add salary in subsequent trades. By virtue of using the full mid-level exception this summer, Houston is hard capped at $88.7 million in payroll. The Rockets now stand about $1.2 million below that total.

 

If you take a step back and look at it, this is a good deal.

This clearly means the Rockets didn't want to pay Dmo, and now they don't have to see him walk for nothing.

 

I now know how Carl Herrera felt when we traded Patrick Patterson.

 

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">DMo told ESPN he heard Stan Van Gundy is a little strict.</p>&mdash; Calvin Watkins (@calvinwatkins) <a href="https://twitter.com/calvinwatkins/status/700388272548130816">February 18, 2016</a></blockquote>
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Does this trade fall through when D-Mo can't pass his physical?

 

Morey never draft any player like Tony Parker, Barnes or Green...

 

conveniently ignores that Donatas was picked 20th