<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Cleveland has still been pursuing a first-round pick for Luol Deng today, but no one will make that deal without a promise he'll re-sign.</p>— Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojYahooNBA) <a href="https://twitter.com/WojYahooNBA/statuses/436579198288031745">February 20, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
I think we'll end up doing something like this... http://espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=ltlvddc
He also kept saying asik & d-mo are goners only about 100 times!!!! By keeping those 2 players, Morey is leaving the door open to trade Howard at the end of the season.....
True! I still can't believe Omer Asik is still on the roster. But I did identify Jordan Hamilton as an under the radar trade target. Hamilton is well liked by advanced stats, which is why I identified Hamilton. I keep trying to tell you guys that Morey is all about advanced stats. If you pay attention to what teams are doing then you can more easily project future moves. A somewhat under the radar PG who will be a free agent this summer is Isaiah Thomas. Thomas was also being heavily shopped prior to the trade deadline by Sacramento, which tells me that they undervalue him. The Kings have also been making some pretty bad trades lately. Would Sacramento sign and trade Thomas to Houston this summer for either Jeremy Lin or Asik (probably Lin)? I believe they would. Keep an eye on Thomas.
Forgot to type out that Isaiah Thomas is VERY well liked by advanced stats, much more so than Jeremy Lin. Which is why I suspect Daryl Morey has his eye on Thomas. Besides trading Lin to Sacramento, what else should we expect this offseason from Houston? Well, obviously Morey will continue shopping Asik; I think Asik is moved for a heavily protected 2015 first round pick and a cost effective backup C. Phoenix can offer Miles Plumlee with a pick for Asik. We will also probably see what Morey decides to do with Chandler Parsons. Parsons is a good player but does Houston really want to give him the large contract (probably something like four years, $48 mil) that the market will bear? If not, do not rule out a draft day trade, where Parsons is swapped for a mid- to late-lottery pick. Houston made this same move with Kyle Lowry and Chase Budinger. Houston would presumably draft Parsons' replacement with this pick. Parsons is good but is overrated not only by Rockets fans but also by other teams, one of whom will wind up overpaying him. Otherwise, I don't really see Houston doing much in free agency, besides signing an under the radar "threes and D" free agent, probably to a one year, minimum salary deal. Remember, Kevin Love WILL be traded, possibly this summer, although my guess is that Love is moved in Feb 2015. So Morey would like to have the assets and the flexibility to make a competitive bid for Love. Sample 2014-15 roster, when the season begins: The starting lineup PG Patrick Beverley SG James Harden SF Chandler Parsons or 2014 lottery pick (Rodney Hood/Jerami Grant/Doug McDermott) PF Terrence Jones C Dwight Howard The rest of the rotation Isaiah Thomas (acquired for Jeremy Lin) Donatas Motiejunas Miles Plumlee (acquired with 2015 1st rounder for Omer Asik) Robert Covington The end of the bench Isaiah Canaan Francisco Garcia Houston's 2014 first round pick (presumably a PF/C; Willie Cauley-Stein?) Veteran free agent SF/PF (3's +D) (or maybe Jordan Hamilton is resigned?) Stashed in the developmental league New York's 2014 second round pick (probably also a big) Troy Daniels In Feb 2015, Morey presumably looks to upgrade at PF, with Kevin Love as the target. Maybe Paul Millsap would be his backup option. How great would Doug McDermott be for Houston? This kid can really shoot the ball.
Mmmm, I can see Asik going somewhere in the summer. Packaged with one of our power forwards, perhaps, and 3.2 milion dollars. As long as the return is good, of course. Millsap and a pick? Draft rights to Lucas Nogueira (if his knees are okay). Maybe something doing with the Sixers.
McDermott would be great here......but at the 4. Not the 3. He's not quick enough to defend 3's. But he is savvy and he is bulky enough to be a stretch 4. And we're not trading Parsons for that pick. We're not trading Parsons dude. That should be obvious by now. We're not going to trade him next year either except if gets us Lebron. Lebron signed to a fresh 4 years would be about the only player Morey will trade Parsons for. As far as Parsons goes, I think Morey is going to let it run it's course. He's gonna play out the 4th year and then Morey is going to offer him more than any other team will after 2015 after we make a run with our cap space at either Love or Aldridge or possibly somebody else. Then Parsons' deal will go down. The deal will be structured favorably, probably a front-loaded deal with decreasing salary hits each year and the 5th season will be partially guaranteed with a player ETO so Parsons can opt out for more money if he feels like it's there. The more I think about Parsons the more I think this is how Morey plays it out. Kawhi will be a free agent at that time or will have already been extended by San Antonio. That plus Hayward's deal this summer will be kind of the market guide on Parsons after next year. Hard to see anybody offering more than 4/48 at this point for Parsons. And if that is the number than 5/65 with a front-loaded deal and partial guarantee that Parsons can opt out of if he wants trumps 4/48. Hard to see Parsons going anywhere for less money either except back home to Orlando or possibly Miami. Doesn't look like Miami will likely have cap space for him and doesn't look like Orlando will be interested in paying him the max. As for Lin for Thomas.....if Sac had wanted Lin that deal would have gone down at the deadline. Lin is even more undesirable for them next year seeing as Thomas is not going to get more than about 4/15 or 3/12 max. And for as good as Thomas is, it could become just as difficult to move him as it is Jeremy Lin. This league is watered down with point guards right now. As good as Thomas shows on advanced metrics you have to take his defense into account and his size. He is another midget. Great player for his size. But honestly....he's going to be difficult to move out if we need his cap space if he is signed to a 4-year deal. Which brings us back to McDermott. Looks like he's going to fall right in line with where the Wolves will be drafting. Wouldn't that be oh so convenient for them? And if they took him as the potential Love trade fallback, then that frees us up to be more creative in trading for future picks and players as we won't have to provide them a replacement at the PF. And if they don't take him and McDermott falls...just slightly...then perhaps we can talk some team into taking Terrence Jones for their pick and we'll just slide ole Dougie right into our 4 spot until the Wolves figure out they've gotta move Love.
I have refined, and slightly revised, my projections for Houston's upcoming offseason: T 1) Acquire a signed-and-traded Isaiah Thomas from Sacramento via trade for Jeremy Lin. Projected contract terms are four years, $24 mil. Advanced stats love Thomas, and view this as a pretty significant upgrade. Four years, $24 mil represents excellent value given Thomas' anticipated production. 2) Trade Omer Asik to Phoenix for Miles Plumlee and one, maybe two, future (2015 or beyond) second round picks. This will be perceived as a simple salary dump but Plumlee provides solid value at his price and is a very good backup C for any team. It is difficult to find very good backup Cs in free agency, and they tend to get overpaid (e.g., Zaza Pachulia, Kosta Koufos). This move also improves Houston's cap flexibility. 3) Trade Chandler Parsons to a team picking in the #8-#14 range in the 2014 draft. Houston presumably uses the pick to select a replacement starting SF. Possible targets: Doug McDermott from Creighton, Rodney Hood from Duke, Jerami Grant from Syracuse. The idea here is that Houston does not view Parsons as a good value at four years, $48 mil, which is about what he will fetch when he inevitably hits free agency. The time to sell high will be this June. I could be wrong on this--Houston may decide to keep him and pay him--but I doubt it. 4) Draft a backup PF/C with your 2014 first round pick. This will need to be a fairly polished player who can step in and play 12-15 minutes/game in the event that one of the four bigs in your rotation (Dwight Howard, Terrence Jones, Donatas Motiejunas, Miles Plumlee) are unable to play for any reason. This player will be on the 13-man active roster, not the d-league. 5) Draft a less polished big man with your 2014 second round pick (the Knicks pick). This player will likely spend the entire season in the d-league. 6) Sign Kostas Papanikolaou. Projected salary: three years, $7.5 mil. Papanikolaou will be expected to be the team's backup SF in 2014-15 and may even compete for the starting job with your 2014 first round pick. 7) Let Omri Casspi, Greg Smith, and Jordan Hamilton all walk. 8) Exercise your team option on Troy Daniels. 9) Attempt to upgrade at PF at the February trade deadline. The top target is Kevin Love, but Paul Millsap is the more realistic possibility. Projected roster to begin the season: The starting lineup PG Patrick Beverley (30 minutes/game) SG James Harden (36 min/g) SF 2014 lottery pick (28 min/g) PF Terrence Jones (32 min/g) C Dwight Howard (36 min/g) The rest of the rotation Isaiah Thomas (30 min/g) Kostas Papanikolaou (20 min/g) Donatas Motiejunas (16 min/g) Miles Plumlee (12 min/g) The end of the bench Isaiah Canaan Robert Covington 2014 late first round pick (PF/C) Francisco Garcia Stashed in the d-league Troy Daniels 2014 second round pick (C) Note that Houston is sitting on a rather large amount of unused cap space to begin the season, which puts them in an excellent position to acquire Love or Millsap in February 2015.
Word is that Houston did not want to include Pardons in the Rondo trade, so there is no way they trade him for a unknown.
Rogower, are you really looking at the 2014 draft and saying "their is a SF in this draft that could start on a championship contender", the SF position Is pretty week when it comes to what we need out of them, a vet would do x10 more impact. + parsons being moved for his bird rights in the offseason has a reduced value, I'm not even sure if it would net is a lottery pick
I think there will be a team dumb enough to trade a mid- to late-lottery pick for the right to be the team to grossly overpay Chandler Parsons. Mostly, I do not see Houston wanting to be the team to grossly overpay Parsons. I think they can live with a short term downgrade at SF, although I'd like to think that Houston will identify a SF in the draft who will eventually be as good if not better than Parsons. It's not about being "cheap." It's about a focus on value, and also about maintaining cap flexibility. San Antonio made a move like this several years ago when they traded George Hill for the right to select Kwahi Leonard, shortly before Hill hit free agency. Worked out extremely well for the Spurs but they were undoubtably viewed as "cheap" at the time.
Rog, Love reading your stuff, honestly do. I think you're a knowledgeable and quality poster. But most of this ain't happening man. 1. There is no way in Hades we are paying Isaiah Thomas $6 million per to clog up our cap. No way dude. We're trying to acquire a 3rd superstar. This is not the move that gets us there. Trading Lin? Yes. But not for another mediocre point guard on a long-term deal. 2. If we trade Omer for second rounders then we're giving him away. We've already been offered a first rounder for him. I know that. 3. We're not trading Chandler Parsons. He's our ace in the hole. He's not going anywhere. We're trying to get a 3rd superstar and keep Parsons as our 4th guy. His contract makes that very very doable in the next year and a few months, not by trading him but by keeping him and outright signing a max free agent if we have to after next season. 4. We may draft a backup big with our first rounder. Don't know about that. But I do know this...our pick in the 2014 draft will be used to acquire an asset. That may be a big drafted or it could be a shooting guard. If we actually draft a player we're gonna draft the guy that is the best player available. Or we could wind up trading that pick for a future pick. Or combining that pick with Asik or Jones to get a 10-14 pick in this draft or a future draft. The pick is an asset and Morey is going to do his best to turn it into a better asset. 5. See 4 6. We're not signing that guy unless we can trade his contract or unless we get him at a minimum salary deal. So either it's one year guaranteed with a second year non-guaranteed or it's a multi-year minimum salary deal. However, we could possibly sign Llull with that money or with a part or all of the MLE. Llull is the better player at this stage of their respective careers and his contract could be traded because Llull has proven he can play in the NBA. How? Because he plays at a championship level on a championship team in Europe and he's the main cog. And he's played successfully internationally against NBA ballers. Llull is ready to join and NBA team as a starter. Kostas Papanikolaou is an unproven risk. I like him. But he's risky. 7. Agreed - at least until or if we make a big summer move. Then we possibly bring one or more of those guys back. 8. Obviously 9. We are going to attempt to upgrade to a star/superstar at the 4 during the 2014 off season. Worst case scenario is going to the trade deadline with assets. But getting our guy during the 2014 off season is the first priority.
A mid- to late-lottery pick in this stacked draft > Rajon Rondo. Remember, when you draft a guy in the first round, you have him under team control, at a cheap price, for four years, and you control where he goes in year five, since you have his Larry Bird rights. Rondo will be an unrestricted free agent in just over a year, which negatively impacts his value. Rondo is also expensive, which negatively impacts his value.
