Berman is a Houston based reporter, I think he’s being fed this info by sources within the Rockets organization. Why would the Wolves leak to him and not guys based out of Minnesota like Darren Wolfson who have been covering this saga?
I agree that Berman is probably being fed this info by the Rockets but I wonder why they would do it. Leaking it at this moment doesn't help them unless its to push EGo to extend?
They did it so other suitors think "this must be a leak by Minnesota to increase the offers, i won't bite" -> Minnesota says "ok, nobody offers more, let's agree to close the deal with Houston" Spoiler
http://www.espn.com/nba/insider/sto...ler-trades-teams-offer-minnesota-timberwolves Spoiler How much is Jimmy Butler worth in a trade? According to the latest reporting from ESPN's Zach Lowe and Adrian Wojnarowski, the high demands of Minnesota Timberwolves coach and president of basketball operations Tom Thibodeau have scuttled the possibility of satisfying Butler's request for a trade so far. Other teams believe that if Thibodeau is willing to trade Butler at all, he wants to recoup the same value the Timberwolves gave up to get Butler from the Chicago Bulls last June. Realistically, Butler's trade value is lower now that he's heading into what will almost certainly be the final season of his contract. (Butler has a $19.8 million player option for 2019-20 that he will surely decline barring serious injury.) So what is an appropriate expectation for Butler's trade value? Butler's value in 2018-19 There's no doubt that a healthy Butler will be a good value this season, when he'll make $20.4 million as part of the max contract he signed with the Bulls prior to the NBA salary cap increasing rapidly when the league's current TV deals kicked in. That's the league's 40th-highest salary. Butler will make less than Danilo Gallinari ($21.6 million), Chandler Parsons ($24.1 million) and teammate Andrew Wiggins ($25.5 million). Based on a combination of my wins above replacement player (WARP) metric and ESPN's real plus-minus (RPM), I project Butler as providing 13.9 wins above replacement this season, good for seventh in the NBA. If that sounds high, remember two important factors working in Butler's favor: he finished fourth in RPM last year and plays the wing spots that have proven most difficult to replace in recent seasons. The caveat to that value is Butler is being projected for 75 games by my SCHOENE projection system, which would be the third-highest total of his career. Butler has missed an average of 15 games over the last five seasons, including 23 last year, when he underwent surgery on his right knee meniscus after the All-Star break. If we prorate Butler's value to 67 games, he drops to 12.5 wins above replacement and 13th in the league -- nearly exactly where Butler finished in our NBArank voting (14th). The time Butler missed in 2017-18 did reinforce his value. Minnesota went 10-13 in the 23 games Butler sat out, a 36-win pace over a full season. With Butler healthy, the Timberwolves went 37-22, a 51-win pace. Because of the players they'd have to give up, a team dealing for Butler can't quite count on that kind of leap. Nonetheless, after a reasonable trade Butler would still make whatever team ultimately lands him more competitive this year. Butler's value on his next contract The team that trades for Butler will get full Bird rights to potentially re-sign him as an unrestricted free agent next summer. That's where things start to get trickier. Butler will be able to command a huge raise, with an estimated max starting salary of $32.7 million. That would translate into a maximum five-year deal using Bird rights worth $190 million, as compared to a max deal of four years and $141 million with another team. At the beginning of a max contract, Butler may still be a solid value. Historically, I've found that each win above replacement costs teams about 3.5 percent of the salary cap in free agency. Since Butler's max salary will start at 30 percent of the cap, that means he'd have to produce at least about 8.5 WARP per season to live up to his deal. My multi-year projections suggest Butler producing 12.9 wins above replacement in 2019-20 and 10.3 in 2020-21, the first two years of his next contract. (That's based on the full 13.9 wins above replacement this season as a starting point.) Three years is as far out as my projections go. To look deeper into Butler's next deal, we can utilize FiveThirtyEight's CARMELO projection system, which goes farther into the future using the development of similar players. Translating their wins above replacement metric to the same scale I'm using, CARMELO projects Butler as producing 8.6 wins above replacement in 2021-22, 7.6 in 2022-23 and 5.9 in 2023-24 at age 34. That makes it clear that, unless Butler can age better than typical players of his ilk, he'll be heavily overpaid on the back half of a five-year max deal. It's probably more realistic that Butler will age quicker than average, given his injury history and the heavy workload he's carried throughout his career. Butler led the league by playing 38.7 minutes per game in 2014-15 under Thibodeau in Chicago and has ranked in the NBA's top four in minutes per game each of the last five seasons. Trade value contingent on situation Considering all of the factors discussed in the previous section, I think it's likely a five-year max deal for Butler would ultimately prove a bad investment for his new team. Frankly, a team that knew they could sign Butler in free agency next summer would be better off waiting and getting him on a four-year max deal with smaller raises from season to season (capped at five percent when changing teams, as compared to max eight percent raises using Bird rights). As a result, there's two compelling factors that make a Butler trade worth doing now. First, there's the value of having him on the roster this season, which is considerable. Based on the cost of a win in free agency this summer (a little more than $2 million), the conservative projection for Butler's 2018-19 value still makes him worth at least $7 million more than his salary, equivalent to the surplus value of a 2019 first-round pick in the late teens. If teams believe Butler can stay as healthy as projected by SCHOENE, he'd potentially provide as much surplus value as a 2019 first-round pick in the top 10. Second, some teams -- most notably the Miami Heat -- can't sign Butler in free agency next summer because they don't have salary cap space. Miami would have to make a trade to get Butler, either now or via sign-and-trade as a free agent. Given that the teams on Butler's original list of desired destinations (Brooklyn Nets, LA Clippers and New York Knicks) aren't realistically contenders this season with him, the Heat appear to represent Minnesota's best chance of getting value in a trade. Assuming the Timberwolves' asking price becomes more reasonable, Miami may determine the value of contending for home-court advantage in the first round this season and potentially re-signing Butler next summer is worth the cost.
I have no idea if the Rockets will get Butler, but Mark Berman doesn't participate in the "random tweets of leaked information with no real substance behind them" game that most reporters do.
Man upon sleep n some back n forth with my bro about butler and gordon, this may be just a lateral move. N losing pj n gordan may not be worth the one year rental to basically be the same but with parts shifted. Cause does jimmy really make a def against durant. Probably not. Man wish this was Kawhi we was talking bout. Then i think i guess if we somehow got ariza back with bulter that may make a def. But thats a gamble that ariza gets bought out. This is a tough one folks. I dont know what to do. Getting cold feet
Not sure which way to take this information... Do we think, "where there is smoke there is fire!?!?" Or do we think... We are snatching the headlines and attention before what is actually gonna go down, goes down. You know, the whole leverage thing. Definitely worried about the haul we would give up. Even Ego, who is without a doubt in the deal, is tough for me. The spacing he provides with the REALLY DEEP range is important for our style of play. But gotta get the stars when and where you can.
Basically what Woj reported. "It'll be a challenge." "Will need a 3rd team." But "Scoopster Robinson" would lead you to believe the Rockets are the favorites and/or a deal is close. Good. Rockets already got rid of their boat anchor. Minnesota has to get rid of theirs on their own. Not Houston's job. "Well send a first to Minnesota for JImmy and send out another first to Sacramento so they can take on DIeng."
I would love to hear Morey’s phone conversations trying to get a third team. “Look we both know your squad isn’t making the playoffs. I’ll get you a couple picks for the future and you can help me dick slap golden state and that p***y KD for causing this bullshit” If I was a multi billionaire owner that didn’t have a chance at a championship I would probably help whoever dethrone the warriors
I just don’t see how a Rockets’ first round pick is worth taking on Dieng for 3 years (its 3 right?). Aside from the fact that our first rounders can be worst that an early 2nd round pick because of the contract that comes with it, Sacramento has a lot of big men so taking on a bad contract like that at a position they really don’t want more of.... hard to see it happen.
Maybe Brandon Knight goes to Sacramento's cap space with a pick. Then one of the Kings' smaller expirings like McLemore to the Wolves along with Gordon and maybe Hartenstein, etcetera. Can the Rockets get picks for Chriss from some other team to use in a Butler trade? The team sure has been quiet about him, no speeches about, "We LOVE this guy."
yeah regarding chriss, matt thomas inquired about him in at least 3 of his interviews and basically got nothing back. morey did tell rich eisen that chriss has had a good camp so far though
Chemistry problems are definitely a risk. I think you’re onto something about Chriss, but I can’t see him fetching more than a second. Maybe that’s the holdup, we’re throwing around multiple second round picks and it’s just not enough for these third parties
I think the Rockets might have a better chance to move Chriss during the season, if he can play 15/20 minutes with James and Chris, even someone as dumb and bad like him can look much better than what he really is. The problem is that i think the Rockets would love to move him sooner rather than later and let another team decide what to do with the team option for the 2019/20 season.
Valid point... IIRC unless their own pick is #1 overall, they lose it to the Celts. I think they are trying to hedge their bets to be sure that they have a 1st round (no matter where it is) pick in the upcoming draft. Also, I think SAC has a plan to ship out some of those expiring contracts at the trade deadline. So they may be thinking asset accumulation to make a deal for a high profile player (meaning offering up their expirings and newly acquired first to take on a big contract). Just thinking out loud....
