The trade of Donovan Mitchell and Kevin Durant could further a historical trend that has roiled the NBA: one in which a team trades away three or more first-round picks. right.
When the Atlanta Hawks traded three future first-round picks—two of which were unprotected—and an unprotected first-round swap right to acquire Dejounte Murdoch from the San Antonio Spurs At the time, many observers compared the deal to the Milwaukee Bucks trading three first-round picks for Jrue Holiday in 2020.
Their thinking is that Murray is the missing piece next to Trae Young, just like Holiday is the last cornerstone of the Bucks.
But a better comparison might be Holiday’s first big trade — a landmark deal in 2013 that started what would later be called “the process” in Philadelphia. Holiday was 23 years old at the time and had entered the All-Star once with the 76ers, a mid-level team; Murray was 25 years old and had also entered the All-Star once with a mid-level team.
Philadelphia traded Holiday in 2013 to the New Orleans Pelicans, who were eager to win and completed the No. 1 pick in the draft. The San Antonio Spurs traded Murray to Atlanta, which was under huge pressure to win, and their goal was to increase their chances of acquiring Victor Vunbanyama or Scott Henderson.
In 2013, the 76ers traded Holiday for two first-round picks: the No. 6 pick in the first round (Nerlens Noel), and the top five picks the following year. Protect the order. Atlanta paid more for Murray and protected him less.
The first Holiday trade was overshadowed by the night’s other landmark trade: the Brooklyn Nets traded three future first-round picks — including three-year and five-year draft picks. Unprotected draft pick later this year - and an unprotected first-round swap to the Boston Celtics for Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett (and a few others). Age and injuries have severely weakened the Nets. The two unprotected draft picks are Jaylen Brown (third overall pick in 2016) and Markelle Fultz (first overall pick in 2017), which the Celtics acquired in exchange for Third pick - Jayson Tatum).
The trade was so costly that several front-office executives said they never imagined there would be another trade that would place three or more future unprotected or lightly protected draft picks Rights are sent from one team to another. In 2017, the league even considered introducing a rule that would completely prohibit a team from trading their first-round swap rights in the year between two first-round-less seasons, sources said. However, this plan was never implemented.
Over the next few seasons, teams tread carefully. When the salary cap stagnates, rookie-level contracts become more coveted. When new TV revenue poured into the league in 2016, the salaries on those rookie contracts didn't rise as quickly as the salary cap -- making first-round picks even more valuable. Cheap rookie contracts provide some cushion against the harsh luxury tax.
They have long since stopped being so cautious, leading executives to wonder whether teams are underestimating the value of the first round, or instead correctly evaluating the value of the first round compared to proven It's not enough to outshine their own talented players - leaving the Nets potentially facing their second deep rebuild in a decade.
"Obviously, planning for the future is outdated," one senior executive quipped.
On the second day of the Murray trade, the Timberwolves traded four first-round picks for Rudy Gobert - three unprotected and one top-five protected. The deal caused a stir in the NBA, rightly or wrongly, and created a new talking point in trade talks for Kevin Durant and now Donovan Mitchell — including one from the Utah Jazz. discussions between the team and the New York Knicks, who acquired a number of additional first-round picks from other teams. (Most of these picks from other teams are heavily protected, which leaves room for bargaining -- Utah will likely target as many of New York's own picks as possible.)
Count it The first Nets-Celtics trade, there have been seven trades in the past decade involving a team trading three or more first-round picks: the first, plus Holiday ( Trades to Bucks), Paul George (to Clippers), Anthony Davis (to Lakers), Gobert (to Timberwolves), Murray (to Hawks) and James Harden (to Nets). According to research by ESPN's Kevin Pelton and Basketball-Reference, there appears to have been only one such trade before 2012 since the ABA/NBA merger. Two more such trades — Durant and Mitchell — could be on the way.
(Both Pelton and the Basketball-Reference staff caution that the further back in history, the more difficult it is to determine the precise details of past mega-trades. There may be questions about whether one of the assets was a draft pick or a swap right. There is conflicting information.
In a previous trade in 2013, the Jazz sent three first-rounders - including Johnson, who later became "Magic" - to the Lakers as compensation for signing Gail Goodrich in the free agent market. The other two include Chris Webber! Meanwhile, one of the three first-rounders Milwaukee acquired in the trade for Jrue Holiday originally belonged to another team. )
This kind of all-in transaction was once the preserve of big-market teams and teams that were just missing the last piece of the puzzle. Draft picks don't mean much to big ball markets; they have an advantage in attracting stars in free agency or forced trades. The trade between Atlanta and Minnesota defies that logic entirely.
Although the Eagles reached the conference finals in 2021, they cannot be said to be just one piece of the puzzle. Young is their only All-Star. What if Murray — a free agent in 2024 and unable to sign an early extension — chafes at being the No. 2 option far behind the No. 1 pick?
The following may seem counterintuitive considering the Timberwolves haven't won a playoff series since 2004, but they may be closer to "just one shy" status than Atlanta. They had two true stars in Anthony Edwards and Karl-Anthony Towns; Gobert made them a Big Three — even though he was a decade older than Edwards, who was just starting his career.
The decision to upgrade from a two-star team to a three-star team can be one of the trickiest team-building moments. That choice depends on the talent of the two existing stars, role players, the team's timeline, injury risk and other variables. The Clippers and Celtics have been content to stick with two stars and maintain flexibility. The Nets got the third. What's unique about New York's pursuit of Mitchell is that he will be the No. 1 star -- meaning the Knicks will have fewer avenues to acquire a No. 2 star.
The Timberwolves have never signed a significant free agent, so they could view acquiring Gobert as a use of cap space. Still, you rarely see a team in a place as small as Minnesota take such a risk. The Wolves may still not be a core contender until Edwards transforms — and Gobert may be old by the time he transforms.
Even if you separate out the failed deals from the successful deals, it's hard to draw a clear line between all these large deals. While Brooklyn was putting everything on the line, Garnett and Pierce were already on the decline. The risks are obvious.
Harden was 31 years old at the time and still in his prime. The Nets bet on his future and paired him with Durant and Kyrie Irving. In Brooklyn, Harden quickly returned to the MVP conversation. It now appears that the Nets superteam is a historic failure — objectively speaking, it is — but it could also be the result of two ill-timed injuries in the 2021 playoffs (one to Harden, one to Irving). ), and a black swan event (the coronavirus pandemic, coupled with local vaccination regulations that kept Irving from playing home games) destroyed this well-structured superteam. The Nets understand their star's stormy personality — and the risks that come with it — but I'm not sure the end result is enough to condemn what they had in mind when they put this team together.
Murray is 25 years old. Davis was only 26 when the Lakers acquired him, and he may be the most important non-rookie player the Lakers have acquired through a trade since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in 1975. George and Kawhi Leonard were traded from their parent teams by the Clippers when they were 29 and 28 years old respectively to form a pair - a reasonable decision that made the team appear in the league for the first time in its history. conference finals and set them up for a championship run next season and beyond.
But the risk is always there, no matter how good the star being traded is. In addition to "risk," several executives around the league have used one word to describe the recent Atlanta-Minnesota trades: reckless. Even though Durant is 34 years old, any team that acquires him will lose more than half of their roster. If it ends up being the Phoenix Suns — which became even less likely after they matched the Indiana Pacers' offer for Deandre Ayton on Thursday — considering Durant is 34, Chris Paul At 37 years old, any unprotected Phoenix pick is valuable.
On the other hand, teams that acquire a large number of draft picks in multiple player-for-pick trades often find themselves unable to use all of their picks. They end up placing players overseas, trading draft picks, or (as the Thunder have done in the last two drafts) using multiple picks to move up the draft.
The Timberwolves traded four first-round picks to the Jazz for Rudy Gobert, causing an uproar in the NBA. It also set unprecedented standards for two other trades: one involving Gobert's former teammate Donovan Mitchell, and the other involving Kevin Durant.
What exactly causes these risks? What does this mean?
Some factors are easy to analyze:
? Since the Toronto Raptors rented Leonard for one year to win the 2019 championship and then Durant left the Golden State Warriors , there has always been a feeling that the competition for the league championship (by NBA standards) has been opened up.
Few foresaw Phoenix becoming a true contender.
When more teams think they can at least build a conference finals caliber team, they will sacrifice the future for the present.
(To add to the discussion about competitive balance. Sources said that at the recent NBA Board of Directors meeting in Las Vegas, the growing dispute between the Warriors and Clippers and the rest of the league The salary gap has become a hot topic. Next year's Warriors and Clippers will join last season's Warriors as the three most expensive teams in NBA history. There is no doubt that they will spend more than other teams. Except for the Nets) - they either take the loss or try to compensate with arena revenue like the Golden State Warriors
There's probably no magic solution - if you even think this is a problem. It could be argued that these bosses are billionaires, if not more so, and bearing heavy taxes is the price of competing for the title. Maybe that's true, but that doesn't convince stakeholders much. These measures include a tougher luxury tax, a higher revenue share, and a tighter cap. The last one will be very difficult to convince the players union, which will also be uncomfortable with tougher tax penalties; they like a few teams to ignore it. The idea of ??spending everything. )
Adjusted lottery odds and playoffs seem to tip the balance a little in the winning direction. Mid-tier teams are motivated to chase the No. 9 and No. 10 seeds. Good teams no longer view their future first-round picks as automatic golden tickets to a top-three pick — even if they intentionally finish last. .
Teams also recognize the risky nature of the draft. An average value for a mid-first round pick could be a solid backup player. The high pick Boston received in the 2013 trade with the Nets was an exception. Teams have taken note of how well the Raptors, Miami Heat and others have done with lower draft picks, or even no picks at all.
It's possible that the teams are overreacting a little bit. For a long time, the new lottery odds still favored the worst team winning the No. 1 pick — as was the case with the Houston Rockets two seasons in a row and the Oklahoma City Thunder in past drafts. Same.
But this is indeed no longer an easy task. "The Process" The Sixers can be fairly certain that a few seasons of heavy losses will get them a top-three pick. Philadelphia didn't lock those picks at the level they expected, but ended up getting a star player (Joel Embiid) and turning a confidence-shaken No. 1 pick (Ben Simmons) into Harden. The 76ers haven't made it to the conference finals yet, but they have a chance every season.
Beyond the signs of calm, there is a feeling around the league that windows are opening and closing faster than ever before — that your cornerstone star may only be one season away. Ask for change, or even worse, demand a trade. If there are more people among the new bosses who are keen on change, you will see a more aggressive operation of exchanging the future for the present. (Hawks owner Tony Ressler publicly said Atlanta was a "mistake" not standing still after the 2021 playoffs. Minnesota's incoming owners Marc Lowe and Alex Rodriguez made no bones about it Their desire to make a splash may be reflected in Minnesota's new president of basketball operations, Tim Connolly. The long-term security of a guarantee may embolden decision-makers — or persuade them to shrug and do what their bosses want.
The window seems so short that those weighing in on it. Teams that offer a superstar to one side of a tier-1 trade may have reason to believe that if the deal falls through, they can immediately position themselves on the other end of the same trade: There will always be a team that will go out of their way to get one of their established players. Paying too much for draft picks (The Nets did such a 180-degree turn, trading the dissatisfied Harden to Philadelphia for Simmons, thus regaining two first-round picks.
? The NBA is a copycat league. When one team gambles, another team may be more inclined to do the same thing. Sometimes more teams choose a certain path. There are reasons to think that going the other way would lead to greater efficiency - choosing stability and continuity may be more powerful when competitors are swinging between frenzied deals
But this offsets the stability in the end. What does it look like? Boston and the Denver Nuggets appear to be taking a calmer path: Everything revolves around two stars and selective upgrades -- one after two seasons with Derrick White and Marko. Tom Brogdon, a trade for Aaron Gordon before the critical deadline
(Making Jaylen Brown the core piece of Durant’s super trade makes sense in theory, Kay. The Celtics must be wary of Brown becoming an unrestricted free agent in two years, but sources say the two sides have not yet entered into substantive negotiations on such a deal)
With Ja Morant and Jaren Jr. The Memphis Grizzlies, with Jackson as their cornerstone, could be the next test case and have enough trade chips to do whatever they want.
On the lower tier, the Cleveland Cavaliers will face a tough but tempting choice as Darius Garland, Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen will develop at the same time.
Those teams all have their own drafted stars. The same goes for the Eagles and Timberwolves. Few strategies - whether continuity, boldness, wildness - can work consistently without a single star on the team. Even in the new era of lottery odds, the draft remains the most common way to acquire your first star. This is even more true for a small team with no signing history in the free market.
This is why most teams are afraid of lottery reform, even though only one team (Oklahoma City) is confident enough to vote against them. This is why the Thunder, Pacers, Spurs, Magic, and maybe now the Jazz have or are failing. (Harden put the big-market Rockets on this path, and their status as a relatively more attractive free-agent destination should give them an edge in their rapid ascent.) Indiana trades Domantas Sabonis for Tyrese Haliburton, in part because they believe Haliburton, who is four years younger and more adaptable than Sabonis, has greater star potential.
Even one-star teams can find themselves in a bind - underdog in a trade war, unable to acquire a second star, but not bad enough to reach the top of the lottery. . The Washington Wizards and Portland Trail Blazers might be in that position right now.
There is no foolproof way to build a team. If the goal is to compete for a championship, then every path is low probability. But every team will take a good look at how these mega-trades will pan out in five years.