Sports
NBA Trades That Would Feel Just Wrong – Bleacher Report
Nearly all NBA trades arrive with some level of shock attached.
A few of them, though, surpass the usual surprising territory and enter a range perhaps best described is “icky.”
We just saw one such swap this summer, when the Golden State Warriors brought longtime nemesis Chris Paul to town. Given his history with the franchise, it was jarring to see, even if the Dubs had long needed a backup point guard and had to find a way out of the remainder of Jordan Poole’s contract.
Piggybacking off the CP3-to-GSW deal, we’ve drummed up four hypothetical trades that could work theoretically but would feel very wrong if they ever went down.
Los Angeles Lakers receive: Dillon Brooks
Houston Rockets receive: D’Angelo Russell, Maxwell Lewis and three second-round picks
The Lakers might like how their roster looks for now, but it’s possible they’ll eventually find themselves in need of a perimeter stopper. Could that need become big enough for them to bring Brooks to Hollywood?
Probably not, since he just beefed with LeBron James in April, calling him “old” and adding “I poke bears” and “don’t respect anyone until they come and give me 40.” And in the game after Brooks made those comments, he was ejected for a flagrant foul 2 after hitting James in the groin area.
Naturally, James got the last laugh, as his seventh-seeded Lakers ousted Brooks and the second-seeded Memphis Grizzlies in six games. The latter’s tenure on Beale Street effectively ended in that series, and he wound up signing a four-year, $86 million deal in Houston this offseason.
The Rockets surely will be in no rush to move him, though if it’s obvious their rebuilt roster isn’t ready to compete, they could see the value in flipping a present contributor for future assets.
L.A., which has enough in the backcourt to get by without Russell, has beefed up its supporting cast around James and Anthony Davis but is still lacking a lockdown defender on the perimeter. Brooks could easily fill that void. He has limitations on offense, but his defense is dominant. Just last season, he landed in the 95th percentile for estimated defensive plus/minus, per Dunks & Threes.
Houston, meanwhile, might be intrigued by Lewis, who looks like a three-and-D wing with ball-handling and playmaking flashes that suggest he could grow beyond that label. The Rockets would also nab three second-rounders to keep or help sweeten a future trade offer.
Russell would mainly make the money work—Houston is set at point guard after splurging on Fred VanVleet—but he could have trade value if the Rockets wanted to quickly ship him out like the Portland Trail Blazers just did with Jrue Holiday.
Miami Heat receive: James Harden
Philadelphia 76ers receive: Tyler Herro, Caleb Martin and a future first-round pick swap
Apologies to Tyler Herro, but you actually aren’t safe from more trade talks. Not as long as Miami remains in need of a perimeter shot-creator who could help Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo unlock this team’s championship potential.
Harden, who skipped the Sixers media day amid his ongoing attempt to get traded out of Philly, remains a capable candidate for that role. He may no longer have quite as much burst as he once did or the bonkers scoring numbers of his prime, but he just topped 20 points per game for the 11th consecutive season while also collecting the second assists title of his career.
The 34-year-old would work wonders out of the pick-and-roll with Adebayo or even Butler, plus he could, in theory at least, offer some off-ball value as a career 36.3 percent three-point shooter. Then again, that “in theory” qualifier is necessary, because he doesn’t always stay engaged when he’s not involved in the offensive action.
And that essentially gets us to where everything feels off with a Harden-Heat deal. He doesn’t have bad blood with the franchise, but he hardly feels like an ideal fit for the club’s famed #culture. He has a tendency to float around the court at times (particularly on defense), and he’s right in the middle of his third messy split from a team in the past three years.
As badly as the Heat might need his offense, they may not want any part of the media circus that often follows him. It’s probably telling that no sooner had Miami learned it had lost the Damian Lillard sweepstakes that Anthony Chiang and Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald were reporting the Heat were “not expected to pursue Harden.”
Maybe that’s just as well, since Philly’s interest in this potential package is probably debatable. While Martin would be an easy fit, Herro’s defensive limitations could make him tricky to slot alongside Tyrese Maxey. And a future pick swap hardly moves the needle for a contender that needs to prove it can win big to Joel Embiid sooner than later.
From a purely value standpoint, though, this offer feels about right with Harden on an expiring deal. If only the rest of the trade didn’t feel so off.
New York Knicks receive: Trae Young
Atlanta Hawks receive: RJ Barrett, Immanuel Quickley, Isaiah Hartenstein and two first-round picks
The Knicks are sitting atop a mountain of trade assets and just so happen to be one impact addition away from rising to the ranks of a full-fledged contender. They just need the right star to shake loose.
They likely don’t have Young atop the wish list, since they already have an ascending star at point guard in Jalen Brunson. Then again, they were mentioned in the Damian Lillard and James Harden sweepstakes, so they seemingly aren’t totally against the idea of adding a scoring playmaker.
Young would be a fascinating target for a lot of reasons, not least of which is his history with the fanbase. When the two teams tussled in the first round of the 2021 playoffs, he was the subject of some colorful chants from ‘Bockers fans and seemed to savor the moment.
“It was the craziest environment, probably, that I’ve played in,” he said of last season’s playoff series on the Old Man and the Three podcast. “… Them yelling the whole time, it was probably one of my favorite times playing basketball.”
If the Knicks thought Young could help them—a big if given the defensive challenges he’d face in an undersized backcourt with Brunson—they wouldn’t hesitate to snatch him up. Still, it’d be tough to lose the fun of having him in Reggie Miller’s old super-villain role in Gotham.
The Hawks, who didn’t close the door on a Young deal earlier this year, might be open to a trade if they don’t think they can ever field a championship-level defense with him on the roster.
So, they’d offload him here for a pair of young, potential-rich players in Barrett and Quickley, a serviceable rotation center in Hartenstein (who’d make it easier to deal Clint Capela and promote Onyeka Okongwu to the starting five) and two of the many first-rounders held by the Knicks.
Miami Heat receive: Karl-Anthony Towns
Minnesota Timberwolves receive: Tyler Herro, Caleb Martin, Nikola Jović and a future first-round pick
It makes sense to double up on possible Miami trades here, as the Heat seem as likely as anyone to make a major move this season.
You’ll never hear that sentiment directly out of South Beach, where skipper Erik Spoelstra perpetually believes his team has enough to compete, but there’s a reason the Heat keep being linked to just about every shot-maker on the market.
They have a glaring need for scoring support—25th in offensive efficiency last season—and a roster that otherwise seems ready to contend for the crown. They also can surely hear the ticking clock attached to Butler, who turned 34 in September and previously logged some high-mileage minutes under coach Tom Thibodeau.
Is all of that enough to point them toward Towns? It doesn’t seem super likely, given his history with Butler and the fact that he doesn’t play on the perimeter. Then again, he is among the most skilled scorers in the NBA, and he could have a much easier time playing alongside Bam Adebayo than he has with Rudy Gobert.
Adebayo has the quickness and versatility to handle the defensive assignments Towns can’t take on, while Towns’ sure shot from distance (career 39.5 percent) would give Adebayo (and Butler) all kinds of room to attack. The Heat have previously struggled against size, and the 6’11”, 248-pound Towns would be a (literally) big way of addressing that issue.
Minnesota may not want to abandon ship on its super-sized frontcourt after paying a fortune for Gobert last offseason, but if this pairing doesn’t work—the two bigs posted a plus-0.6 net rating over 529 minutes together last season—then waiting on a major move might merely be delaying the inevitable.
Not to mention, moving Towns might alleviate some of the win-now pressure on this team and shift its focus more toward the future, where it arguably should be when its two most important players are 22 (Anthony Edwards) and 23 (Jaden McDaniels) years old.
Herro would immediately become a building block and quite possibly scratch its itch for a long-term playmaker. Martin is young enough to keep (28) or good enough to flip for at least a decent return. Tack on two future wild cards in Jović and a first-rounder, and that could be enough for Minnesota to bite.