NBA Trade Ideas and Random Thoughts

Trade 1

2 way deal between the Suns and the Lakers shipping Kobe to the desert. Let's see what each team would get:

Suns: Kobe Bryant ($17,717,750)

Lakers: Leandro Barbosa ($1,679,733), Shawn Marion ($15,070,000), and 2 first round picks the Suns received from the Hawks in the Joe Johnson deal.

Analysis

This trade only goes down if Shawn Marion agrees to sign an extension with the Lakers because he will be a free agent next summer. If he agrees to do that, this is the best value the Lakers can get for Kobe. The Lakers starting lineup for the future would be Barbosa, Jordan Farmar, Lamar Odon, Shawn Marion, and Andrew Bynum. That’s a pretty nice core. The Suns starting line up would be Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Raja Bell, Boris Diaw, and Amare Stoudemire. This trade would make the Suns the prohibitive favorites going into next season.

Trade 2

3 way blockbuster deal between the T-Wolves, Lakers, and Bulls. Let's see what each team would receive:

Timberwolves: Tyrus Thomas ($3,260,760), Ben Wallace ($16,000,000), and the Bulls no.9 pick in this year’s draft

Lakers: Luol Deng ($2,614,440), Chris Duhon ($3,024,000), Ben Gordon ($3,862,080), Victor Khryapa ($1,172,400), P.J. Brown via a sign and trade ($8,560,000), and the Bulls’ 2007 second round and 2008 first round picks

Bulls: Kobe Bryant ($17,718,750), Kevin Garnett ($21,000,000), Maurice Evans ($1,620,000-via Lakers) and Craig Smith ($412,718-via T-Wolves)

Analysis

Let’s break down this deal. Kevin Garnett can opt out of his deal next summer so the T-Wolves are eagerly examining trade options. And the Lakers just might decide to let Kobe go because of all the damage that the most stubborn player in sports has already caused (there is a 24 second video out there of Kobe trashing Andrew Bynum and the Lakers front office). This trade has a chance of working only because the Bulls have an extraordinary amount of great young players and draft picks. Let’s see what each team’s lineup would look like after the trade.

Lakers- Jordan Farmar, Ben Gordon, Luol Deng, Lamar Odom, and Andrew Bynum

T-Wolves- Randy Foe, Ricky Davis, Tyrus Thomas, Ben Wallace, and Julian Wright or Jeff Green (from either the no.7 or no.9 pick in this year’s draft). The T-Wolves could use one of these picks on a small forward and the other one on a big guy like Yi Jianlian, Joakim Noah, or Spencer Hawes.

Bulls- Kirk Hinrich, Kobe Bryant, Thabo Sefelosha, Andres Nocioni, and Kevin Garnett.

Huge deal. Let's look at all of the key players that the Bulls would be losing: Ben Gordon, Luol Deng, Tyrus Thomas, and Ben Wallace. The reason the Bulls must do this deal is because of their cap situation. A considerable number of the Bulls’ young players are still on their rookie contracts. Very soon all of these young players (Gordan, Deng, Thomas, Sefelosha, etc…) are going to be demanding big-time contracts and the Bulls will have to let them walk because they won’t have enough cap-space since they signed Big Ben to such a mammoth contract last off-season. By trading away these young players and Ben Wallace, the Bulls will avoid this problem and have the league’s best duo in Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett. The Bulls can play Garnett at center and force match-up problems with other teams. Sefelosha has a long wing-span and would be able to play the 3 while Nocioni would be a menace on the boards at the 4. This Bulls team would be a lock for the finals and would have a 3- or 4-year window where they would be contending for championships.

I think the T-Wolves would instantly become better than they are right now and that the Lakers would have a solid foundation for the future.

I love this deal. What does the Scrapper Nation think?

Random Thoughts

1. Check out what Greg Oden had to say about Josh McRoberts on his blog:

I am staying in Carmel, Indiana, which is north of Indianapolis. In this area lots of people know high school basketball. When you ask someone about it, the first name that pops in their minds is not Greg Oden, Michael Conley Jr., or Eric Gordon. It's JOSH MCROBERTS, one of my favorite people in the world. He is one of the funniest people I have met, and the one person in high school basketball that I dreaded playing, because I had to guard him and he is a monster. He uses both hands on the court. That gives him an edge on everybody else. He was here for a day so I got to hang out with him. It was one of the greatest days. Him and a couple of his friends and I laid out at his pool, played horse in the pool, stayed in too long, hands got wrinkled and when we got tired of being in the pool his mom came and grilled some hamburgers and teriyaki chicken with macaroni salad and cookies. It was the BOMB! Then we just chilled later on with some of his friends from high school and it was cool. The next day he left for Chicago to work out. He is a great player and I hope him well this year in the draft. I hope they invite him to go to the draft cause he will probaly have me laughing the whole night. I don't want to brag, but we were on one of the best AAU teams ever with 1. Michael Conley Jr, 2. Eric Gordon, 3. Deaquan Cook, 4. Josh McRoberts, and 5. little ol me. We also had Aaron Pouge, Curtis White, Mark Titus, Reese Cheatem, and Devin Williams coming off the bench. Those years were fun.
-Greg Oden

Josh McRoberts was the one player Greg Oden was scared of playing against? I feel bad for Josh, he would have been a lottery pick if he had come out straight out of high school or if he had even came out last year. Josh and Shavlik Randolph have had a very similar fate. Both were highly touted, top 5 recruits coming into college. Both were extremely athletic and were forced to gain weight to play in the post at Duke because Coach K doesn’t recruit enough post players. They should have both been allowed to play the 3 or 4 and float around the perimeter or in the post as they desired but Coach K had to try and make them big men. At least Josh left now, if he had waited until after next season he would have been a late second round pick (or not even been drafted).

2. It’s been a couple of days now so I think I can vent a little bit about Tiger’s loss. He didn’t have a clean 4th round and chunked a couple chip shots but that double bogey at the 3rd hole was what really cost Tiger. Tiger has finished second in the last two majors and was a total of only 3 shots away from a second Tiger Slam. Oh well, he’ll be back.

3. In more Tiger news, Tiger had a baby GIRL named Sam Alexis Woods yesterday. Sam? Tiger sounds like he really wanted a boy. I wonder how having a child is going to affect Tiger. When Jack Nicholas had children he had a major drought for a couple of years. I think Tiger’s a family guy so we’ll see what kind of an effect this has on him.

4. Mike Nifong, Durham’s rogue District Attorney, has been disbarred. Now he better get ready to be sued.

5. The Scrapper starts summer school tomorrow but I’ll try to update as often as I can.