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A show about basketball
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Welcome to Gucci Row on the Rebel HD 2. I'm your host Kevin Kelly with co-host Will Despar. Thanks for tuning in to our courtside conversations covering all things NBA.
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Welcome back, y'all.
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Gucci Rowe, episode four. I'm here, your host, Kevin Kelly. Your co-host, Will Despart. How we doing, man? Good, how are you?
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Good, good, good. You got a good episode ahead of us. Talk a bit about trades, especially some of the ones that just happened this spring and summer and get into a little bit of historical context discussion about the value that front offices look for in trades and how that shifted. And then we'll cut into a bit of the landscape of this next season and what we think some teams might be able to do to jump and stuff like that. And then we'll cut into the mid-season tournament that Adam Silver put in and discuss the implications of that. That time of year. That time of year, yep. To begin with some of the trades that happened, I'll start earlier. On the 18th, we had Brad Beal sent to Phoenix for Chris Paul, Landry Schamett, multiple seconds and pick swaps. I think an important thing about this trade that I wanted to discuss is the lack of first rounders in there and I think that that can go to speak to just how insane it is for a team to give anyone, let alone a guy like Brad Beal, a full no-trade
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clause. Yeah, I was definitely surprised when I saw that that wasn't much of a haul compared to what I thought it would be, but it does make sense compared to the contract situation. I don't know if you can give up that much with him.
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Yeah, it seems like there was a real peak in what teams were willing to give up last he picks plus players to the Wizards but just because Beal would have preferred to play in Phoenix they're left with no first picks and only swaps so you know for all the talk that he had for years about like wanting to do right by DC and
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everything it's a pretty pretty weird way to go out. I'm not exactly sure he's
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that much of a ceiling raiser for a team anyway I mean especially when you're
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I don't really know if that's a championship trade.
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Yeah, and it does seem a little redundant with what he and Book do to me. To get into that though, the Wizards didn't hang out with Chris Paul for long. They flipped him to the Warriors in a trade that sent Jordan Poole and a 20-30 first-round pick top 20 protected and a 20-27 pick to the Wizards. I was wondering if you had thoughts on that as the as the warrior fan here. I'm pretty neutral I don't know it feels good to get the Poole contract off the books but I mean I'm not a huge Chris Paul fan even just mostly because of the rivalry honestly but just I think a 38 year old giving up a 24 year old for him is never really a good deal because you're trading away potential for something that can only decline. That's true. It's interesting. I know we had mentioned the other day when it first dropped a bit about how we look at this trade is so reliant upon Jordan Poole's career arc and if he's able to grow. Because like you said, it is giving up whatever, 14 years of age on a guy who clearly has a pretty high ceiling.
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If we've seen the peak of Jordan Poole, then I don't think it's a bad trade. But if he turns into something else that he hasn't become yet, then it could age horribly.
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That's the thing, it could. But also, if like you mentioned, he has seen his peak, it's not just a good trade, it's a phenomenal trade from the Warriors front office to give off whatever, $200 million for years of dealing with that just to be able to have one year of Chris Paul and have you know a lot more cap next year. That one will be interesting to see how it rounds out. But I thought it was funny that the only first round pick that the Wizards got out of this whole thing was for Chris Paul, included in that. Certainly no Sam Press, the operation. So another one that I think is worth talking about is a three-team trade that happened on June 21st that sent Kristaps Porzingis and a 2023 first round pick, and a 2024 first round pick via Golden State to Boston, who sent out Danilo Gallinari, Mike Muscala, a second round pick, and Marcus Smart. The other two teams involved here were the Wizards, who got Tyus Jones, Gallinari, Muscala in that second, and the Memphis Grizzlies, who got guard Marcus Smart.
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Overall thoughts on this one? I liked it for the Celtics. It's definitely tough for the fan base to give up Smart after nine years there. I don't think there was much left that they could have done as far as getting over the hump with that lineup. I think it's good they added KP. I think he'll be a big boost to their offense and defense.
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I like this especially for, like you said, the Celtics, but also the Grizzlies. I think that just giving up Tyus Jones, who is one of the best backup point guards in the league and has been for about half a decade, but to give him up for a tone setter and an incredible defensive player of the year, Marcus Smart, is a really good grab and I think that they certainly needed a bit of leadership and culture in that locker room.
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It's definitely about as good as you can get as far as a Dylan Brooks replacement.
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Yeah, and I think it's funny to mention now that the Wizards are just loaded up with tremendous backup point guards when you think of Ty Jones, Montee Morris, Dillon Wright. Talon right like they just you know are loaded with good but not great guards so You know it'll be interesting to see the direction they go and they they had a good draft I thought moving up to get below
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and
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They have a lot of room to you know take chances on things like that definitely a lot of room Yeah, so then another thing this was certainly not as big, but the Nuggets were able to move into a couple picks in this draft class by moving future picks. For example, they got the 29 in this year's and the 32 in this year's draft for the 40 and the future for next year and you know after seeing how how big Christian Braun was in the playoffs and it seems like that was a great move that they can get guys that can contribute right away. I think we've definitely seen even just for the Jokic
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and how he's emerged like the value of second round picks has seemingly gone up.
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Yeah yeah and so I guess to get into a bit about we mentioned you know the We mentioned the Donovan Mitchell and the Rudy Gobert trade from last year. So I think it's worth getting into a bit about just how draft capital has become so much more sought after for GMs and front offices around the league as opposed to getting guys that can help you win now or even young guys that have high ceilings. For me, what comes to mind is the first huge draft capital deal I can really think of was the KG and Paul Pierce trade to the Nets back in 2010.
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Yeah, that was 2012.
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2012. So it seems like that was the first instance that I remember at least where it was just loads of draft capital. And you saw it turn into some really good picks like Tatum and Jalen Brown. So yeah.
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And it aged horribly for the Nets.
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Yeah. And then also like another one that included a ton of draft capital that we don't really talk about all that often was the trade that sent Dwight Howard to the Lakers in which Aaron Ofalo, Al Harrington, Christian Ienga, Josh McRoberts, Moe Harkless, Nick Vucevic, but then also a 2013 second, a 2014 first, 2015 first, a 2015 second, and a 2017 first, all for Dwight Howard. How did that turn out for him?
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Not great.
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So, and then, like I mentioned, you know, with these, the Gobert trade that demanded four firsts, swaps, and the Jazz and Cavs trade last year that sent Donovan there for Consexton, Lurie Marketing, Ochi, three firsts, two swaps, and second. So you know, it just seems that teams are going to be a lot more reluctant going forward to give up their entire decade-ish of control over their draft.
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Which is good, I think, for the future of the league. I don't like seeing Kings ransoms be given up for players that are just going to walk out of the door in three or four years.
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Yeah, to your point, too. It's way more fun, I saw someone mention about how it's way more fun to watch a league where GMs are trading to get better but not to bottom out and have good prospects and drafts for the next 10 years. That creates a culture of a real lopsided league, which I think is good to get away from for sure. the trades in the 1990s and the Value that was returned for them like one of them Charles Barkley was with the 76ers for eight seasons six of which he was an all-star and averaged 25 points per game 12 rebounds per game that summer he didn't put out an official trade request, but Everyone knew he wanted out so they moved him to the Suns for Tim Perry, Andrew Lang, and one year of Jeff Hornacek. He went on to win the MVP in Phoenix. It's just astonishing how low of a return that is for an MVP.
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It seems like it probably started a couple decades worth of front office futility for the Sixers too because I don't know if they've ever really recovered from that trade barring their 0-1 run which was kind of more luck than skill.
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Yeah, you know, anytime you trade away someone that good, you're taking big risks for sure. Like another one mentioned in that video is how Popovich and the Spurs traded Dennis Rodman to the Bulls in the 90s for Will Purdue, which is just, I mean, it doesn't even sound right, which is worth mentioning that the reason that Pop said that they gave it up for so little was that no one wanted a chance, wanted to take a chance on Rodman at the time, which, sure, but...
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Pop and Rodman also hated each other, which should be mentioned. They still hate each other to this day, I'm pretty sure, but they were never going to co-exist after that.
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Two polar opposite personalities. But still, you know, regardless, you should demand a lot more in return for that. Another one involves your Warriors. Mitch Richmond, a 25-year-old, was traded away for the third pick, who turned into Billy Owens.
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Yeah, the Warriors, until 2014, were really just a futile franchise all around. Some of the decisions they made and some of the players they missed out on, if you look through the 90s, it's just nauseating.
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So how we get from these trades that include either very little for good talent or just young talent or current talent instead of picks, and then we mentioned early ones like the Nets trades, what do you think might have inspired that shift in value and why do you think front offices Started to put so much more emphasis on having as many picks as they could Probably just getting burned in the past and giving up a player of say Barclays stature and realizing Okay, we got nothing in return for this that could have built our franchise moving forward. So you got to play the hard game and Do that. Yeah, I also think, you know, as talent in the league and in the draft rose just over time, it seems to make sense that you'd have more hope for getting a star out of the draft or whatnot. So, I guess to talk about some of these teams that have really low picks, you know, like the, or high picks rather, like the Spurs, Pistons, rockets. I don't know if you want to pick one of them individually or just talk about them as a whole, but what do you think might have to happen for a team like that to jump either just into the play-in or just get out of the purgatory of being high in the lotto? Well for the Spurs I think it's pretty obvious that it all relies on Wemby and I think that's a pretty safe bet to make because he's 7'5 and he moves like a point guard. So I mean... Yeah, I guess, would that be then your most confident pick out of the lottery teams to
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get back into the play-in? Oh yeah, I think they could be a play-in team this year, the way they've built. Because the thing with the Spurs is, when they played all their players last year, they weren't the worst team in the NBA. They were a fine team, but they intentionally played bogus lineups to tank. When they get those players back, and when they add a few players around Wembley, I think they could be the 10th or the 9th team in the West, not the East.
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Yeah, I think, I don't know. I agree they have a chance to jump up, but I don't know that I'd pick them to jump ahead of a team like the Hornets who have been in the play in two of the last three years and then had a down season this year with the Mellow getting hurt. I think it's possible for a team like them to jump back up, but when you talk about the really young teams like Spurs, like I said, Rockets, Pistons, I'd probably say the Spurs, but also I think that the Rockets are building something really special with the talent they have there and and Jalen Jabari and and Sangoon and Amin and now Cam Whitmore. I think that um It's really exciting and even the bad young teams have a lot going for them. One concern
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I have with the Rockets is how they'll gel moving forward though because last year they still had not as much of a king-granton of young talent But they still had a really good handful of young talent and they played horrendous together, so I'm hoping that Jalen Green can turn into more of a team for his guy and not...
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Yeah, I wonder how much of it has to do with leadership, both just in the locker room and from the coaching staff. You know, I saw Tari Eason's mom is on Twitter pretty active and she was talking about how she was excited that with Imei coming in they there's going to be nothing given basically is what she said and that guys are really going to have to fight for not only spots and lineups but touches and that type of thing is not handed to the highest draft pick. What Houston can
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do in the near future will definitely prove Imei's sole as a coach too because that Celtics run kind of looks a little suspect after Missoula took him to the Eastern Conference finals
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Yeah
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Yeah, you know it's a good point. It's because Everyone is quick to crown him and you know Somewhat deservingly so like he jumped in and Had the Celtics go on that January to April run where they were just you know basically unstoppable two years ago but I think it's like you said it's a lot different with a young roster unproven and you know a lot more jump to make so and no Jason Tatum right exactly so I guess to get into the next topic I just just I wanted to get into a little bit about the mid-season tournament that is being implemented by Adam Silver and I can get into a couple of the details. He said it's going to look different in the sense that it just won't look like regular games. They're going to have different court floors that are designated for the tournament and different uniforms that are specially made for the tournament. He was quoted as saying that one of the reasons this is being implemented is to create games
0:19:10
of consequence during the regular season and he said that it was very European soccer inspired. Well, when it first came up a few years ago, I wasn't really the biggest fan of it because I'm definitely a traditionalist as far as that goes, but in the past few years I've gotten more into soccer and European sports in general and I think that's definitely made me come around on that. But I think a big thing in that regard is differentiating it from the finals and differentiating it from the NBA season and like I think a good idea would maybe to have like overseas teams come and play in there like something like that to something like a cup like something that matters and it's not just a Like the WNBA is a little tournament like you need that that gets played to the season It doesn't it doesn't feel like it matters at all, right?
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Yeah, I think that's an interesting point if you brought some, you know, like an ACB team or You know someone like Barcelona. I think that despite the big talent gap there, I think it would be interesting to see. And also it would bring a lot of eyes from different areas.
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Oh, it would be a blowout, but it's just like the FA Cup in soccer where you're putting
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the lower leagues against a Manchester United sure it's gonna probably be a horrible. Well, they also don't play their best lineups and games like that You give you know, you're 14 13 14 15th guys a chance to get more run and I think even just for that That's awesome. You know for sure so They said it'll have There's the incentive is like five hundred thousand to each winner 200 K to each second place player. So you know, I guess they needed some more money to inspire them. But no, I guess just, yeah, overall, do you think it's a good idea? Do you think it's doing too much? Do you think that the players are incentivized? Yeah. I don't think they're very incentivized.
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I don't think 500k does much for any of them except the people at the bottom of the roster.
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Well, that's a good point. I think that, right, for your Jason Tatum's, your Joel Embiid's, clearly they don't have too much to gain when you're on the MVP ladder and you're going to be playing a game that just matters to them a few hundred thousand. I think like you mentioned to those Bottom of the roster guys to the young guys. I think that this could be a really good way for them to get important burn and have higher usage rates and For teams to see what they can do with their young guys and how they can invest in a direction That's if they use it that way though. Yeah, no, definitely Yeah, it'll be it'll be interesting to see how it's laid out for sure. So just to get into a little bit of award prediction for this next year, far too early
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but worth it anyway, if you wanted to start with MVP, I have a couple of my picks here. Well, this is a dark horse like I've said. I've mentioned this on previous podcasts. The Aaron Fox, that's something I'll put a futures bet on. I don't think it's likely to happen, but that's someone I would slip a ticket in for. Other than that, I think Jokic probably has a pretty good shot.
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Well, it's interesting you mention that because I was looking at, you know, some of the later in this past season's MVP ladder, the Kia MVP ladder, and just looking at where guys stood in terms of after the first three or top five candidates. Like you mentioned Fox, he was on the ladder in the top ten for almost all of the spring, but as was his teammate, Damantis Savonis. I think that in a lot of those cases, guys cannibalize each other's MVP chances, which of sort of changed the perception of the Kings and what they are. I think in the regular season people kind of looked at that as a Sabonis-Carried team and now it's very clear that it's Deere and Fox who is the clear engine and then Sabonis is more of a second fiddle to him, although he's a pretty good, more of maybe like a 1B to a 1A, but there's definitely a 1A and a 1B there. Yeah, He's also geared towards being a hub and initiating actions. You're not looking at him as much as you are at Tierran to put the ball in the hoop, especially late in the fourth quarter. I agree. I think my other ones I'd throw in, I don't know if you mentioned, Giannis I think has a good chance to have a nice bounce back season for MVP. And then Shay and Steph I think are worth mentioning. the that I think that he's going into pretty much a perfect opportunity for him to jump up. Also, I think it's worth mentioning Brandon Miller just because of the shot attempts he'll be able to see on the Hornets. And then Keontae George for the Jazz who I think is stepping into one of the best spots, best fits of any of the year this one Is pretty speculative obviously based on what teams are gonna be good on defense, but I think BAM and ad are my top two Yeah, I could see ad getting it just because the increase in respect He sort of also got during the postseason. I think that kind of maybe
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People will see that he hasn't maybe gotten his fair due in terms of DPO wise and well yeah and when he was someone well
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you're right and when he was healthy during the regular season last year they were a phenomenal defense it's just about you know whether he can stay healthy and be on the floor so yeah six man of the year I'm gonna give a confident pick to Chris Paul here well I did see a report today that the Warriors are gonna try and start Chris Paul really and run a super small ball lineup trying That's interesting because like you said, I think that they have a really good opportunity for it. Like you mentioned, how they play such running gun, pass and go style offense with Steph. Bringing Chris Paul off the bench could give them an opportunity to slow games down and take other teams' offensive prowess out by just running more pick and rolls and, like I said, not movement-based offense so that'll that'll be interesting I think to go back to the six-man I think IQ Emmanuel quickly had a really good chance this year at taking that and I think that if I had to pick another he's coming for it next year. Yeah it's a good pick. Most improved this one also I'm pretty confident about in saying Kale Bridges I think right now he leads the odds but yeah I'd say McHale and if not McHale then Kate Cunningham coming off an
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injury. McHale definitely seems like he's morphing into a star mm-hmm so I could
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see that. And you know the usage and shot opportunities open in Brooklyn should do a lot as we saw in the playoffs for him. Two others to mention I think I'm the leaf monk just because we mentioned how good the Kings are and he's really important to that offense coming off the bench adding a spark and Christian would who you know his value and His place in this discussion went up and down a bit last year But it provides so much on offense that I think he could do the same you want to know V Yeah, and then coach of the year of new John Collins, I think that was a great move. That's a good pick for now, but it's the beginning of the offseason, probably going to have to wait for a more educated pick on that because free agency, I can feel like it's going to be a bear. A big one, yeah. And then I guess just to wrap up, Clutch Player of the Year, this is again something that's really tough to predict, but I think De'Aaron Fox could repeat as his clutch player. He was special in the fourth quarter all year. Yeah, I mean, I agree. I think DeMar DeRozan as well. He's just always been one of those players in the clutch that always seems to get it done. Yeah, it'll be interesting, especially to see what their roster looks like and if they're able to compete. So that's all the topics we have for today on Gucci Roe. I appreciate y'all being here much love. Take care That's a wrap for Gucci Roe this week. Thanks for tuning in on the rebel HD 2 with your hosts Kevin Kelly and Will Dusparte Will Dusparte You can find us on instagram at one kev kelly and will dusparte. We'll see you next time on the rebel HD 2