KOTB:LAL/CHA/ATL/NO/Pho Minor Deal!

[Lin Your Face]

Yes I wasted way too much time doing a lot of math tonight for this minor deal.

"If you believe all teams would accept this trade, vote yes. If you believe otherwise, vote no. Please explain your vote."

This trade must be completed after December 15. Devin Ebanks would also have to waive his bird rights and agree to the trade.

Los Angeles Lakers trade: Chris Duhon, Earl Clark, Devin Ebanks, Darius Johnson-Odom, $1,054,389
Los Angeles Lakers receive: Desagana Diop, Diante Garrett

Note: Garrett is included so the Lakers still have 13 players on the roster. The Lakers may choose to waive him after the deal after they sign another player.

Charlotte trades: Desagana Diop
Charlotte receives: Chris Duhon, Earl Clark

Atlanta receives: Devin Ebanks, $1,054,389

New Orleans receives: Darius Johnson-Odom

Phoenix trades: Diante Garret
Phoenix receives: 2016 Lakers 2nd round pick


Why for the Lakers:

1. If the Lakers keep the roster at 13 then they would add 4,210,011 for this season. If they sign Howard to a max deal, pick up Jodie Meeks's option, and then sign 5 players to the absolute league minimum deals to get to 13 players then they save 4,291,735. Of course with the new luxury tax system, these savings would be multiplied if the Lakers decide to have 15 players, sign players to the veterans minimum, and use the tax payers MLE.

2. Diop's large expiring could still be dealt in case the Lakers feel they are one piece away and need to make a move.

3. None of the Lakers players included in this deal are currently receiving any playing time besides Duhon who will presumably lose his rotation spot once Steve Nash and Steve Blake return.

Why for Charlotte

While Charlotte is off to a surprising start this season, I am expecting them to fall back to earth. They won't be as bad as last season, but they won't be close to a .500 team.

1. Charlotte saves 2,632,200 this season, while they add only 1,500,000 in guaranteed money for next season. Charlotte could just choose to keep Duhon since the minimum team salary will raise to 90% of the cap (52.23 million) and I'm guessing they won't be big free agent spenders.

2. Charlotte will still have a little over 16.5 million to spend if they drop Duhon and decide they want to make a free agent splash.

Why for Atlanta

1. Atlanta receives Ebanks for free and does not even have to pay him this season.

2. Kyle Korver is currently the only other true small forward on the roster.

Why for New Orleans

1. New Orleans receives a young player with a little potential at no cost.

2. With Eric Gordon's injury, the Hornets have playing time available. The Hornets aren't expecting to win big now and Odom could get a chance to take Roger Mason Jr's minutes.

Why for Phoenix

If Phoenix was willing to give the Lakers Steve Nash, I'm assuming they'd be willing to facilitate this deal.

1. Phoenix gets a pick for a player that has little value.

[Dr Aki]

1. lakers don't have cash to give, they gave it all to phoenix for nash
2. sure, it saves the lakers roughly 4.3 mil, but 2.4 mil can be saved by simply waiving duhon next season, the remaining 1.9 mil would be eaten up by minimum contracts regardless.

lakers save maybe 0.8 mil in pure savings only, which might equate to maybe 3-4 mil in LT savings? and then give up a 2nd round pick in 2016?

lakers say no. savings aren't complicated and this is too complicated for too little

[theatlfan]

Yeah, this deal is overly complex and should cut a couple of teams that really don't do much. Honestly, I don't know why you don't cut out ATL, NOH, and PHX - just have the deal directly between CHAR and LAL. CHAR gets more value and their the ones doing LAL the biggest favor. I'd guess my vote only counts for ATL, but I'll put one down for some of the others in unless and until they put theirs in.

ATL (Y): I don't know if we could do it. I didn't think you could use a vet mini exception in a trade and I know we used almost all of our TPE for Korver and we're over the cap this year. Ferry did show some interest in Ebanks in FA though so getting him and his cheap contract would be a yes IF we could do it - even without the $$ to pay Ebanks.

CHAR (N): Really having problems with why they'd do this. A non-taxpayer rearranges their salaries to take $$ in future years, but the incentive to do it is Earl Clark? Even if you cut out the other 3 teams and send them Ebanks, DJO, and the 2nd, I still don't think I'd do it. CHAR has nice assets and Diop is a big expiring - they could put together a package and chase after at least a medium-sized fish @ the deadline. Instead they take on Duhon and sucks some value out of that package since he has guaranteed $$ next year all to get a few fringe assets. I'll put in a no for CHAR.

NOH (Y): Rebuilding team gets cheap young prospect for free. Not sure if they can do this for the same reason as my Hawks, and another team that can be simply cut out without affecting the deal though. Assuming they can, I'm actually 50/50 here - NOH might just do better by simply trolling the D-League. I guess the WCS for them is just cut DJO and sign the D-Leaguer later, but then again, maybe someone else would take the guy you've got your eye on. Once again in the absence of NOH voters, I'll put in a yes since this would be the only way NOH could take a chance on DJO.

PHX (N): I think this one is actually an easy no for me. PHX has spent a few months developing an UDFA that they obviously like. If Garret can prove himself an adequate prospect in a 10-15 backup PG role behind Dragic, then it'd give PHX more incentive to put Kendall Marshall on the market. Marshall would arguably be the best PG prospect between last year's draft and the one upcoming (is Lilliard still considered a "prospect"? next year's draft is uninspiring with the top PG prospect or 2 possibly better off as a combo G.), so there should be a lot of interest. Not sure I'd burn that possibility for a late 2nd that comes in 4 years.


I'm not going to vote for LAL, but I'd conflicted with them as well. To them, even Duhon's $1.5 guarantee next year would balloon into $5+M if the LT hits them as hard as most expect, so shipping him off would be a priority. Even still, packaging virtually everyone on the roster who can remotely cling to a prospect label to do it since counter intuitive as well. You need those prospects to fill out a roster on the cheap, so it seems like it could just be a robbing Peter to pay Paul situation there. Still, if those prospects don't add up to the value of their salary + an extra $5+M for Duhon, then you could replace them with a handful of D-Leaguers for a year, so maybe it's not that bad...

[Lin Your Face]

Thanks for the feedback. I had forgotten that the Lakers used up all the cash they had in the Nash deal. This deal could still work if the Hawks want Ebanks for free. I'm not sure if the Hawks would want Ebanks if they have to pay his salary or if the DUI he just got would lower his value.

theatlfan: Firstly, all the other teams are required for the deal so the Lakers can have 13 players on the roster and so they don't take back more than 125% + 100k in salary for this season as required by the CBA. If a Duhon for Diop deal could work than I would just propose that trade. Also, the Hawks could take on Ebanks through their trade exception from the Willie Green deal. With Charlotte, I didn't consider Earl Clark to be a positive incentive. I think Charlotte would still make the trade because they save more money overall and they only take on a little salary for 1 year. I'm also surprised that you think Phoenix would say no. I'm admittedly not very familiar with Garret, but with Dragic, Telfair and Marshall, I'd assumed Phoenix would be happy to get anything of value for him.

[HornetJail]

No from Charlotte.

I'd rather just keep Diop's expiring in hope that we come across another Maggette-like deal. Also we're kind of shallow at the top so Diop can actually play for about five minutes and not completely suck. Can't say that for Duhon or Clark (ok maybe Clark sometimes)

[HartfordWhalers]

A 5 team deal without Billy King?

I get the idea, making a Duhon-Diop swap work but this is just too much work to be realistic.

If I have to pick a team to say no, its Charlotte. Moving Diop in a bad contract + incentive for Diop deal would be first priority, and letting him expire and having the cap next season would be second, with moving money from now to later third.

[theatlfan]

theatlfan: Firstly, all the other teams are required for the deal so the Lakers can have 13 players on the roster and so they don't take back more than 125% + 100k in salary for this season as required by the CBA. If a Duhon for Diop deal could work than I would just propose that trade. Also, the Hawks could take on Ebanks through their trade exception from the Willie Green deal. With Charlotte, I didn't consider Earl Clark to be a positive incentive. I think Charlotte would still make the trade because they save more money overall and they only take on a little salary for 1 year. I'm also surprised that you think Phoenix would say no. I'm admittedly not very familiar with Garret, but with Dragic, Telfair and Marshall, I'd assumed Phoenix would be happy to get anything of value for him.

Ah, forgot about the Willie Green SNT - nice call.

As for the rest - Why are you so worried about LAL's side? LAL is already giving up the prospects - why not just let CHA have them? Seems like a lot of effort (for NBA GMs... and I'd guess you as well) to find extra teams just to ensure that CHA doesn't end up with 2 kids who I can't see CHA thinking as having negative value. Even if you wanted to serve up a 13th player to LAL, then why not just send over Cory Higgins instead of finding Garret? Neither would see more than 100 minutes all year, so it's not like the difference between the 2 is too great.

[SCourGe OF GoD]

Great job Lin ...i vote yes. Also if Phoenix wanted we could give the Memphis 2nd instead of our own

[Lin Your Face]

Cha_77_Bobcats: I agree a Maggette type deal would definitely be better for Charlotte, but I can't think of any team that would make a similar deal.

theatlfan: I'm not more worried about the Lakers side, its just a lot more complicated with them because they pay the luxury tax so they wouldn't be able to take on Cory Higgins with Diop. The amount LAL could afford to take on with Diop was about 565k.

Hartfordwhalers: I'd agree that if any team says no its Charlotte in case they'd prefer an incentive to take on any money for next year. I guess I could easily cut out NO and have them get Johnson-Odom and cut Cory Higgins. That would actually save them about 300k more and I don't know much about Higgins, but I'm assuming Johnson-Odom has a little more value.

Ghostx: The Memphis 2nd is top 55 protected so I wasn't sure if that would convince a team to facilitate a deal. Since I don't think Garret has any value and the Memphis pick might be conveyed I suppose it could still be enough.

[WallabyPie]

I'm also surprised that you think Phoenix would say no. I'm admittedly not very familiar with Garret, but with Dragic, Telfair and Marshall, I'd assumed Phoenix would be happy to get anything of value for him.

And when they signed Garret they already had all these guys on the roster. That means they like him a lot. It's highly unlikely they would draft a better prospect in late 2nd round.