TRADE: No. 7, LaVine, Dunn for Butler, 16

[LibertyPrime]

I thought it was a good trade at the time, and so did most posters on this board, in large part because the wounds of three years in a row under .400 post-Love/Martin were very fresh at the time, and it was clear that LaVine was never going to learn to play defense. I don't think we'd have been a better team last year had we not made the trade. This year? Maybe, if Zach flowered the same way under Thibs that he did under Hoiberg this year. That's not likely.

[Calinks]

I wont ever bash this trade. It was good. Jimmy just decided to screw us in the end and it blew up in our faces. If jimmy was committed and bought in to helping this squad, we would probably be looking at a perennial playoff team for the next 5 years.

[King Malta]

I think you had to take the risk. Personally I think I'd have preferred we kept Lavine at the time but given his ACL and the fact he played (and still plays) even worse defense than Andrew I can understand why we sent him and not Wiggins.

Still a kick in the balls mind you.

[panthermark]

Meh....hindsight is 20/20. Even on the Bulls board, a good chunk of us were not happy with the money given to Zach (myself included) and wanted him to walk.

Now we are all like "hell yeah!"...but in reality....no one knew he would explode like this.

[Calinks]

Meh....hindsight is 20/20. Even on the Bulls board, a good chunk of us were not happy with the money given to Zach (myself included) and wanted him to walk.

Now we are all like "hell yeah!"...but in reality....no one knew he would explode like this.

I was pretty confident Lavine would blow up. I am pretty sure I posted on your board last year telling Bulls fans that you got a great player and be patient. He had baller DNA 100 percent.

[PharmD]

Meh....hindsight is 20/20. Even on the Bulls board, a good chunk of us were not happy with the money given to Zach (myself included) and wanted him to walk.

Now we are all like "hell yeah!"...but in reality....no one knew he would explode like this.

You guys never watched his growth curve the way we had. Zach is basically doing what i thought he would do in his age 23 season (I've always said Zach's ceiling is winning scoring titles).

The one benefit of hindsight is that we now know that our bad defense wasn't Zach's fault. Thibs brought in 3 new veteran starters and the defense was basically unchanged vs starting three 21-year olds.

I thought it was a bad trade at the time. Things have played out more-or-less as i expected them too, but worse because Thibs is worse at his jobs than i thought and Jimmy turned out to be an actual crazy person.

Also I absolutely loved Markkanen as a prospect.

[Grits n Gravy]

Well here's hoping Butler doesn't hold us hostage after next year and doesn't go back to missing 15+ games a year.

I knew Zach was gonna be big time too.

[NattaNerNutta]

I was in the boat of not so much wanting to trade for Butler, but wanting to keep Lavine and trade Wiggins. My reasoning was two fold.

1) I felt the trade package would've been better from our end because with Wiggins perceived value (at the time) means we more than likely would've only had to deal Wiggins and Dunn, and could've kept the pick.

2) I always liked Lavine over Wiggins. Mainly because of his drive and passion to be better. I just didn't see that in Wiggins. Every time I watched Wiggins (and still do) I see another Derrick Coleman. A player who has the talent to dominate his position but seemed perfectly fine coasting through his career. Coleman showed that he could just roll out of bed, give minimal effort and log his 20/10 and feel like he did his part. He could've been so much more....I feel that way with Wiggins. At least with Lavine I could see there was a fire to get better and a passion on the floor.

[Sothron]

I thought at the time it was a good trade for both teams. The assumption being that Butler would stick here and be the veteran leader we thought he would be. Instead, we got a prima donna that is poison on the roster. This will go down as one of the worst NBA trades of all time. I don't blame us for making that trade but the results speak for themselves.

[shrink]

I thought at the time it was a good trade for both teams. The assumption being that Butler would stick here and be the veteran leader we thought he would be. Instead, we got a prima donna that is poison on the roster. This will go down as one of the worst NBA trades of all time. I don't blame us for making that trade but the results speak for themselves.

That’s a lot of hyperbole. The trade got us a trip to the playoffs, plus whatever we get trading away Butler’s second year.

[Rookie-Mistake]

I thought at the time it was a good trade for both teams. The assumption being that Butler would stick here and be the veteran leader we thought he would be. Instead, we got a prima donna that is poison on the roster. This will go down as one of the worst NBA trades of all time. I don't blame us for making that trade but the results speak for themselves.

Pretty much this, I was strongly on the side of keeping the team together, but fully understand the viewpoint to expose the team to playoffs and accelerate the maturing process. What I would like to know is what this supposed 'truth' Jimmy speaks of that has led him to run for the hills. If the reason is because of Towns and Wiggins not doing the heard yards, must he be reminded that we was 22 when he got drafted, and it took him till he was 24 to start having an affect on the league?

[PharmD]

I thought at the time it was a good trade for both teams. The assumption being that Butler would stick here and be the veteran leader we thought he would be. Instead, we got a prima donna that is poison on the roster. This will go down as one of the worst NBA trades of all time. I don't blame us for making that trade but the results speak for themselves.

That’s a lot of hyperbole. The trade got us a trip to the playoffs, plus whatever we get trading away Butler’s second year.

We needed overtime in the last game of the season to make the playoffs, then got thrashed in 5 games. Just enough to lose our lottery protected first. Very timberwolves.

[Klomp]

We needed overtime in the last game of the season to make the playoffs, then got thrashed in 5 games.

We were 1 game back of having home-court advantage in the first round. Some people like to conveniently leave that out.

[Jedzz]

I thought at the time it was a good trade for both teams. The assumption being that Butler would stick here and be the veteran leader we thought he would be. Instead, we got a prima donna that is poison on the roster. This will go down as one of the worst NBA trades of all time. I don't blame us for making that trade but the results speak for themselves.

Some assumptions really ruined the outcome. Such as the GM/Coach/Owners assuming Butler would gladly take less money than two underdeveloped former #1 overall picks. The trade doesn't exist in a vacuum. The results are not occurring on their own. Wiggins was given a max deal after The Trade and based on nothing more than wishful thinking about what he could become one day. This paved the way for a problem being able to pay Butler. Wiggins' and Town's play since paved the way for Butler seeing there is no future here with them getting top dollar and him taking less to try and carry them. Causes and effects.

It would be nice if Butler noticed what Rose is offering this team this year at near league minimums and if he chose to be a part of that. Fat chance I suppose.

[shrink]

This year, with Zach’s big contract, he makes $1 mil less than Butler, plus Markannan and Dunn make about $9 mil more. Surprisingly, next year when Jimmy gets the supermax, he will cost about the same as the three players - starting at a little over $30 mil. Usually when you are young, you’re cheap, but Zach’s FA money and the CBA’s increase to rookie scale seem to have removed the financial advantages to this trade.

And I should point out that even though I’ve been a big fan of Zach’s work ethic ever since we got him, and enjoyed his offensive displays in CHI this year, he is still an abysmal defender. It’s not that he doesn’t put out effort .. it’s that he still doesn’t know where he’s supposed to be, or what he’s supposed to do. There is still a little room left in the NBA for abysmal defenders on $20 mil deals, if they are truly elite offensively. Zach has been almost elite, at least in the early parts of the season, so he may be worth that money. However, I think it’s easy for people who like Zach, like me, to use hindsight and compare him to the Wiggins contract and say how much better we would have been if we had traded Wiggins instead. Wiggins can score, and can defend somewhat, so the gap is not as big as it appears. Zach would not get all these offensive opportunities if he was still on this team, and his defense would hurt.

[Killboard]

This year, with Zach’s big contract, he makes $1 mil less than Butler, plus Markannan and Dunn make about $9 mil more. Surprisingly, next year when Jimmy gets the supermax, he will cost about the same as the three players - starting at a little over $30 mil. Usually when you are young, you’re cheap, but Zach’s FA money and the CBA’s increase to rookie scale seem to have removed the financial advantages to this trade.

And I should point out that even though I’ve been a big fan of Zach’s work ethic ever since we got him, and enjoyed his offensive displays in CHI this year, he is still an abysmal defender. It’s not that he doesn’t put out effort .. it’s that he still doesn’t know where he’s supposed to be, or what he’s supposed to do. There is still a little room left in the NBA for abysmal defenders on $20 mil deals, if they are truly elite offensively. Zach has been almost elite, at least in the early parts of the season, so he may be worth that money. However, I think it’s easy for people who like Zach, like me, to use hindsight and compare him to the Wiggins contract and say how much better we would have been if we had traded Wiggins instead. Wiggins can score, and can defend somewhat, so the gap is not as big as it appears. Zach would not get all these offensive opportunities if he was still on this team, and his defense would hurt.

I really doubt Wiggins is any better than Zach defensively. He could, but at this point isnt consitent at all. The size adventage didnt translate to rebounding or blocks for example, for which I think both play better at SG (or being the smallest wing).

In offense Zach is a lot easier to build around, specially as a pure SG. He space the floor much better and even his handles and passing game are looking a lot better than Wiggins. Wiggins lack of definition as a SF or SG affect the lineup because you need other wing who can shoot to space the floor for him, rebound and block better than him to not be a weak team in the paint, but also handle and pass the ball for his lack of playmaking efficency.

Lavine is averaging 12 points more per100 (37.4 points, wow), while leading TS% .583 vs .517. Zach is still having a lot of TO though.

[Rashodamus]

I called the trade a franchise killer the night it happened.

It was bad on many levels, but ultimately the real franchise killer is Thibs.

[AirP.]

I called the trade a franchise killer the night it happened.

It was bad on many levels, but ultimately the real franchise killer is Thibs.

Odd, a team that missed the playoffs 14 previous seasons made a trade what you call a "franchise killer". I thought the Kevin Love trade was more of a "franchise killer" trade.

The franchise killer isn't Thibs(he was open to moving Wiggins which the owner was not), I get you don't like Thibs or his style, but without Taylor's interference in the basketball decisions you would have LaVine right now and probably Markkanen and be seeing Wiggins playing for Chicago with a max contract. Chicago wanted Wiggins more than LaVine at the time.

Taylor just needs to hire someone(who Taylor see eye to eye with) and let them handle all the decisions(which won't happen). Even after Thibs you still have a huge issue as long as Taylor is the owner and pushing his own ideas for trades.

[shrink]

I called the trade a franchise killer the night it happened.

I would ask you to prove that, and show us the post, but you just joined six weeks ago.

At the time, lots of people here lamented losing LaVine, but nobody called the trade was a “franchise killer the night it happened.”

If you actually did, it’s not something to brag about, IMO. That would have been a very bad take.

[Killboard]

The franchise killer isn't Thibs(he was open to moving Wiggins which the owner was not), I get you don't like Thibs or his style, but without Taylor's interference in the basketball decisions you would have LaVine right now and probably Markkanen and be seeing Wiggins playing for Chicago with a max contract. Chicago wanted Wiggins more than LaVine at the time.

You still acting like Thibs only realized Wiggins unavailabilty once he wanted to make the trade for Butler. If that was the case he is more dumb than I imagine. One of the things he should have talk with Taylor at his signing is:
"Owner, what players do you want to build around?"
If the owner said Andrian Payne he should have said "I dont want the job". If it was Wiggins you say "Ok, so I should make an strategy to ease Wiggins transition into a positive NBA player". Signing Teague, Crawford, Taj and pick Patton wasnt going to help to:
Give Jimmy a max
Space the floor for Wiggins
Improve the defense enough

It was a bad plan for the offseason, as it shows right now.

And then, since last offseason he is refusing to admit he has failed and trade Butler, losing any respect of the rest of the roster and of his GM's pairs in the meantime.

Taylor just needs to hire someone(who Taylor see eye to eye with) and let them handle all the decisions(which won't happen). Even after Thibs you still have a huge issue as long as Taylor is the owner and pushing his own ideas for trades.

It works both ways: The owner should buy into the GM ideas, but the GM should buy into onwer ideas or dont take the job.