RealGM

Would Washington Wizards do this draft trade with Utah?

Wizards send Emeka Okafors final year $14.5M to Utah straight up for the #8 pick.

Why for Washington: If they don't move up into the top 3 on lotto ball night they believe that the entire top 7-8 players are tier 2-3 players and they feel that adding more mediocre youth (especially from the 8th spot) in this weak draft isn't worth who they could get on the open market in Free Agency.

After this trade they only have $48M committed next year and could further buy out or trade players to move more under the cap. They can then go out and do what the Warriors did: Get a solid backup PG and a starting PF. Say Jack/Millsap (who can be had for $7M per).

Or my preference for the Wiz is to go after Pekovic who is the best young and up and coming center in the league. Yes he is restricted but the Wiz could pare back payroll even more and make it happen.

The Jazz do this if they believe someone will slip to them like an Anthony Bennett who is now injured and can't work out for teams, or Alex Len or if they decide they want to package #8 & #14 to go up and get a Ben Mclemore, Trey Burke or Bennett. Maybe the Jazz would have to include #21 (sorry but moving up 6 spots in this draft isn't worth destroying cap flexibility so Wiz can't get #14), but I think taking on that amount of $ for free is a good deal for #8 in a weak draft. Maybe the deal becomes a hybrid for both teams where the Jazz take Okafors $14.5, Wiz take Utah's Marvin Williams $7.5M and they flop places #8 for #14.

My preffered strategy for the Jazz is to pick up whoever slips to 8: Hopefully Bennet, Len, Oladipo etc and then pick up Dennis Schroeder at #14.

So the question is: are fans of a losing franchise addicted to young pie in the sky potential that comes with a lottery pick? Or are they thirsty for a shrewd trade? Sometimes you can get a great player at #8, sometimes you get Jan Vesely at #6:( Do you trust your GM to draft well?

Thoughts.

blackham9258 wrote:Wizards send Emeka Okafors final year $14.5M to Utah straight up for the #8 pick.

The plain language of that means Utah trades a #8 pick for Okafor, but the way the rest is written sounds like Wizards send #8 pick to Utah with Okafor, with nothing specified in return. Either trade seems unrealistic, but I can't tell which trade is being proposed.

PS: There is a trade thread: viewtopic.php?f=35&t=1242501&start=495

PPS: Giving away a lottery pick in order to move a decent starter on an expiring contract is in fact the exact move I expect our GM to do. Apparently so does everyone else, which is why trades like this are proposed.

This is just laughably offbase evaluation and complete anathema to the Wizards goals of competing next year.

Moving Okafor at the expense of the 8th pick one year after we went out of our way to acquire him for the chance to enter the 2013 free agent derby when there’s more cap space than good players around? Come on, now. Okafor’s our defensive MVP and the backbone of our rebounding efforts; we were 5th in the league on defense and defensive rebounding with ownership concluding the season with “we love what he brings on the floor and off it” quotes. Not happening.

Also, we’ll have more cap space with Wall at the max even after adding the 8th pick and a full MLE come the summer of 2014. We could just go after Ed Davis or DeMarcus then, so accelerating our entry into the market does nothing for us if it’s at the expense of a 2013-14 starter and an asset. We’d lose the MLE by going under the cap, so we’re looking at resigning Martell and then having maybe $7 million left over. Are we going to replace Okafor and the 8th pick for $7 million? Is there any way to do this trade without actually weakening the team next year? No to the 1000th power.

If there’s a deal between the Jazz and Wizards this offseason, my view would be that it’s most likely a sign and trade for Millsap in July. If they decide to go that road, Okafor probably gets retained and we avoid the 2014 free agent market aside from MLE/BAE guys. Millsap at $7 million seems absurdly conservative given how much money is out there combined with the 90% salary floor, though.

montestewart wrote:PPS: Giving away a lottery pick in order to move a decent starter on an expiring contract is in fact the exact move I expect our GM to do. Apparently so does everyone else, which is why trades like this are proposed.

No, the bad trade that "everyone" is worried about Ernie making is the 8th pick outgoing with salary balast for a decent starter to put a better team on the court next year and secure his job security.

I have not heard anyone expecting us to ship out the 8th pick with a decent starter in exchange for nothing so that he can put an inferior team on the court next year and imperil his job security.

There is no reason to worry about that particular scenario playing out. Other bad scenarios, yes, but not that one.

Is this thread meant to be serious?

Ruzious wrote:Is this thread meant to be serious?

Only the part about EG somehow frittering away another lottery pick.