Shams: Pistons trade Olynyk and Lee to Utah for Bogdanovic

[Spider156]

This isn't a seismic needle moving trade by any means, but that also doesn't mean that it wasn't a very good trade.

The Kelly Olynyk signing was a terrible one from jumpstreet. Kelly never fit this team in any way shape or form. Olynyk's box score hero end to his 20-21 season after being traded to the G league caliber Rockets team, was the very definition of don't fall for a guy piling up numbers on a godawful team in a contract year.

It was inevitable that some GM was going to be the sucker to buy into that 100% mirage version of Kelly Olynyk, unfortunately that sucker ended up being Troy Weaver.

However to Troy's credit, and taking a page from Dumars' old book, he found a way to rectify his mistake here. That is one of the main reasons why this a good trade for Detroit.

The other reasons why have all been discussed already:

Bogdanovic is an upgrade talent wise on Olynyk and Lee.
Bojan is a solid/reliable scorer with a very good shot. All will help take some pressure off of Cade/Ivey and improve spacing
Moving out 2 contracts for one, obviously alleviates the problem of having too many guaranteed contracts
Bogdanovic is an expiring, so no long term financial committment
There is a decent chance, Bojan can be flipped for an asset down the road
Lee was buried on the depth chart, and he isn't really all that good anyways

Well done, Troy

It doesn’t matter how olynyk did, he got hurt and COVID threw him off. You’re gonna take away his whole career contending for championships every year? Yeah as if Riley and Ainge didn’t want to sign this guy either. Last year sucked for olynyk, so what? We obviously wanted to tank not having a center all season. You put olynyk next to Lebron and he becomes amazing. No the reason weaver signed olynyk is cuz we needed a shooter, he’s a proven veteran (meaning what?), meaning he’s valuable enough that he can hold his value to trade for another veteran (bogs) if he had a bad year which he did. Of course he’s gonna get a bad year, our roster sucks. This is like signing Ersan Ilyasova. He always had value no matter what team he played for, he had a long successful career. Olynyk is in a similar boat.

First off, Olynyk hasn't contended for championships "every year." He's made it past the 1st round of the playoffs twice in his 9 seasons. In those 2 years, he only played 19.2 MPG for the 2017 Celtics and 15.2 MPG for the 2020 Heat. In other words he was a low end rotation player not some kind of core piece for either of those teams.

Secondly, what the heck does Lebron have to do with Kelly Olynyk? They have never been teammates. Besides you can put any random player alongside Lebron and that dude is gonna look a whole lot better. You're not exactly making any prophetic proclamations here.

Lastly, your "of course he's going to have a bad year, our roster sucks" statement is a true head scratcher. For one, I think you should go back and take a gander at the Rockets G league caliber roster that Olynyk was a part of when he had the best stretch of his career, by a longshot. Secondly, if you expect a guy to have a bad year simply because the roster sucks, doesn't that mean that signing a player like that is a bad move? So basically a bad team signs a player, that is destined to have a bad year because he's on a bad team. Talk about being counter productive. Using that type of logic, why would a bad team (that isn't in full on Hinkie mode) ever sign any player that isn't a high end talent?

First thing I said is he sucks because he got hurt and COVID threw him off. Olynyk is a GOOD player. There’s a reason he stuck around the league. The point of Lebron next to him is that olynyk is in fact as you mentioned a rotational player that is only as good as his team allows him to be and of course his health comes first which he didn’t have last season. News flash, Ainge just traded for him to get him again! Olynyk is a good player that will likely continue to be in the league for another 3 years if he stays healthy. I don’t like how people knock players off just because of a bad year. I like Olynyk and I think he’s a valuable piece to a contender and I wish we could’ve kept him over Noel. It’s the same argument I always get into with Dumars sucking and SVG. Both were good for us but sucked in the end. You know who actually did suck? Flip Saunders. That man underperformed in playoffs with the best team of all time for years straight. You know who sucks? Not Brandon knight. Austin Daye. Killian sucks, sekou sucks. Olynyk doesn’t suck.

[bstein14]

KO ended up working out fine for us. If we would have had to have $3 million less in cap space next year it likely would have been a bit of a bummer but getting the return we got for him makes the deal solid. Having to trade a 2nd rounder to get the space to sign KO by moving Plumlee was a bit of a head scratcher for me because KO and Plumlee are similar good locker room vets but I could see Weaver wanting more perimeter shooting, and I could see the reason gave of Plumlee was signed to be a starter and they wanted to open it up for Stewart, where KO was signed knowing he'd be a bench guy.

[Kilo]

So Bojan wants a contract extension and that was a hang up in trade talks with other teams - Is Weaver open to one as reason for making the trade or just figured he could deal with possibly disgruntled Bojan who would in the very least play selfish hero ball to try and earn his next contract and thus raise his trade value at TDL here?

[Sort]

So Bojan wants a contract extension and that was a hang up in trade talks with other teams - Is Weaver open to one as reason for making the trade or just figured he could deal with possibly disgruntled Bojan who would in the very least play selfish hero ball to try and earn his next contract and thus raise his trade value at TDL here?

Bojan isn't getting another big contract by playing hero ball. The argument for his payday will be something akin to, "If Bojan is your fourth or fifth best starter, you can have deep playoff goals."

I don't actually think this stopped many teams for trading for him. He's obviously on a one-year deal and a prove-it situation. Most teams can go over the cap to sign their own guys. Yes, a few teams are so far over they walked away. I think there will be a trade market for him come Deadline.

As a fan of this team, I'm still hoping the wins are happening to the point we're the ones considering giving him an extension.

[flow]

So Bojan wants a contract extension and that was a hang up in trade talks with other teams - Is Weaver open to one as reason for making the trade or just figured he could deal with possibly disgruntled Bojan who would in the very least play selfish hero ball to try and earn his next contract and thus raise his trade value at TDL here?

Bojan isn't getting another big contract by playing hero ball. The argument for his payday will be something akin to, "If Bojan is your fourth or fifth best starter, you can have deep playoff goals."

I don't actually think this stopped many teams for trading for him. He's obviously on a one-year deal and a prove-it situation. Most teams can go over the cap to sign their own guys. Yes, a few teams are so far over they walked away. I think there will be a trade market for him come Deadline.

As a fan of this team, I'm still hoping the wins are happening to the point we're the ones considering giving him an extension.

It's not really a prove-it situation. Who he is and what he does is well established. Teams will be happy to sign him next off-season. Teams likely felt it was too late in the off-season to start negotiating a new contract for a player of his caliber as part of a trade (good, but not a star).

[FloridaMan78]

A lot of ways Weaver can go with this.

He is who is. He’s going to play well.

I think there will be a trade market for him come trade deadline. We should be able to get a late 1st rd pick from a desperate team looking for a rental. We could use that pick for a trade in the future.

Let him expire and use his cap space. Olynyk still had that 3 mil in guaranteed money.

Extend him because no better option becomes available in free agency or the trade market.

Great flexibility. Pretty much traded nothing for it. Really loved the trade. I hated that we didn’t have good spacing, this solves it, at least for the starters.