Jaden McDaniels commercial value, offers

[wolves_89]

There's some logic in the Wolves moving McDaniels, but I'm highly skeptical there are any deals out there that would make sense for Minnesota. The primary problem is attempting to trade Jaden during one of the worst shooting slumps of his career isn't going to result in offers that are even a little attractive. Since the Wolves don't really need to move him, I fully expect him to stay in Minnesota to see if he can get his offensive game on track.

[Texas Chuck]

I'm going to start asking for two starters and 2 unprotected 1sts for PJ Washington. This isn't a waste of time because he actually did swing a playoff series against the 1 seed no less. And he has scored 20 points more than once.

I actually won't but this is what you are suggesting. Hope that illustrates the issue here.

Sent from my SM-A156U using RealGM mobile app

[toooskies]

I responded to your first question already, but his offense was instrumental in one Suns game and two Denver games. His defense was brilliant and turned the tide for us in the Denver series as well.

Massive overpay would be a top 20 PG, a couple of unprotected firsts and a teams starting SF to replace him. Again not the kind of deal likely to happen. The type of deal that you cannot say no to. Or a blue chip, a starting PG, and a couple unprotected firsts.

yeah you said massive overpay and that is absolutely that. Don't blame you for not wanting to trade him for his actual value of course. He plays an important role. But you have to know no team is approaching anything close to two quality starters and 2 unprotected firsts for a rich man's Dorian Finney Smith who just went for 2nds.

Why would the Wolves trade him? His money is excellent, he has shut down elite guards in the playoffs, he is 24, ect… BTW, DFS is 31, Jaden is 24. DFS is 6’7 Jaden is 6’11. DFS isn’t best friends with our star player. You are trying to convince a team to trade a core player, and that core player is on a fantastic contract. He is so much cheaper than OG and as cap smoothing comes in and Jaden improves, his deal will be DDV level in 2 years. What is the incentive to trade him again?

You compare him to OG, I compare him to Okoro or Thybulle.

Measuring a player by his peaks doesn’t imply he’s that good. Jaden is as likely to score under 5 points in the playoffs as he is over 20.

There is no assumption that Jaden will improve offensively given 1.5 years of offensive decline. And if he doesn’t improve, lineups will suffer with him in them. Like they have this year. -13.6 on/off is really bad. You can’t get paid 15+% of the cap and be a massive net negative.

[winforlose]

yeah you said massive overpay and that is absolutely that. Don't blame you for not wanting to trade him for his actual value of course. He plays an important role. But you have to know no team is approaching anything close to two quality starters and 2 unprotected firsts for a rich man's Dorian Finney Smith who just went for 2nds.

Why would the Wolves trade him? His money is excellent, he has shut down elite guards in the playoffs, he is 24, ect… BTW, DFS is 31, Jaden is 24. DFS is 6’7 Jaden is 6’11. DFS isn’t best friends with our star player. You are trying to convince a team to trade a core player, and that core player is on a fantastic contract. He is so much cheaper than OG and as cap smoothing comes in and Jaden improves, his deal will be DDV level in 2 years. What is the incentive to trade him again?

You compare him to OG, I compare him to Okoro or Thybulle.

Measuring a player by his peaks doesn’t imply he’s that good. Jaden is as likely to score under 5 points in the playoffs as he is over 20.

There is no assumption that Jaden will improve offensively given 1.5 years of offensive decline. And if he doesn’t improve, lineups will suffer with him in them. Like they have this year. -13.6 on/off is really bad. You can’t get paid 15+% of the cap and be a massive net negative.

You clearly don’t watch the Wolves. Blaming Jaden for the struggles of the offense is like blaming Joel Embiid for the Knicks not winning the NBA championship. Sure these thing are connected, but highly speculative and by no means 1-1. Mike Conley falling off a cliff, Rudy not being passed to properly now that KAT and Kyle are gone and Mike is not running the offense very often, Ant black holing, Randle ISO, and lack of structure are all ahead of Jaden. Plus if your statement is true no one should want Jaden so we might as well keep him.

P.S Jaden is going to be far better than OG in 3 years.

Edit to add: Jaden is often playing with Ant and Randle, and not with the bench mob who are the best 3 man net rating group. Anyone with that group looks better, guys who don’t get minutes with them look worse.

[shrink]

Jaden is a different kind of dude.

Ant is outgoing and affable, Jaden is almost always quiet and never smiles. He was asked if he would rather score or keep someone from scoring, and he was completely in on defense. He doesn’t have much of a desire to gain offensive stats. He was also asked what he did to celebrate signing his five year deal, and he said he went to Olive Garden!

This guy’s personality is like no other NBA player

[toooskies]

Why would the Wolves trade him? His money is excellent, he has shut down elite guards in the playoffs, he is 24, ect… BTW, DFS is 31, Jaden is 24. DFS is 6’7 Jaden is 6’11. DFS isn’t best friends with our star player. You are trying to convince a team to trade a core player, and that core player is on a fantastic contract. He is so much cheaper than OG and as cap smoothing comes in and Jaden improves, his deal will be DDV level in 2 years. What is the incentive to trade him again?

You compare him to OG, I compare him to Okoro or Thybulle.

Measuring a player by his peaks doesn’t imply he’s that good. Jaden is as likely to score under 5 points in the playoffs as he is over 20.

There is no assumption that Jaden will improve offensively given 1.5 years of offensive decline. And if he doesn’t improve, lineups will suffer with him in them. Like they have this year. -13.6 on/off is really bad. You can’t get paid 15+% of the cap and be a massive net negative.

You clearly don’t watch the Wolves. Blaming Jaden for the struggles of the offense is like blaming Joel Embiid for the Knicks not winning the NBA championship. Sure these thing are connected, but highly speculative and by no means 1-1. Mike Conley falling off a cliff, Rudy not being passed to properly now that KAT and Kyle are gone and Mike is not running the offense very often, Ant black holing, Randle ISO, and lack of structure are all ahead of Jaden. Plus if your statement is true no one should want Jaden so we might as well keep him.

P.S Jaden is going to be far better than OG in 3 years.

Edit to add: Jaden is often playing with Ant and Randle, and not with the bench mob who are the best 3 man net rating group. Anyone with that group looks better, guys who don’t get minutes with them look worse.

Jaden has a worse plus/minus than the starters. Jaden has a negative 2-man net rating with every player on the team. Conley might have fallen off a cliff but he’s still only -0.9 on/off.

Ant and Randle are recent all-NBA guys. Claiming Jaden doesn’t play well with his team’s stars is not the point in his favor that you might think. It’s also not statistically true as they’re 1st and 5th among his 2-man lineups, although he is in Ant and Randle’s worst 2-man net ratings among rotation players.

Anyway, no, I don’t watch enough Minnesota basketball to get persuaded by an eye test. The stats shout that McD is the issue, though.

[winforlose]

You compare him to OG, I compare him to Okoro or Thybulle.

Measuring a player by his peaks doesn’t imply he’s that good. Jaden is as likely to score under 5 points in the playoffs as he is over 20.

There is no assumption that Jaden will improve offensively given 1.5 years of offensive decline. And if he doesn’t improve, lineups will suffer with him in them. Like they have this year. -13.6 on/off is really bad. You can’t get paid 15+% of the cap and be a massive net negative.

You clearly don’t watch the Wolves. Blaming Jaden for the struggles of the offense is like blaming Joel Embiid for the Knicks not winning the NBA championship. Sure these thing are connected, but highly speculative and by no means 1-1. Mike Conley falling off a cliff, Rudy not being passed to properly now that KAT and Kyle are gone and Mike is not running the offense very often, Ant black holing, Randle ISO, and lack of structure are all ahead of Jaden. Plus if your statement is true no one should want Jaden so we might as well keep him.

P.S Jaden is going to be far better than OG in 3 years.

Edit to add: Jaden is often playing with Ant and Randle, and not with the bench mob who are the best 3 man net rating group. Anyone with that group looks better, guys who don’t get minutes with them look worse.

Jaden has a worse plus/minus than the starters. Jaden has a negative 2-man net rating with every player on the team. Conley might have fallen off a cliff but he’s still only -0.9 on/off.

Ant and Randle are recent all-NBA guys. Claiming Jaden doesn’t play well with his team’s stars is not the point in his favor that you might think. It’s also not statistically true as they’re 1st and 5th among his 2-man lineups, although he is in Ant and Randle’s worst 2-man net ratings among rotation players.

Anyway, no, I don’t watch enough Minnesota basketball to get persuaded by an eye test. The stats shout that McD is the issue, though.

You really need to understand what is happening in Wolves games to understand why guys numbers are depressed. Almost every game starts with the starters in a 10 to 12 point hole before the bench mob comes in and cleans it up. Ant and Randle play terribly together. Each one ball stops and when they play together it turns into your turn my turn and kills everyone else’s rhythm. Guys like Jaden, DDV, and even Naz are rhythm players. The guys who spend less time with both Ant and Randle do the best. They guys who spend less time with either Ant or Randle are the stand outs. You might wonder why this is true. The poor coaching and lack of offense structure of Chris Finch has been a problem for 3 years. It got turned up to 11 without Karl adding spacing and without a PG running the show. Mike’s shooting woes have taken the ball out of his hands, he spends half his minutes in the corner while Ant and Randle ball stop. Finch is the reason everyone is looking bad this year.

You keep talking about Jaden’s money being too high relative to his production. That is an excellent argument against trading him. Why would a team sell low on a 24 year old under contract for 5 years? Especially when he is your best POA defender and can guard 1-4 on a switching defense. You need to give a convincing reason why replacing Jaden with a low value player is going to make us better. If all you can do is talk about saving a few million you fail this conversation. Especially if you factor in that we don’t own our 25, 27, 31 1st round picks, 29 is top 5 protected, 26 is an unprotected swap, and 30 is a top 1 protected swap. If you don’t control your future money isn’t the priority, winning is.

[Ell Curry]

The Raptors could use a defensive wing, assuming we don't draft Flagg (or Edgecombe) and could take on some money. Not sure what the offer would be. Maybe you need a 3rd team involved. I also just want to steal NAW instead outright for the non-tax MLE and give Minnesota nothing, so you'd wanna be sure that was off the table.

[winforlose]

The Raptors could use a defensive wing, assuming we don't draft Flagg (or Edgecombe) and could take on some money. Not sure what the offer would be. Maybe you need a 3rd team involved. I also just want to steal NAW instead outright for the non-tax MLE and give Minnesota nothing, so you'd wanna be sure that was off the table.

Wolves have the bird rights. Which means if nothing else they can sign NAW to whatever money he needs and figure it out at the trade deadline. I am concerned NAW will want to leave our team in pursuit of a starting role. That will of course require bird rights to optimize his money and options, which means sign and trade.

P.S I looked it up and the MLE is expected to be 14.1 million next year. If keeps playing well I could see him in the 18-20 range.

[shrink]

No doubt that Jaden had a very poor start to the season, both offensively and defensively. Conley really struggled with a wrist injury, and Jaden is probably more effective when a PG is setting him up. It also looks bad that many teams try to hide their worst defender on Jaden, like the Spurs tried to stick Chris Paul on him, but the Wolves went after that. I also think turning KAT into Randle probably made things harder for Jaden initally, especially since Randle struggled to figure out where he should be on the floor. So when people call him a “role player,” I can see how they think that.

Me, personally, think he is far beyond that. He is a truly elite wing defender, and there aren’t many players out there, even those that were on All Defense with him, that I would prefer defending with the game on the line. His three point shooting has declined, and he doesn’t look decisive when he dribbles inside. But man, there is so much offensive potential there, and the Wolves have him locked into a deal for five years.

Because of MIN’s second apron concerns, and MIN needing to take back less salary than it sends out, any Wolves poster can see that behind Randle, Jaden’s contract would be the easiest number to send out to complete a trade. But you almost never see a wolves fans start threads about trading McDaniels. It’s because most wolves fans see him as a key part of their future. They hope the offense comes around, but he does so much for the franchise defensively that it’s hard for Wolves fans to picture trading him.

[toooskies]

You clearly don’t watch the Wolves. Blaming Jaden for the struggles of the offense is like blaming Joel Embiid for the Knicks not winning the NBA championship. Sure these thing are connected, but highly speculative and by no means 1-1. Mike Conley falling off a cliff, Rudy not being passed to properly now that KAT and Kyle are gone and Mike is not running the offense very often, Ant black holing, Randle ISO, and lack of structure are all ahead of Jaden. Plus if your statement is true no one should want Jaden so we might as well keep him.

P.S Jaden is going to be far better than OG in 3 years.

Edit to add: Jaden is often playing with Ant and Randle, and not with the bench mob who are the best 3 man net rating group. Anyone with that group looks better, guys who don’t get minutes with them look worse.

Jaden has a worse plus/minus than the starters. Jaden has a negative 2-man net rating with every player on the team. Conley might have fallen off a cliff but he’s still only -0.9 on/off.

Ant and Randle are recent all-NBA guys. Claiming Jaden doesn’t play well with his team’s stars is not the point in his favor that you might think. It’s also not statistically true as they’re 1st and 5th among his 2-man lineups, although he is in Ant and Randle’s worst 2-man net ratings among rotation players.

Anyway, no, I don’t watch enough Minnesota basketball to get persuaded by an eye test. The stats shout that McD is the issue, though.

You really need to understand what is happening in Wolves games to understand why guys numbers are depressed. Almost every game starts with the starters in a 10 to 12 point hole before the bench mob comes in and cleans it up. Ant and Randle play terribly together. Each one ball stops and when they play together it turns into your turn my turn and kills everyone else’s rhythm. Guys like Jaden, DDV, and even Naz are rhythm players. The guys who spend less time with both Ant and Randle do the best. They guys who spend less time with either Ant or Randle are the stand outs. You might wonder why this is true. The poor coaching and lack of offense structure of Chris Finch has been a problem for 3 years. It got turned up to 11 without Karl adding spacing and without a PG running the show. Mike’s shooting woes have taken the ball out of his hands, he spends half his minutes in the corner while Ant and Randle ball stop. Finch is the reason everyone is looking bad this year.

You keep talking about Jaden’s money being too high relative to his production. That is an excellent argument against trading him. Why would a team sell low on a 24 year old under contract for 5 years? Especially when he is your best POA defender and can guard 1-4 on a switching defense. You need to give a convincing reason why replacing Jaden with a low value player is going to make us better. If all you can do is talk about saving a few million you fail this conversation. Especially if you factor in that we don’t own our 25, 27, 31 1st round picks, 29 is top 5 protected, 26 is an unprotected swap, and 30 is a top 1 protected swap. If you don’t control your future money isn’t the priority, winning is.

This is a conversation about value and offers from other teams for Jaden. I think Minnesota is stuck with him. He’s worse than the day he signed his contract, and that contract assumed OG-trajectory development which hasn’t happened.

I’d have much rather have tried to trade him for some expiring salary than trade KAT in the offseason. Jaden’s super-high salary for his production was worse value than KAT.

And again— Jaden is the worst teammate in terms of net rating for both Ant and Randle, which means he’s worse than them with each other. Ant/Randle is actually +1.7! Adding McDaniels drops them to -2.5. (Which ultimately means they’ve played pretty well in the ~20% of their minutes without Jaden.)

[Ell Curry]

The Raptors could use a defensive wing, assuming we don't draft Flagg (or Edgecombe) and could take on some money. Not sure what the offer would be. Maybe you need a 3rd team involved. I also just want to steal NAW instead outright for the non-tax MLE and give Minnesota nothing, so you'd wanna be sure that was off the table.

Wolves have the bird rights. Which means if nothing else they can sign NAW to whatever money he needs and figure it out at the trade deadline. I am concerned NAW will want to leave our team in pursuit of a starting role. That will of course require bird rights to optimize his money and options, which means sign and trade.

P.S I looked it up and the MLE is expected to be 14.1 million next year. If keeps playing well I could see him in the 18-20 range.

What's the expectation Minnesota's max payroll will be? Assuming Randle picks up his option, they're at 175M with no money allotted to Naz Reid, NAW and a 14th guy.

I guess Randle could turn down his option if the Nets or someone want to pay him? 2nd Apron is 207.8, so if Randle does pick up his option, that's only 30M or so for NAW + Reid, or you're over it again like this year. Is that the plan?

I don't think you're allowed to sign and trade because over the apron?

Someone might trade for Randle, though. Not every team is in Tank or title mode. A middle class team might want him, like the Kings with Demar last year, or uh, hopefully some team wants to give up assets for RJ Barrett.

[winforlose]

The Raptors could use a defensive wing, assuming we don't draft Flagg (or Edgecombe) and could take on some money. Not sure what the offer would be. Maybe you need a 3rd team involved. I also just want to steal NAW instead outright for the non-tax MLE and give Minnesota nothing, so you'd wanna be sure that was off the table.

Wolves have the bird rights. Which means if nothing else they can sign NAW to whatever money he needs and figure it out at the trade deadline. I am concerned NAW will want to leave our team in pursuit of a starting role. That will of course require bird rights to optimize his money and options, which means sign and trade.

P.S I looked it up and the MLE is expected to be 14.1 million next year. If keeps playing well I could see him in the 18-20 range.

What's the expectation Minnesota's max payroll will be? Assuming Randle picks up his option, they're at 175M with no money allotted to Naz Reid, NAW and a 14th guy.

I guess Randle could turn down his option if the Nets or someone want to pay him? 2nd Apron is 207.8, so if Randle does pick up his option, that's only 30M or so for NAW + Reid, or you're over it again like this year. Is that the plan?

I don't think you're allowed to sign and trade because over the apron?

Someone might trade for Randle, though. Not every team is in Tank or title mode. A middle class team might want him, like the Kings with Demar last year, or uh, hopefully some team wants to give up assets for RJ Barrett.

We sign and traded Kyle Anderson to GSW, so I know it is possible. I also know tax payments don’t happen until the end of the season. So signing NAW keeping him till February then trading him is another way to do a version of a sign and trade.

I expect Randle to be moved in 3 or 4 weeks. Some team will want his scoring and playmaking and that will give us back some value at PG and C. As for how much tax we will pay, that depends on who wins the ownership battle.

[winforlose]

Jaden has a worse plus/minus than the starters. Jaden has a negative 2-man net rating with every player on the team. Conley might have fallen off a cliff but he’s still only -0.9 on/off.

Ant and Randle are recent all-NBA guys. Claiming Jaden doesn’t play well with his team’s stars is not the point in his favor that you might think. It’s also not statistically true as they’re 1st and 5th among his 2-man lineups, although he is in Ant and Randle’s worst 2-man net ratings among rotation players.

Anyway, no, I don’t watch enough Minnesota basketball to get persuaded by an eye test. The stats shout that McD is the issue, though.

You really need to understand what is happening in Wolves games to understand why guys numbers are depressed. Almost every game starts with the starters in a 10 to 12 point hole before the bench mob comes in and cleans it up. Ant and Randle play terribly together. Each one ball stops and when they play together it turns into your turn my turn and kills everyone else’s rhythm. Guys like Jaden, DDV, and even Naz are rhythm players. The guys who spend less time with both Ant and Randle do the best. They guys who spend less time with either Ant or Randle are the stand outs. You might wonder why this is true. The poor coaching and lack of offense structure of Chris Finch has been a problem for 3 years. It got turned up to 11 without Karl adding spacing and without a PG running the show. Mike’s shooting woes have taken the ball out of his hands, he spends half his minutes in the corner while Ant and Randle ball stop. Finch is the reason everyone is looking bad this year.

You keep talking about Jaden’s money being too high relative to his production. That is an excellent argument against trading him. Why would a team sell low on a 24 year old under contract for 5 years? Especially when he is your best POA defender and can guard 1-4 on a switching defense. You need to give a convincing reason why replacing Jaden with a low value player is going to make us better. If all you can do is talk about saving a few million you fail this conversation. Especially if you factor in that we don’t own our 25, 27, 31 1st round picks, 29 is top 5 protected, 26 is an unprotected swap, and 30 is a top 1 protected swap. If you don’t control your future money isn’t the priority, winning is.

This is a conversation about value and offers from other teams for Jaden. I think Minnesota is stuck with him. He’s worse than the day he signed his contract, and that contract assumed OG-trajectory development which hasn’t happened.

I’d have much rather have tried to trade him for some expiring salary than trade KAT in the offseason. Jaden’s super-high salary for his production was worse value than KAT.

And again— Jaden is the worst teammate in terms of net rating for both Ant and Randle, which means he’s worse than them with each other. Ant/Randle is actually +1.7! Adding McDaniels drops them to -2.5. (Which ultimately means they’ve played pretty well in the ~20% of their minutes without Jaden.)

Time will tell which of us is correct. Either way, Jaden is not a player TC wants to trade.

[LightTheBeam]

Kings can't make a legit offer. But take your pick of Demar/Huerter + Carter + 1st + 1 swap.

Isn't enough unless Minnesota sees Carter as the ideal piece next to Ant long term.

[Scoot McGroot]

If Indy is willing to pay the tax? I doubt that.

I assume they’d give up Nesmith (and get someone cheaper/less useful back) to avoiding doing that. Especially if the plan is to keep Turner and start paying the tax next year..

I am about to get myself in trouble here for not knowing if this is legal or not but giving up Toppin + Mathurin for McDaniels and then waiving Wiseman gets us back under......I think.

That would put Indy at 13 players though right? And has to be 14 now. Which is why I had Jackson as needed, if not Nesmith.

Feels like I’m wrong, I don’t like disagreeing with Scoot. Especially, on Indy related topics..

You’re welcome to disagree with me on this….im waffling myself

Mostly, it’s just being hopeful. Nesmith was AWESOME last year for us as a 3 and D guard, and ideally, we’d be able to run lineups after a trade with Nembhard, Nesmith, AND McDaniels, but yeah, it gets tough salary wise to avoid the tax in any construction. And dumping Wiseman/JJ is just working around the edges that doesn’t really help.

[shrink]

What's the expectation Minnesota's max payroll will be? Assuming Randle picks up his option, they're at 175M with no money allotted to Naz Reid, NAW and a 14th guy.

I guess Randle could turn down his option if the Nets or someone want to pay him? 2nd Apron is 207.8, so if Randle does pick up his option, that's only 30M or so for NAW + Reid, or you're over it again like this year. Is that the plan?

I don't think you're allowed to sign and trade because over the apron?

Someone might trade for Randle, though. Not every team is in Tank or title mode. A middle class team might want him, like the Kings with Demar last year, or uh, hopefully some team wants to give up assets for RJ Barrett.

That’s the big question that MIN fans aren’t facing, at least until they get the results of the Taylor vs ARod and Lore arbitration.

While the majority of MIN fans want Taylor gone at all costs, I think they intentionally ignore worrisome evidence that new ownership will radically cut the total payroll that Taylor just added. ARod and Lore had to present their plan to the other 29 owners and their lender a few months ago, and their plan was to slash MIN’s payroll so the team wasn’t even in the lux. Obviously this couldn’t be done with Towns on the team, and Craig Kilborn (remember, from espn and his talk show? Big wolves fan) said on his podcast that KAT’s agent sat near ARod and Lore in the game where Towns returned to Minnesota, and shot them daggers all game because she thinks they influenced the KAT trade, and he didn’t want to leave. I’m sure she knows more than we do. But I am in the minority here, and we are all just waiting for the results of the arbitration.

Now, again I’ll say that I’m in the minority, but I have much more confidence that Taylor, the richest man in Minnesota and 83 years old, is much more willing to pay $100 mil in lux taxes again than ARod and Lore. Even if Taylor wins though and MIN is a playoff contender, I would expect purely for functional reasons that he would prefer to take the team under an apron or two. If Randle picks up his player option at $31 for one year, I do not think that is a bad contract for his level of production in today’s NBA economy. However, I think it’s more likely that he works with MIN this summer to do a sign-and-trade to a team he likes that can generate part of the cap space, and he’s traded for a cheaper piece plus the space to get them under the second apron at least. I know keeping Naz is a priority, and keeping NAW is becoming one.

[Scoot McGroot]

What's the expectation Minnesota's max payroll will be? Assuming Randle picks up his option, they're at 175M with no money allotted to Naz Reid, NAW and a 14th guy.

I guess Randle could turn down his option if the Nets or someone want to pay him? 2nd Apron is 207.8, so if Randle does pick up his option, that's only 30M or so for NAW + Reid, or you're over it again like this year. Is that the plan?

I don't think you're allowed to sign and trade because over the apron?

Someone might trade for Randle, though. Not every team is in Tank or title mode. A middle class team might want him, like the Kings with Demar last year, or uh, hopefully some team wants to give up assets for RJ Barrett.

That’s the big question that MIN fans aren’t facing, at least until they get the results of the Taylor vs ARod and Lore arbitration.

Great overall post. And to be fair, I don’t know how Minnesota fans can even face the possibility with the current legal situation. It’s super up in the air, even if we think we know what SHOULD happen.

[Ell Curry]

If Randle picks up his player option at $31 for one year, I do not think that is a bad contract for his level of production in today’s NBA economy. However, I think it’s more likely that he works with MIN this summer to do a sign-and-trade to a team he likes that can generate part of the cap space, and he’s traded for a cheaper piece plus the space to get them under the second apron at least. I know keeping Naz is a priority, and keeping NAW is becoming one.

Informative post.

I do think it's actually pretty tough to find a Randle trade that works. Feels like Minnesota will have to either give him away at the deadline for expirings or I'm not sure how they really save money unless Brooklyn strikes out in free agency and wants him as a backup plan, which I wouldn't rule out or anything.

Maybe Charlotte would do Grant Williams + Micic and Martin's expirings and Randle would agree to just not play the rest of the year to do the Charlotte tank and in exchange they offer him a couple extra years? Saves Minny like 17M, the draft is low on PFs anyways and Charlotte can still use the non-tax MLE on someone (I guess a reliable backup PG since Lamelo is always hurt, or a backup center since Mark Williams is always hurt, they can try to make the playoffs next year with one of these types of combinations:

Lotto Pick - Maluach
MLE - Tyus Jones

LaMelo - JoshGreen - BrandonMiller - Randle - MarkWilliams
Tyus Jones - Tre Mann - Miles Bridges - Salaun - Maluach - Nick Richards

or

Lotto Pick - Egor Demin
MLE - Isaiah Jackson (or Nance Jr or Portis, basically the best big they can find).

LaMelo - JoshGreen - BrandonMiller - Randle - MarkWilliams
Demin - Tre Mann - Salaun - Miles Bridges - Nance JR - Nick Richards

Heat I could see some sense if Butler gets traded for a perimeter player who can shoot, and they have PG-Herro-SF-Randle-Bam,

Lakers do not make some sense basketball-wise, but cap-wise, they do, because they have contracts, so like:

Tanking team: Gabe Vincent + highly protected 1st from Lakers
Minnesota: Hachimura + 10M in expirings from Tanking Team
Lakers: Randle + 2nd from Tanking Team X

And the Lakers try to bully teams with a Reaves-DFS-LeBron-Randle-AD lineup and Christie, Knecht (maybe Christie starts, Randle is the 6th man to get more defence and shooting in the starting lineup) and Hayes are the main bench guys, though I'm not sure Vanderbilt's contract can really be turned into a backup PG. Maybe Hood-Schiffino + 2nd could be turned into Davion Mitchell and you hope he can hit the odd 3 and be the best option on the team to guard SGA, Kyrie or Ja in a playoff series for about half of those star's minutes?