Minnesota trades: Craig Smith, Rashad McCants, Sebastian Telfair, Jason Collins, Brian Cardinal
I made this as an extension off of the thread where WormGuts suggested the possibility of trading Jefferson for Joe Johnson and I wanted to get a good SG, but w/o giving up Jefferson.
JR Smith is still undervalued IMO from being stuck behind Iverson. I'd like to believe he and McCants are the same in skill, but the numbers favor JR big time. He also has a couple inches and is the quintessential SG physical specimen. I think he's a 20 ppg player in the very near future, and his rebounding is very solid, should be around 7 per game. He's also a respectable defender, not amazing, but pretty decent.
Kenyon Martin is immediately our best frontcourt defender and though undersized, is a solid addition to Love and Jefferson for the short-term. Atkins takes over as 3rd PG as I'm comfortable with Ollie at backup.
For the Nuggets, they get rid of Martin's contract and Atkins' contract, the cost is JR Smith. But they get some solid pieces in return, Craig Smith to replace Martin, McCants to replace JR, and Telfair to replace Atkins. The only "long-term" contract is Cardinal, but he's cheaper annually and expires a year sooner than Martin.
All in all, I know most of you will hate the trade because of Martin's contract, but I like the idea of shoring up the 2 problem areas - frontcourt defense and perimeter scoring.
I'd be for this trade because I think JR Smith can be a top 5 shooting guard in his prime, still about 4 years away as he's only 23, and I like the idea of adding Kenyon Martin's defense and rebounding to the frontcourt (though it hasn't been great so far, but it's early
)I'd be against this trade because of the salaries added and the question of whether JR Smith has the right attitude to be a main guy.
I tried to make it even and realistic knowing Denver needs incentive to get rid of JR Smith and MN needs incentive to take on salary.
