Post#314 » by Warriors Analyst » Tue Nov 17, 2020 6:29 am
Can't express how happy I was to get a text about this! I've said it before, will regurgitate my backstory briefly again -- I've read this board for years and was always amused by how you guys reacted to the Warriors' castoffs (SJax, Maggette, Monta) and decided to actively watch Milwaukee after seeing preseason highlights of Giannis' debut.
In the last six years, I've seen more Bucks ball than I have Warriors. I'll always feel some sympathy towards you kind people and the broader Milwaukee community, especially watching the Save Our Bucks campaign come to fruition, watching Kohl sell the team, and watching Giannis' rise coincide with the Bucks staying in Milwaukee long term.
But because this team is my adopted second team and the big appeal for me has always been Giannis (did I mention I am college friends with a guy who played against him in the Greek youth leagues?), I do think I'm a little more capable of emotionally detaching myself from this team and seeing things for what they are.
And guess what? This is a great trade!!!!! Really, I cannot overstate how good of a trade this was. I'll get to that in a second.
But first, I want to briefly re-litigate Horst's last offseason, which was a disaster. Extending Bledsoe early was not necessary. Letting Brogdon go was a mistake and Horst doubled down on that mistake by signing Thanasis and Robin Lopez and not making it the top priority to pick up another ball-handler. If Horst had re-signed Brogdon, moved Bledsoe in the offseason (which probably helps keep Brogdon happy because now he's the PG) this team would almost certainly have advanced further in the playoffs and on top of that, Brogdon could have been used as a trade chip. I was pretty concerned about this offseason because I felt like the Bucks had very little flexibility and almost no way to improve their roster without also losing valuable rotation pieces like DDV or BroLo.
And in spite of that, Horst figured out a way to get Jrue AND get off of Bledsoe and it only cost some pick compensation? Hell F'n YEAH! Assuming Giannis stays, and that does seem to be the case, most of those picks are going to be late 1sts, like 25-30 range. When my Warriors traded for Andre Iguodala, we gave up our 2014 and 2017 first rounders. It was absolutely worth it. This Bucks team has already come closer to the promised land than the Warriors had when we mortgaged our future for Andre. And because we had a good team, those picks were also late firsts! Those picks ended up being Rodney Hood and Josh Hart, who later got traded to the Lakers. And while it might be notable that both of those guys are genuinely capable rotation players in the NBA, if not fringe starters, remember that it's rare to hit on guys in that draft range, and if you do, that's pretty much what they top out as.
So New Orleans now has five of Milwaukee's future firsts, all of which we should assume are late picks. Let's say they get VERY lucky and hit on a Hood type, a Hart type, and to be generous, let's give them a Gobert type of outlier hit. Then let's also give them a Jacob Evans and Damion Jones, both of whom are far more representative of what you normally get in that draft range. This group of players still an outrageously improbable best-case scenario for those five picks.
So now you've traded Eric Bledsoe, George Hill, Rodney Hood, Josh Hart, Rudy Gobert, Jacob Evans, and Damion Jones for Jrue Holliday. Remember, this is assuming New Orleans has a historically good hit rate deep in the draft. Even so, that's a totally acceptable return for Jrue Holliday!
Let's forget the Giannis implications and just talk about Jrue. Jrue is one of the best defenders in the league at the guard position. He's put up about 20/7/5 with 1.6 steals and nearly a block a game in the last three years since he's started playing the shooting guard role next to Rajon Rondo, Elfrid Payton, and then Lonzo Ball. He's a good catch and shoot player, he play with or without the ball, and most importantly, he's a very good playoff defender. The last time Holliday was in the playoffs, he swallowed up Damian Lillard and led the Pelicans to an underdog sweep of the 3rd seeded Blazers. He managed to raise his TS in the playoffs, unlike Bledsoe, who is literally one of the worst playoff performers of this decade. That's no exaggeration. Bledsoe's TS has gone down 7, 9, and 9 percentage points from the regular season to the playoffs in the last three years. Getting rid of Bledsoe was absolutely imperative for this team to get better. I was advocating using the #24 to do it and getting James Johnson back. Horst outdid himself and got a really good player in return.
And now as I've typed this all out, I find out also that Horst landed Bogdan!
So now the Bucks roster as it stands is:
Jrue / Frank Mason
Bogdan
Middleton
Giannis / Thanasis
BroLo
There's a lot of flexibility here. Earlier I was advocating for Jordan Clarkson as an MLE target, that might make less sense now that we have Jrue and Bogdan and Middleton as secondary ball-handlers. I'd go all out on big 2 guards and wings and shooters now. Give half of the MLE to Glenn Robinson III, keep Sterling around for all I care, bring back Connaughton as well now that there's enough ball-handling on this team to get away with him being the smallest guy on the court, give some money to Solomon Hill as a 3/4, throw a little bit of money at Noah Vonleh, and send Minnesota a second rounder for Omari Spellman.
Jrue / Bogdan / Frank Mason
Bogdan / Connaughton / Brown
Middleton / GRIII / Solomon Hill
Giannis / Vonleh / Hill
BroLo / Spellman
Now I am not worried about our depth.
