TRADE: Davis, Hardy, DLO, Exum to WAS | Middleton, filler, 2 FRPs, 3 SRPs to DAL

[KillerLeft]

He looks like a Manute Bol mini-me.

He's giving Swaggy P from what I can tell. I'm going to try hard not to hold that against him.

[Jakeospikez]

First it was Porzingis 4 years ago and now AD. Thank you Washington for bailing us out again!

I don't think there's any reason to thank the Wizards for the KP trade, it wasn't good. Years of Luka's prime were hindered by the untradable Bertans contract. Making the WCF wasn't due to this trade. Dinwiddie had his moments especially against Phoenix but still not worth thanking the Wizards for.

[cow]

I don't think there's any reason to thank the Wizards for the KP trade, it wasn't good. Years of Luka's prime were hindered by the untradable Bertans contract. Making the WCF wasn't due to this trade. Dinwiddie had his moments especially against Phoenix but still not worth thanking the Wizards for.

And we sent them a pick.  I need a drink.

[FireNicoHarrison]

KP trade was awful.

[DanSchwartzgan]

FWIW (admittedly, not much) 

Branham and Johnson were +18.4 in their 72 minutes on the floor together 105.8/87.4
Branham and Bagley were -1.8 in their 80 minutes together (actually good for Wiz) 105.2/107.0
Bagley and Johnson were -15.6 in their 80 minutes together 95.5/111.1

Playing all three together will likely kill the tank.  They were +37 in 11 minutes 103.7/66.7

[Reunion Mav]

FWIW (admittedly, not much) 

Branham and Johnson were +18.4 in their 72 minutes on the floor together 105.8/87.4
Branham and Bagley were -1.8 in their 80 minutes together (actually good for Wiz) 105.2/107.0
Bagley and Johnson were -15.6 in their 80 minutes together 95.5/111.1

Playing all three together will likely kill the tank.  They were +37 in 11 minutes 103.7/66.7

Interesting just the same. I suspect from the eye test our 4 traded guys would do worse given one didn’t play and one almost never played.

[myconsumerclub]

Well at least we can see what we have in the 3 new guys. Chances are we will do better with the 3 guys we draft.

[Chicagojk]

I get the flexibility argument.  Although what do you do with that flexibility.  Trades always bring a rush of excitement.  I guess what I am feeling now is I would have preferred holding onto AD.  I am not sure what the added flexibility brings to increase the talent of the roster now.   I may be completely wrong, but my feeling is I would have felt better sitting AD for the rest of the year and re-evaluating next year.

[myconsumerclub]

I would just send some free pizza and beer over to the after game locker room for Houston Illinois and every team w guys in the lottery. We may get in the top 4 just so the league can prove we were lucky and they did not have the fix in.

[Winter]

I get the flexibility argument.  Although what do you do with that flexibility.  Trades always bring a rush of excitement.  I guess what I am feeling now is I would have preferred holding onto AD.  I am not sure what the added flexibility brings to increase the talent of the roster now.   I may be completely wrong, but my feeling is I would have felt better sitting AD for the rest of the year and re-evaluating next year.

For me, the added flexibilty is a "TBD later ticket". Essentially, the Mavs decided that the financials outweigh the available young talent in the AD trade. I think it's a fair point really. I mean if we get real talent now, we might start winning games. So there's that.

And with AD out of the way now and a bunch 2nd round picks to play with (and some MLEs), it might mean our draft night could be more productive.

[DanSchwartzgan]

I get the flexibility argument.  Although what do you do with that flexibility.  Trades always bring a rush of excitement.  I guess what I am feeling now is I would have preferred holding onto AD.  I am not sure what the added flexibility brings to increase the talent of the roster now.   I may be completely wrong, but my feeling is I would have felt better sitting AD for the rest of the year and re-evaluating next year.

I'm in the camp that I'm glad this is behind us.  I never thought the summer meant we'd get anything more for AD.  It did mean we'd be in the tax in 25/26 and would absolutely have to do something aggressive to get out of the tax next season to avoid repeater penalties.

I'm also not in the camp that this was a great return.  There was some thought/hope that AD might bring salary savings, young talent and draft capital.  Some thought getting two of the three would be a good outcome.  I'd say this deal is a check minus on draft capital.  Let's be real, this is five second round picks (with slight upside in 2030).  The only real value is being able to add fake firsts into future deals.  It is definitely a check minus on the young talent front.  It is a couple of defensively challenged backups in Branham and Bagley and an exciting athletic specimen in Johnson who is a ways away from being a real NBA player on a good team.

HOWEVER, this deal gets a check plus plus plus on the financial front.  Not only did they move away from the second apron, but they got all the way out of the tax and got rid of some additional bad future salary.  This is where the team choose to put its emphasis.  It makes the trade grade "incomplete" for me because the success of the trade is completely dependent on what happens with that flexibility.  I'd like to see them get an actual prospect for Gafford or Naji and not another crap first at the end of the round.  Yeah, this is a generational draft at the top, but that doesn't necessarily translate to the late 20's.  Some of these kids will go back to college and take NIL money rather than get drafted in the 20's.

The hard truth is there wasn't much of a market out there for AD (even worse than the most conservative of us thought frankly).  Some will attribute it to GM skill, or lack thereof. But that is just argument for the sake of proving the position you held was correct.  It wasn't and it is pretty obvious AD was never going to yield the big haul we all hoped.  I doubt the pressure of repeater penalties would have made things any better in the summer and to extract more value then we would need to play him some in March/April and possibly hurt our draft position.  I'm modestly pleased with where we are, but not thrilled with it.  We have a clean slate with a generational talent and not much else around him and not much ability to improve through the draft other than this June.

[RoyTarpleysGhost]

No owner wants to pay second apron repeater tax for a lottery team. It's not really a Dumont has money or not thing. It's just not realistic. That's in addition to all the "flexibility" you have for roster building.

Every team knows this. That's why I've been saying for two months the Mavs have zero leverage in any AD trade talks. The Mavs needed to trade AD more than any suitor needed to trade for AD.

And that's why I am fine with this trade.

[KillerLeft]

No owner wants to pay second apron repeater tax for a lottery team.  It's not really a Dumont has money or not thing.  It's just not realistic.  That's in addition to all the "flexibility" you have for roster building.

I think this is true, so this isn't intended to be contrary. 

But, while many are framing this as a sign that the Mavs' new ownership might be cheaper than we hoped, I'm choosing to believe it's a sign they're getting smarter - figuring the NBA out. Again, there are increasingly difficult to navigate obstacles that go up for expensive teams and regardless of whether or not the owners mind lighting $100's of millions on fire, it's just not smart to have a team this unsuccessful with the type of payroll it had and was heading towards. I know most of us understand this, but I keep reading variations of "I guess the money mattered most," and to that idea I think: "GOOD!" 

I loathe the idea of using assets, even minor ones like late firsts or 2nds, to get off of peripheral salary bloat like Hardy/DLO, when there's a MAX level player who has only played 29 games over his basically one full season as a Mav and was in some level of demand still. It just screamed to me that cutting your losses with AD could fix a lot of things really tidily, and it appears that in the end, the Mavs agreed. I did harbor hope along the way that a better deal could be made, but then again, I don't think this is as bad of a deal as some reactions seem to suggest. 

Once we understand that the goal was to fix the financial situation of the team, you have to admit that this deal accomplished that better than anything we here imagined (unless I missed something someone wrote along the way). The financial component of the ATL deal we talked to death was to come over the summer by letting two large contracts expire, meaning (and I truly don't think some have fully realized this yet) that NEXT SEASON would've had to be the "don't pay tax, no matter what" season needed to reset all the penalties. NEXT SEASON, when we're all hoping they'll start trying to be good! In this Mavs deal, not only did they not take any bad salary back, but they got WAS to eat DLO and Hardy (we'd all agree that's worth AT LEAST a 2nd round pick each, I'd hope) and they moved up the non-tax year to NOW. This means that they can go out and operate like a team trying to be good next year. I have no idea if they'll get right back into tax range or even if it will be appropriate to do so, but this is the year we know they suck, so this is the year they needed not to pay tax no matter what, and I'm honestly shocked such a huge salary dump was even possible.

Think about it - WAS could've used this cap space for anything. You just know teams out there have been blowing them up trying to leverage their space to get things done for months. It didn't even occur to me to do something like this. For me, this trade indicates a HIGHER value for AD than I expected, not a lower value. 

End of the day, I'd rather have Risacher and those ATL expiring contracts, for sure, but I'm one of the only people here who even likes Risacher, and I didn't read ONE other hypothetical (and plausible - that's the key) deal that I liked better than this one the entire time we were discussing this here. This blows ANY version of a TOR deal I've seen completely out of the water, and I think it's pretty clear that Pelicans pick was never going to happen (though I'm glad they tried). This, for me, was better than expected. Straight up. I think there are all sorts of cool possibilities of where to go from here.

[RasheedsBigWhiteSpot]

I hope, at the least, the Mavs use some of this space on the short term. Charlotte got TWO 2nds for only taking on the rest of Tyus Jones' $7 million contract this year. Yes, I know you don't necessarily want to chip away at the giant, pristine TPE, but at least see what picks you can get using the $6 million one.

[ThisIStheYear]

I've been watching AJ Johnson highlights all night...super quick, athletic...can handle, can shoot, big dunker for a guard. Quick first step.

I have no idea if he'll be any good at all, but I predict he'll be the next "why isn't the coach playing this guy" around here, at the very least. His play history paints a picture of a raw player, as does the fact that he has been trade deadline filler annually, so far, but if the goal is to increase lottery odds, maybe he'll get a lot of time here for the rest of the season.

I agree. He will be the next lightning in the bottle boy who the fans clamor for, though he’s not good, a shooting guard who can’t shoot a lick. Perfect tank player though. Give the fans what they want and Johnson a green light to rain down threes!

[Winter]

I agree. He will be the next lightning in the bottle boy who the fans clamor for, though he’s not good, a shooting guard who can’t shoot a lick. Perfect tank player though. Give the fans what they want and Johnson a green light to rain down threes!

Whether he is or isn't any good long term, we are getting him at the right moment. The best games he's ever had in the NBA were this month!

[Chicagojk]

I think AJ is a player I probably won't like.   More show, than substance.   More look for my great play, than the smart play.   We will see. Might as well take a test drive.   

I think these players who took/found a short cut like G-League or playing overseas over college really miss a step.   Especially guys who are talented but should have stayed in college for a few years.   It seems like all these players just miss a crucial stage of development and it is tough to recreate in other situations...even when you are playing real games.   

A lot of good players are in G-league but it feels to lack that urgency and it feels like everyone scores 20 a game.

[StrandedOnBeauboisHill]

Does anyone have a read on either of these two guards defensively? Johnson is listed at 160 lbs and doesn't really look the part but Branham does. Having said that I've also seen old Spurs forums posts about how bad Branham was defensively. Curious how they handle him this offseason since he's expiring (I believe) because this will basically be a very short tryout for him the rest of the season.

[mvossman]

Does anyone have a read on either of these two guards defensively?  Johnson is listed at 160 lbs and doesn't really look the part but Branham does.  Having said that I've also seen old Spurs forums posts about how bad Branham was defensively.  Curious how they handle him this offseason since he's expiring (I believe) because this will basically be a very short tryout for him the rest of the season.

I hope those two get a ton of minutes.  Good for both evaluation and the tank.

[Kidnova]

I've been watching AJ Johnson highlights all night...super quick, athletic...can handle, can shoot, big dunker for a guard. Quick first step.

I have no idea if he'll be any good at all, but I predict he'll be the next "why isn't the coach playing this guy" around here, at the very least. His play history paints a picture of a raw player, as does the fact that he has been trade deadline filler annually, so far, but if the goal is to increase lottery odds, maybe he'll get a lot of time here for the rest of the season.

Free AJJ!