TRADE: Dinwiddie + Bertans to DAL | KP + 2nd to WAS

[mvossman]

Been away from the board for a while so haven't had the opportunity to provide my perspective on this trade. Count me among the cautiously optimistic. Seems the general consensus around this deal is that the Mavs made the trade to free themselves from KP's contract and open up flexibility to make additional moves in the future. Fair point. But I like this move from a pure basketball standpoint, especially for playoff basketball and especially for Luka.

We all know good defensive teams switch in the playoffs and the two recent Clips games offer a template for how to beat the Mavs in a seven game series. We saw it last year too. It's all about exploiting the Mavs personnel by switching on Luka and forcing him to be a scorer. Luka can (and likely will) go off for 40+ but Brunson was only one other guy on the roster who could consistently attack a switching defense, but he struggles with length. 

I'll go on record that Dinwiddie will play with Luka and Brunson when teams try to force Luka into being a scorer. Dinwiddie can attack defenses on his own and that will help keep Luka fresh for the fourth quarter. My best guess is he'll settle into a 25-32 minute role, essentially taking KP's 15 shots and scoring 16-18 points per game. If he can do it, this trade is a big win.

Of course, we also know good defensive teams tend to blitz Luka with double teams in the fourth quarter. When that happens you need shooters to space the floor and a secondary initiator to take the pressure off no 77. Dinwiddie has the potential to add value against blitzing defenses but Bertans adds value as an elite floor spacer. 

Bertans is a four-five in the modern NBA but in Washington he was often on the floor with two other bigs. Not ideal. I'll go on record that Bertans will never play with two bigs in Dallas and Chriss is the guy most likely to loose his spot in a playoff rotation. Bertans will come close to matching Kleber's 20-25 min but will outscore him many nights, taking 6-8 of THJ's shots and boosting the second unit 8-11 points per game. If he can do it this trade is a home run.

My biggest issue with this line of thinking is what we are going to do with Bertans on the defensive end.  Kidd's defense seems to be predicated on bigs having quick feet.  Bertans makes KP look like Draymond in that regard, and he does not have the rim protection to make up for lack of lateral quickness.  

Your right that he wont be playing with two bigs.  We only have two playable bigs on the team (with maybe a few minutes from Chriss).  I have a hard time thinking of Bertans as a big.  He gets two rebounds a game.  

The Bertans hope seems a little too much like the JRich hope.  The difference being that Bertans has been much worse this year than JRich was in Philly.  I think folks need to temper their hopes on this guy.  If he gets us 15 minutes of useful play a game it will be a huge upgrade over what he is doing now.