DAL OFFSEASON: Trade & FA | Mavs "mostly done...but you never know."

[Scott41theMavs]

Funny how when you have no assets and have to rely on luck and the needs of other teams you end up with crap. Might be good to accumulate assets.

Funny you say that... Because I felt like we only had Brunson, our 1st this year and whatever the GS pick was going into the year.
THJ suddenly turned into an asset... And we got Curry on a great deal. You could argue Kleber on a team friendly deal with improved play also became a pretty good asset.

Just finding good players and elevating their status by having them in your system I think can be a good way to find value. We really have no other choice but free agency and undervalued players via trade.

That's what I'm saying. The Mavs do have some assets - 18, 31, Curry, DFS, Maxi, Brunson the '25 FRP - but the usage, or misusage, of those assets could make them a worse team for '20-'21. They basically have to include between four and all seven of those listed assets to compete with the other 28 teams in the league for any particular player they want in trade in order to build the "real" starting lineup that they don't have right now. How good of a team is left when you have Luka, KP, the guy you traded for, your collection of non-assets (Wright, Powell, etc.), THJ, and between zero and three of what you didn't trade? I think it's clear that that's almost certainly a worse team than you had to begin with - sideways movement at best.

The Mavs have three opportunities to add assets this summer - the MLE, wise drafting, and wise usage of your trade assets. I think they're putting themselves in a bad place asset-wise if they don't retain #18 or actually trade up. And then, as you say, the fourth - internal improvement over the next year. Their big opportunity to increase their talent quotient and their trade assets chest is in '21. That's when they can either add a monster third player like GA or KL, or split cap room into a number of players who want to play with Luka and are willing to take paycuts. That means, further, that those assets cannot just add a player or players in trade - they also need to serve as sweeteners to dump our anti-assets like Wright and hopefully Powell. Ergo, our assets are stretched too thin, and we aren't getting the players we would like without spending more in trade than we can really afford. We can beat other teams if we're willing to do what we really can't do.

Is THJ a trade asset? I would argue no, rhetorically no more than KP is a trade asset. He is an asset to us as an expiring contract. We want him to buoy the team in order to attract the players we really want in '21, and then we want him to expire in order to be able to sign those players. I see the correct route with THJ right now as "keep, play, expire." He isn't likely to be sent out for another player who will expire (although I keep breaking this rule and dreaming that we'll get OPJ for THJ and some other asset). If the Mavs traded him for a long term contract, even if it's a guy who fits well with Luka and KP, you're basically punting on '21, so you had better nail that trade.

This is just my variation of KL's "be prepared." I'm prepared for the Mavs 1) not to get anyone good, 2) to trade #18 for a lame, underwhelming player (Fournier is looking like the best-case scenario to me right now), and/or 3) keep #18 and draft the '20 version of Shane Larkin or Mo Ager.