Suns Trade for Tyler Johnson/Wayne Ellington

[Split T]

I’ve never even heard of Tyler Johnson and he’s making $19 mil? What the heck.

Brooklyn tried to pry him away with one of those deals to a 2nd round pick that starts low(8 million) and jumps way up halfway through(19m). Miami matched the contract

[Superbone]

Well, that was an unexpected move.

[Mori Chu]

I think my general take is that I'm mildly negative about this trade. It eats up cap space for a marginal player. I don't like that big $20m salary; even though the contract is short, it feels like it'd be hard to move if we needed to. I'll try to reserve judgment until I see Johnson play, but I am not very excited about him. I'd rather have given his minutes to our existing guards. We'll have to wait and see.

[Flagrant Fowl]

A pretty meh trade.

Contrary to some people's belief around here, I think Johnson is a decent fit with how Igor has used Booker. Johnson is a reliable ball handler and he can actually hit an open shot with some consistency.

I'm also not bent out of shape of about adding $3M to the cap next year because I've never once believed the Suns are a FA destination. The best they could probably do is a mid-level guy like Rubio, and space can be cleared to get someone like that if they wanted to try it.

[Drewsprocket]

I watched a bunch of his highlights: definite rotation player, heady combo guard, good defender, competitive spirit, comes off screens and hits 3s or dives into the lane, can hit the open man, good ball handler. Looks like he was just over paid. With the suns he will have the opportunity to prove himself.

He can't be a good defender. WW said he was TERRIBLE!

Stats say he's a bad defender. -1.5 DRPM (well below average, bottom 25th percentile). NBA math puts him at -4.59, which is below average. NBA Advanced stats has his DEFRTG at 105.8, which is a little below average. His OFFRTG is 103.1, which is very poor

There's really not many ways to slice it: he's not a good player, we're paying him 19M, he doesn't address our needs at PG at all, and if he isn't buried on the bench we'll just be screaming at him because he couldn't find an open player if his life depended on it. Like, he makes Melton look like a great distributor.

You could be right. But numbers don’t squarely reject him not playing to his abilities on a Bad team. Hey, I’m open to him playing up to his abilities. I’m not deflated by the move and am reserving being hopeful.

[Flagrant Fowl]

I'll only be upset with this trade if it turns out that Johnson is good enough to take the Suns out of the bottom 3.

[JeremyG]

I feel like eventually the Suns are gonna trade for Boban and tell us he's our new point guard.

[iLLmatic]

Making moves to make moves. Great, we acquired a combo guard.

[bajanguy008]

when did he become terrible ?
I know it's a constant doom n gloom around here but geeez lol , sometimes I find the player assessments fairly interesting.

just looking at stats never tell the full story. when I've watched the Heat, Drews breakdown doesn't seem too far off and I've always noticed his ability to play bigger than his size getting blks but yea his numbers are down but without watching him I will reserve judgment because he was a solid/key part of the rotation last year. is he a pure point ? No so I get why people will be annoyed but I just don't see how he's viewed as terrible
saying he only avgs less than 3asts so can't distribute without watching a game doesn't make much sense to me.
a guard initiating the offense with those numbers would obviously be deemed terrible but his role in Miami is playing off Dragic , J-Rich and Wade. so a guy who is spotting up or curling off pin downs to either shoot a midrange or get to the basket will never have high asts totals. without watching him play consistently I would not be able to say if he has the capacity to hit the open man or not so I will just wait and see.

when it comes to the contract stuff, I never get into those discussions cause some of you know the CBA stuff top to bottom lol and the bottom line like Split said it is known Nets made them overpay which is a fair point but despite that I don't see him as terrible just not ideal unfortunately

[Split T]

I'll only be upset with this trade if it turns out that Johnson is good enough to take the Suns out of the bottom 3.

I think we’re 4th. Knicks, Cavs, Bulls will out lose us

[bajanguy008]

on the other hand I thought something would be able to be done with Ellington. playoff teams always looking for shooters , oh well

[djy2j]

Jesus. Now Jones is helping the Heat. Takes bite out of our cap space this summer if in fact we sedated someone heavily enough to sign a contract here.

I’ve seen the argument that Johnson will be an expiring contract this summer. Well, Guess what? Austin Rivers was an expiring contract and we let him walk so no this trade really do much for me. We just traded for a 20 mil backup SG

And the fact that the Suns are saying he’s a PG is the biggest load of monkey shit of it all. This guy is as much of a PG as Jamal Crawford.

Just when I thought we couldn’t make any dumber moves they go and do this.

[iLLmatic]

I'm disappointed we didn't trade for another small forward.

[djy2j]

I'll only be upset with this trade if it turns out that Johnson is good enough to take the Suns out of the bottom 3.

I think we’re 4th. Knicks, Cavs, Bulls will out lose us

No way. Supposedly we are shutting Booker down for the rest of the season. We won’t win more than 2 more games with this roster

[Flagrant Fowl]

I'll only be upset with this trade if it turns out that Johnson is good enough to take the Suns out of the bottom 3.

I think we’re 4th. Knicks, Cavs, Bulls will out lose us

Possibly, but remember that Booker will still miss another 6-8 games.

[Split T]

I'll only be upset with this trade if it turns out that Johnson is good enough to take the Suns out of the bottom 3.

I think we’re 4th. Knicks, Cavs, Bulls will out lose us

No way. Supposedly we are shutting Booker down for the rest of the season. We won’t win more than 2 more games with this roster

Where is this coming from

[Shabazz]

Kevin Pelton likes it for us:

Phoenix Suns: B+

Over the past couple of years, the Suns' dilemma has been whether to acquire a starting point guard or let Devin Booker take over the position. Dealing for Johnson sort of splits the difference. A combo guard capable of playing either at the point or off the ball, Johnson can share playmaking duties with Booker while retaining value as a spot-up shooter when Booker is at the controls.

So far this season, Johnson has split has minutes almost evenly between the point and the 2-guard positions, taking on the latter role as a starter recently alongside Justise Winslow. I'd expect Phoenix to use Johnson to bring the ball up and initiate the offense on a regular basis before giving way to Booker as part of the primary action.

The downside of Johnson's versatility is it's hard to identify any specific area in which he excels. He's a solid 3-point shooter but not an elite one, having hit 37 percent beyond the arc in his career but just 35 percent so far this season -- a tad worse than league average. Nonetheless, Johnson is a huge upgrade on the Suns' other ballhandling options. Even if he's not Phoenix's point guard of the future, he can solidify the position for the short term and keep the Suns from having to overpay to get one.

Ellington was included strictly to help Miami save money and has little use to a team flush with wings. ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski reported that his agent is working with Phoenix on waiving him to sign with a playoff team. Ellington has leverage because as a player on a one-year contract with Bird rights at its conclusion, he had veto power over his inclusion in the trade.

From a financial standpoint, the Suns are probably thinking of this as paying $3.6 million next year for Johnson. That's the marginal difference between his salary and the $15.6 million Anderson was guaranteed in 2019-20 after agreeing to reduce it as part of Phoenix's trade acquiring him from the Houston Rockets. (The Suns could also have stretched Anderson's guaranteed salary to create additional cap space.)

Given Anderson wasn't a contributor at all -- after opening the season as Phoenix's starting power forward, he hadn't seen game action since December 4 -- that and Ellington's salary the remainder this season are a small price to pay to upgrade.

[djy2j]

I'll only be upset with this trade if it turns out that Johnson is good enough to take the Suns out of the bottom 3.

I think we’re 4th. Knicks, Cavs, Bulls will out lose us

No way. Supposedly we are shutting Booker down for the rest of the season. We won’t win more than 2 more games with this roster

Where is this coming from

I’ve been on the RealGM boards all day. I thought I read it as Gambo said it on the radio but I’ll go back and look. They were discussing it over there.

[Split T]

That draft pick most likely drops us to pretty much the MLE, so we essentially don’t have cap space. Unless we renounce Oubre’s cap hold.

[ShelC]

A pretty meh trade.

Contrary to some people's belief around here, I think Johnson is a decent fit with how Igor has used Booker. Johnson is a reliable ball handler and he can actually hit an open shot with some consistency.

I think this is exactly it. Igor's offense isn't overly reliant on a PG pounding the ball and getting everyone else set up. I also think Johnson being coached by Spo in that Heat system might have played a part. We shed Anderson for someone who will play minutes for us. I'm fine with it.

I'm not fine with shutting Booker down again. No matter the record, he needs to play. I'm sure he's pissed enough about this season, but now we're shutting him down again? Can't happen.