Suns News: Week 25 4/11-4/17

[JCSunsfan]

Watch us use the #13 pick to move him for basically nothing, by saying "our guy" wasn't there at 13.

Cmon. Stay away from the dark side. It's not good for your soul.

How unlikely do you find this? 30%, 50%?

90%. McD really likes drafting.

[Indy]

Watch us use the #13 pick to move him for basically nothing, by saying "our guy" wasn't there at 13.

Cmon. Stay away from the dark side. It's not good for your soul.

How unlikely do you find this? 30%, 50%?

90%. McD really likes drafting.

He does, but do you think it is his decision to make? And he also likes making bad trades...

[EDC]

Bad trades? With an s? Shrug.

You are holding moves that are 9 years old against the team acting like it has been the MO of the front office since then.

[The Bobster]

Here's the significant trades he's made -

Dudley for Bledsoe - Advantage Suns
Scola for Green/Plumlee/Pick - Advantage Suns
Gortat/Marshall for Okafor/Pick - Advantage Wizards
Pick for Wright - to be determined
Dragic for Picks - to be determined
Thomas for Pick - Big advantage Celtics
Plumlee/Ennis/Pick for Knight - Advantage 76ers
Marcus Morris for Pick - to be determined
Markieff Morris for Pick - to be determined

Really only two bad ones (the Thomas to Boston and Knight from Milwaukee trades) but both were really bad.

But really only one clear win and one trade (Scola) that looked really good for the first year but not quite as good now.

[dragickingdom]

Bad trades? With an s? Shrug.

You are holding moves that are 9 years old against the team acting like it has been the MO of the front office since then.

I think he's referring to both the Knight trade and IT3 trade. All the other trades he's made have been good to excellent in my eyes with hindsight on a couple (Wizards trade that netted Ennis didn't pan out).

[Indy]

Bad trades? With an s? Shrug.

You are holding moves that are 9 years old against the team acting like it has been the MO of the front office since then.

Just 1 year. The trade of IT to Boston was a bad trade. They clearly raped us. The trade of the Lakers pick for 3 months of BHS was also a bad trade. If we loved him as much as we paid him, we could have done that in the off-season without wasting incredibly cheap, but incredibly valuable assets.

[Indy]

Sorry, thanks guys. My reply was delayed and didn't see your posts.

[Indy]

Here's the significant trades he's made -

Dudley for Bledsoe - Advantage Suns
Scola for Green/Plumlee/Pick - Advantage Suns
Gortat/Marshall for Okafor/Pick - Advantage Wizards
Pick for Wright - to be determined
Dragic for Picks - to be determined
Thomas for Pick - Big advantage Celtics
Plumlee/Ennis/Pick for Knight - Advantage 76ers
Marcus Morris for Pick - to be determined
Markieff Morris for Pick - to be determined

Really only two bad ones (the Thomas to Boston and Knight from Milwaukee trades) but both were really bad.

But really only one clear win and one trade (Scola) that looked really good for the first year but not quite as good now.

Great summary

[EDC]

You were talking like it wouldn't surprise you if we combined the 13th pick with Knight to get nothing. Thus the 9 year comment. Not sure how anything they have done recently would lead you to believe that is a possibility.

I think you could easily put the "to be determined" tag on the Knight trade. The Laker pick has a chance to be really good but there is no guarantee. We also don't know what we will get back from a Knight trade.

As for Thomas we gave up nothing to get him and we walked away with a pick. He has had a great year but it isn't like there were tons of teams just waiting to snatch him up or he would have cost a lot more than he did. He is an undersized offensive guard with bad defense. There are a lot of those to be had out there.

So anyways I think that list is kinda skewed. Not to mention the fact that most people around here couldn't wait to get rid of the twins yet now it is a "to be determined". It wouldn't shock me if by next season those trades will be counted as bad moves.

[JCSunsfan]

Here's the significant trades he's made -

Dudley for Bledsoe - Advantage Suns
Scola for Green/Plumlee/Pick - Advantage Suns
Gortat/Marshall for Okafor/Pick - Advantage Wizards
Pick for Wright - to be determined
Dragic for Picks - to be determined
Thomas for Pick - Big advantage Celtics
Plumlee/Ennis/Pick for Knight - Advantage 76ers
Marcus Morris for Pick - to be determined
Markieff Morris for Pick - to be determined

Really only two bad ones (the Thomas to Boston and Knight from Milwaukee trades) but both were really bad.

But really only one clear win and one trade (Scola) that looked really good for the first year but not quite as good now.

Great summary

Some of the "to be determined" trades are clear wins.

Like Kieff to Wizards. No matter WHAT happens, that was a win. I even consider the Marcus trade a win. There was no way we were going to get more for him anywhere. Also, three months of Dragic (he was going to leave anyway) for picks was a clear win, no matter how the picks end up.

To label those as tbd is just ignoring facts and trying to make a case against McD. Two of those tbd's are near miracle trades.

Did Markieff need to be traded? Yes. Did McD get more than anyone would reasonably expect in a trade. Absolutely. Advantage Suns.

Did Goran need to be traded. Yes, he clearly indicated he would not resign with us. Did we get more for him that anyone thought we could given that situation? Absolutely yes. One of the reasons we have hope for the future is those two Miami picks. Advantage Suns.

Its fine to be critical, but the criticisms need to be fair.

[The Bobster]

The Marcus deal is a lot more complicated than that - they made the trade which had a domino effect -

- they used the money to overpay Chandler
- the trade pissed off his brother
- it left them talent-thin when Warren got hurt

The Markieff deal will not be determined until they make the draft pick. Sure, they had to get rid of him at some point, but "No matter WHAT happens, that was a win" simplifies it a bit too much.

There is almost always a deal out there if you're looking to get rid of someone who has talent. They call it the "town drunk syndrome" - because in the old westerns there was always a good woman in every town who thought they could straighten out the down drunk. Coaches are like that. There will always be one who thinks he's "the smartest guy in the room" and can fix somebody's behavior.

So you just have to be patient and make the right deal. Time will tell if the Suns did.

[carey]

Does anyone want to go to this and report back?
https://twitter.com/paulcoro/status/721058898120015876

[OE32]

Here's the significant trades he's made -

Dudley for Bledsoe - Advantage Suns
Scola for Green/Plumlee/Pick - Advantage Suns
Gortat/Marshall for Okafor/Pick - Advantage Wizards
Pick for Wright - to be determined
Dragic for Picks - to be determined
Thomas for Pick - Big advantage Celtics
Plumlee/Ennis/Pick for Knight - Advantage 76ers
Marcus Morris for Pick - to be determined
Markieff Morris for Pick - to be determined

Really only two bad ones (the Thomas to Boston and Knight from Milwaukee trades) but both were really bad.

But really only one clear win and one trade (Scola) that looked really good for the first year but not quite as good now.

Great summary

Some of the "to be determined" trades are clear wins.

Like Kieff to Wizards. No matter WHAT happens, that was a win. I even consider the Marcus trade a win. There was no way we were going to get more for him anywhere. Also, three months of Dragic (he was going to leave anyway) for picks was a clear win, no matter how the picks end up.

To label those as tbd is just ignoring facts and trying to make a case against McD. Two of those tbd's are near miracle trades.

Did Markieff need to be traded? Yes. Did McD get more than anyone would reasonably expect in a trade. Absolutely. Advantage Suns.

Did Goran need to be traded. Yes, he clearly indicated he would not resign with us. Did we get more for him that anyone thought we could given that situation? Absolutely yes. One of the reasons we have hope for the future is those two Miami picks. Advantage Suns.

Its fine to be critical, but the criticisms need to be fair.

TL;DR:

I agree. To say the Knight trade was for "three months of Knight," well then, we traded "three months of Goran" for those Heat picks and "eight months of Gortat" for the Wiz pick - except that Goran and Gortat were UFA, whereas Knight was RFA. Indy always deliberately ignores the difference. IDK why. Sheesh!

I just don't think you can say that picks are "TBD". They are assets. Volatile assets are assets, then you make good or bad draft selections. Whether or not the trade was good is not dependent on how you draft - they are separate matters. You evaluate the Gortat trade separately, then the drafting of Ennis separately, then the trade of Ennis in the Knight deal separately.

NOW THE OTHER ISSUE is Monday-morning quarterbacking. How many of you called the IT trade bad at the time? I will keep harping on this. We can't judge McD against no metric; I think the only sensible metric is what alternative we would ourselves have espoused. If you wanted to deal Markieff for nothing, then McD must be given appropriate credit. If you wanted to deal IT for the late first, then it's strange to turn around and judge him negatively for something you also would have done based on the same evidence. I would not have done it; I thought IT was playing the best of our three point guards while most around here were so busy loving Goran that they couldn't see straight. So I view that as a bad trade because I thought, based on the objective indicators available at that time, IT was worth more than that. But very few here did.

Net of all our trades:

Dragic UFA, Gortat UFA, Scola 1yr, Thomas 4yr, Morris 4yr, Morris 4yr, LAL1st, MIN1st/2ds
for
BledsoeRFA, Knight RFA, Wright 1yr, 2014 #28, MIA 2018, MIA 2021, 2016 #13, 2016 #28,

Essentially, we turned the 2012-13 squad and cap space into Bledsoe and a bucket of picks, and we traded the LA pick for Knight. Knight hasn't worked out. The rest is hard to be mad about. The overall result is excellent.

But then you can't say the IT trade was very bad unless you could concede that the signing was even better - which it was. Overall, we ended up in a positive spot. Boston did even better. Sacramento made the biggest mistake of all.

In my universe, I would have kept IT and not traded for Knight, and I think I can comfortably say that would have been my decision at the time. I also doubt I would have traded for Wright. The end result of my alternative universe would have been:

Dragic UFA, Gortat UFA, Scola 1yr, Morris 4yr, Morris 4yr
for
BledsoeRFA, 2014 #18, 2014 #28, MIA 2018, MIA 2021, 2016 #13

And I gotta say, I'd have picked all of Len, Booker and Warren, since those were the guys I wanted. I'm 3/3 with top picks in the McDonough era (though in 2014, at #18 I'd have taken Kyle Anderson and at #28 I'd have taken Stokes, for better and worse, respectively). Today we'd have:

Thomas/Goodwin
Bledsoe/Booker
Warren/Tucker
Anderson/Stokes
Len

Now THAT'S a tank! My guess is I'd have had to trade Bledsoe during the offseason because he'd be so pissed about playing the 2, and Chandler would not have signed. Ho hum.

[Indy]

I agree. To say the Knight trade was for "three months of Knight," well then, we traded "three months of Goran" for those Heat picks and "eight months of Gortat" for the Wiz pick - except that Goran and Gortat were UFA, whereas Knight was RFA. Indy always deliberately ignores the difference. IDK why. Sheesh!

When you overpay for a resource, it doesn't matter if he is restricted. Clearly the team that owned his rights didn't want him. A point you seem to keep ignoring. Nobody but us were going to go out and give him $70M. Heck, his original team didn't even want him on his rookie scale!

[Indy]

The overall result is excellent.

Really? Excellent? The net result of all FO decisions under McD is excellent?

[OE32]

The overall result is excellent.

Really? Excellent? The net result of all FO decisions under McD is excellent?

Hey, at least I'm consistent.

[OE32]

I agree. To say the Knight trade was for "three months of Knight," well then, we traded "three months of Goran" for those Heat picks and "eight months of Gortat" for the Wiz pick - except that Goran and Gortat were UFA, whereas Knight was RFA. Indy always deliberately ignores the difference. IDK why. Sheesh!

When you overpay for a resource, it doesn't matter if he is restricted. Clearly the team that owned his rights didn't want him. A point you seem to keep ignoring. Nobody but us were going to go out and give him $70M. Heck, his original team didn't even want him on his rookie scale!

Hey, don't I owe you an avatar? I think I do... 6 months, because the CLE pick ended up above 25.

We could take another 6 months on: In the event Knight gets traded, we receive positive value in return. You win the bet if we trade him for nothing or if we attach an asset to get rid of him. Deal?

[Indy]

I agree. To say the Knight trade was for "three months of Knight," well then, we traded "three months of Goran" for those Heat picks and "eight months of Gortat" for the Wiz pick - except that Goran and Gortat were UFA, whereas Knight was RFA. Indy always deliberately ignores the difference. IDK why. Sheesh!

When you overpay for a resource, it doesn't matter if he is restricted. Clearly the team that owned his rights didn't want him. A point you seem to keep ignoring. Nobody but us were going to go out and give him $70M. Heck, his original team didn't even want him on his rookie scale!

Hey, don't I owe you an avatar? I think I do... 6 months, because the CLE pick ended up above 25.

We could take another 6 months on: In the event Knight gets traded, we receive positive value in return. You win the bet if we trade him for nothing or if we attach an asset to get rid of him. Deal?

Yes, you "win" because our pick is worse this year than I hoped.

I think the bet was >27 you win, <24 I win.

I don't think we can accurately judge your suggestion on the double or nothing. And I don't like betting against the Suns.

[Indy]

The overall result is excellent.

Really? Excellent? The net result of all FO decisions under McD is excellent?

Hey, at least I'm consistent.

You are. I just can't believe you would say his decisions here have netted "excellent" results. Besides marginal players (Tucker), I don't think he has given a single good contract to anyone. And his drafts have been OK, but he has only picked the consensus pick for the most part. I just don't see excellence there, and am extremely surprised you do.

[JCSunsfan]

The Marcus deal is a lot more complicated than that - they made the trade which had a domino effect -

- they used the money to overpay Chandler
- the trade pissed off his brother
- it left them talent-thin when Warren got hurt

The Markieff deal will not be determined until they make the draft pick. Sure, they had to get rid of him at some point, but "No matter WHAT happens, that was a win" simplifies it a bit too much.

There is almost always a deal out there if you're looking to get rid of someone who has talent. They call it the "town drunk syndrome" - because in the old westerns there was always a good woman in every town who thought they could straighten out the down drunk. Coaches are like that. There will always be one who thinks he's "the smartest guy in the room" and can fix somebody's behavior.

So you just have to be patient and make the right deal. Time will tell if the Suns did.

Most people considered that if the Suns moved Markieff and did not have to give up assets to move him, it was win. Win no matter what happens. Its opinion. Thats mine.