Giannis traded

the irresistible force meets the immovable object, with the ultimate coach killer vs the elder statesman of NBA coaches

even better that giannis doesnt know him from team usa

so now the "quick fix" brigade back home can actually be realistic about our place in the quagmire

Randle to Brooklyn Purgatory (likely done for the later Ayo Dosunmu move)

both of those moves make me wonder what's truly next. Heat and Bucks both gonna be weird teams. found it hilarious that Myles Garrett was cited in the reason Miami was chosen over Boston


Boston fans exhale in relief

What you think about Michigan's coach going to Dallas, Gonzo

i was terrified Herro was going to end up in Detroit as a result of this move. also a little surprised the Wolves did such an extreme salary dump. when they only had MLE money for Ayo I was hoping the Pistons would get in the mix but now hes all but resigned. idk wtf the Nets are doing adding multiple years of Randle's salary but hes having a bad day today :(

Dusty is a real bummer. im wondering if Team USA 2032 came up in these talks.

Am I crazy for thinking this is a bad trade for the Heat?

I mean, sure. Giannis/Bam/Wiggins is a great defensive front court - but what the hell are they gonna put around these guys?

Miami is a nice upgrade on Milwaukee though.

maybe at his age and in his physical state, thats just what he is now

I'm assuming Milwaukee used Boston as negotiation leverage to get all of those assets from Miami.

I'm somewhat curious how they'll flip what pieces they have now.

I don't view this trade as being all that great for Miami mainly because of the fact Giannis been in and out of the Milwaukee line-up as result of injuries for the past 4-5 seasons.

Would be wild if Miami is still a play-in team after moving all those pieces.

Don't know what's out there now in terms of package for JB that could make us better.

If those reports are to be believed in not giving up Scheierman to land Giannis, I honestly have no idea what the C's are doing.

While the package Mil got is pretty good for a superstar trade...getting a player like Jaylen, who was able to keep the Celtics near the top of the East without Tatum most of the year is easily the best thing they'd get for him.

Gotta hope he's a pro about putting him on the table, but...

Pretty wild if he's disgruntled to the point of wanting to move on from the team.

Also have to imagine that'll be a pretty gigantic trade given his talent level (he was a legit MVP candidate last year) and how big his contract is.

To be clear, I am a Knicks fan and I'm not rooting for the Celts, but I was assuming the front office was going to look for a big, not look to trade Brown.

...would have liked Zuby at 24, but in Leon we trust.

will replace Mitchell Robinson since it appears they won't go into the second apron to keep him.

Hukporti isn't ready yet to be the backup 5 IMO, especially to the level he's going to be needed as KAT is still prone to committing silly fouls.

im not sure what the point of a pick swap is with Lamelo and Ant picking after you anyways, but they got 3 (2028-30) and a 2033 (lol) 1st

Charlotte might have just fleeced, getting Naz out of this deal

but this might also be Ant insurance (because he might ask out in a couple of years)

>but this might also be Ant insurance (because he might ask out
>in a couple of years)

the Spurs or OKC right now and both teams are young as hell.

Ant might ask out regardless of this trade if the team flounders in the post-season.

All those picks the Timberwolves gave up in this trade and the Gobert trade will come back to bite that front office.

particularly the Naz Reid part after trading Randle.

Also not certain how ball dominant LaMelo works with Ant, who isn't ball dominant the same way but likes to have the ball in his hands.

Maybe the plan is to have him work off of the ball more because Minny thinks he has had to work too hard in the past.

But...Naz Reid was supposed to be the starter after trading Randle (or at least that's what I heard the plan was - and it made sense), so...you're VERY thin now in the bigs department.

I do think you're right though - this might be a hedge because I don't think Ant is staying in Minny when that time comes.

As for the Charlotte side - banking on Brandon Miller and Kon just doesn't seem like a winning formula to me. they'll put up numbers but i don't see the W's going with that. maybe it's just the long game and they'll build something else, with those guys as good compliment guys.

Ball
Ant
Ayo
McDaniels
Gobert

is pretty good to my eyes

ICE agents, this ain’t for you. Walk around recklessly and obliviously.

Damn his trade value dropped so hard

Because Jerami Grant having two years left at that price suuuuucks. Getting zero draft picks for Morant, who is six years young and not at *that* much higher a price, really shows how much Memphis wanted him out and how much the league didn't want the headache. Really insane.

but you mentioning draft picks made me think how underwhelming both the careers for Zion Williamson and Ja Morant have been so far as they were assumed to both be solid pros coming out of that draft class.

I just looked up the draft listing for their class on basketball-reference.com and there's an interesting mixture of names and varying degrees of success on there. Because I don't watch college basketball, I genuinely had no clue Darius Garland was in their draft class. Given all his injuries, I assumed he came out earlier than they did.

IF that's the move, then fine. It's been in the works for a while. Probably at least since the '24 Olympics. As soon as Dray opted out of his player option, I fugred it will happen.

And yeah, the Warriors with 41-42 Bron could be interesting, with what few young players we have looking promising to various degrees. As long as Bron knows he's there to help Curry and not vice versa, it could work out.

That said, the talk of trading for AD is supreme bad idea jeans. It makes even older and more injury prone, and gives off HUGE "Karl Malone and GP on the Lakers" energy. Do not want.

Also, if Bron signs with the Warrors, and then Dunleavy Jr. lets him talk him into trading for Bronny, then Dunleavy Jr. should be launched into the sun.

wonder how this affects the Kawhi scandal?

Clips in full "tear it down" mode.

If Kawhi is healthy and and allowed to play, Raptors are better but still not good enough to really challenge for the East IMO.

watch Dan LeBatard's show from yesterday on YouTube.

Towards the end of yesterday's episode, Pablo was in studio and brought up a tangential connection the current Raptors owner has to the Kawhi Leonard investigation.

we made this mistake before with Drummond

you cant demand a supermax after your production gets halved in the playoffs and you get bitch slapped by wendell carter, jarret allen and evan mobley

sorry buddy, take this 4/175 or look elsewhere and now hes looking at...Sacramento...lol

I get his logic, Acuff will be a star and he'll eat in the regular season with him as his PG

and zero playoff expectations

of. course . he wants to go there


>Giannis traded
>
>the irresistible force meets the immovable object, with the
>ultimate coach killer vs the elder statesman of NBA coaches
>
>even better that giannis doesnt know him from team usa

i can't keep up. Powell to the Bulls?

who the hell is Giannis and Bam gonna be surrounded by? lol.

On paper this seems realllly lopsided. PG could barely get on the court last year and has one of the worst contracts in the league. Those future pick swaps with the Clips could be real valuable, but….this seems like a major steal for the Sixers. Not used to the Sixers getting the best of C’s in trades…

>On paper this seems realllly lopsided. PG could barely get on
>the court last year and has one of the worst contracts in the
>league. Those future pick swaps with the Clips could be real
>valuable, but….this seems like a major steal for the Sixers.
>Not used to the Sixers getting the best of C’s in trades…


very surprising trade, i thought he was going to denver tbh,

Jaylen Brown for Jamal Murray and draft picks was how I thought it'd end up

Celtics organization must really hate him, because that trade is crazy.

He played reasonably well, but yeah at his age and with that contract….Philly being able to trade him at all, is a major win. That they landed Jaylen Brown….this might be the most lopsided trade since Luka?

Philly should just hold Embiid out until after the all star break and cross their fingers that they can get a few healthy months out of him. Because if they have Brown, Maxey, Edgecombe, and a healthy Embiid in the playoffs? They could be tough to beat in the East.

if Celtics fans will boo Jaylen Brown when the Sixers visit Boston next season.

Interesting for sure given 1) he was their Finals MVP 2) was a legitimate MVP candidate last season and 3) according to Shams, didn't ask the front office to trade him.

Will be fun seeing Jaylen Brown play against the Celtics four times next season; will be even better if they happen to match up in the playoffs.

If anything, he gets a prolonged standing ovation.

For one, Boston fan/sports talk reaction to the trade has already been highly negative just as a trade.

But, more importantly, there’s an emphasis on how much Brown was connected to the Boston community. How involved he in local charities and organizations and how beloved he was by the population.

He’ll get a hero’s welcome.

It's almost as if the front office was upset he performed so well in what was assumed to be a gap year as result of Tatum being injured.

Not saying he's a perfect player because he was on the floor when they lost to Philly in the first round last year, but it's wild they were so eager to let him go.

Their loss will seemingly be Philly's gain, at least on paper.

That terrible trade from Boston's perspective made the Mitchell Robinson signing somewhat more palatable.

>It's almost as if the front office was upset he performed so
>well in what was assumed to be a gap year as result of Tatum
>being injured.

There's obviously been a lot of discourse about what the analytics say about Brown's performance last season vs. the eye test. And Lord knows Brown has been outspoken about his disbelief in analytics (which probably doesn't help with the Celtics' FO).

I think it's less that the FO was upset Brown did so well and more that Brown believed this was proof that the Celtics are his team, when the FO pretty clearly has always believed it's Tatum's team. If the FO could've brought them both back, I'm quite confident they would have... but it's been a tenuous situation that last year almost certainly made untenable going forward. That'd be my guess, personally.

Also, re: the very silly overreactions in the analytics discourse: NBA teams understand that analytics aren't meant to be consumed in a vacuum. So if the analytics say the team has been better with Brown off the floor for four straight seasons, while that's not to be taken without context around it (especially last year given how volume of workload can impact on/off), I think it's understandable for the Celtics to wonder if Brown's as valuable as Brown's contract says he is and as Brown publicly says he is. I'm sure they'd have liked a better deal for JB... but if it was time, and they didn't want to risk him losing even more trade value with public trade demands or whatever, then it was time.

>if Celtics fans will boo Jaylen Brown when the Sixers visit
>Boston next season.

...that makes him want to give up his basketball fandom.

Look, if things between him and the front office/ownership had become untenable, then fine. It happens. Even with wildly popular players.

But FFS sake you gotta get a better haul then two Clippers draft picks that MAY turn into something and the reanimated corpse of Paul George. I understand the Celtics originally wanted VJ Edgecombe as well, but the Sixers turned them down. But there's like 30 other teams out there, and I imagine at least a few would give you more of value than late career PG.

Brown is one of the highest paid players in the league with three years left on his deal.

They clearly didn't want to sign a player with age or injury history matching money they'd have to extend like Giannis. So that rules out a decent number of options.

They probably wanted to do some sort of deal for multiple players... but given how much Brown makes, what sort of deal is that? I'd heard the Portland rumors, but Portland didn't really have a deal-- certainly not one that included any picks whatsoever. Like, do we really think Portland deals Jerami Grant, Shaedon Sharpe, and Clingan? I don't think so.

Also, goes without saying, but people knew JB was malcontent with the Celtics. Is that relegated only to his current team, or will he see himself as The Guy wherever he goes? Clearly Boston doesn't think highly of his ability to deliver elsewhere, or they wouldn't have traded him to the Sixers of all teams. The reported Edgecombe deal sounds more fair if solely factoring in Brown's output over the past couple years... but the fact that they went *that far down* from their original desired deal kinda says a lot about the trade market for Brown imo!

So you're looking for a deal for probably one player (or mostly one player) and picks-- and given the Celtics have been better per On/Off numbers in minutes without Brown for four straight seasons (on/off is a noisy stat, but four straight seasons is, uh, a big sample to completely ignore), you're unlikely to get a present star or a player without some degree of baggage. Would I have tried to figure out a Giannis deal? Sure. But again, Giannis would demand a 3 year, ~220 or whatever type of extension. Given Giannis's age and recent injury history, I get why the Celtics balked.

I'd be interested in hearing what sort of deal people think Boston could've made for Brown where the money works. It's obviously not a great deal... but given things had become untenable and the sheer amount of money Brown is owed for the next three years, I think it's reeeeeeally tough to find an obvious deal.

Plus, I don't really hear anyone saying this... but if PG doesn't work out as a third option or whatever, the following offseason, he's a monster expiring deal that's easily imo more tradeable than Brown with multiple years left. So you're really only worrying about next season if you're the Celtics-- and given last season they were a 2 seed basically without Tatum, and this year they'll have Tatum without Brown, but they'll add PG and Mitch? I obviously wouldn't put them much higher than, like, 4th in the NBA preseason, but that expiring contract next year theoretically gives them a lot of flexibility for sign-and-trades for some of those free agents, not to mention whichever star might become malcontent in the coming several months (Jokic?).

So I get the fan reaction... buuuuuuut I just haven't heard an alternative trade yet where I realistically think both teams say yet. Just really hard with these supermax players to get a true return on talent given how restrictive the money they're paid makes your books.

I didn’t want Brown traded for KD. I didn’t want Brown traded for Giannis… and we got Paul George and picks in the 2030’s, only one of which is a real asset. I don’t even think anyone understands the swap rights.

This is the fucking worst. And no amount of Brad Stevens talking about our “optionality” can comfort me.

>I didn’t want Brown traded for KD. I didn’t want Brown
>traded for Giannis… and we got Paul George and picks in the
>2030’s, only one of which is a real asset. I don’t even
>think anyone understands the swap rights.
>
>This is the fucking worst. And no amount of Brad Stevens
>talking about our “optionality” can comfort me.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DaTWxf7BIwH/

The Red Sox have been going down the same road for the last few years while pretending to stay competitive as they milk their fans and raise the value of the team. I really hate the owners of both teams so much that I can barely bring myself to root for the 2 teams I never thought I’d lose enthusiasm for.

Basketball-wise, I might just be an AJ Dybantsa fan from here on out. He’s from my hometown and I’m so excited to see how things pan out for him. Hope the Wizards don’t fuck it up!

i root for Tiger *fans*, but the back half of the 10's ruined them for me

more than a decade since ive spent a dollar on tickets/merch/anything

and every few years they remind me why. this year its Skubal and that will carry me until im obligated to take my son to a ballgame, at which i will not drink beer and I will make an ENORMOUS mess of my peanut shells.

8 games out of the 82 games next season. Brutal.

I was prepared for Mitch to leave since Dolan in his infinite wisdom made it be known literally before the Knicks victory parade that he didn't want to spend over the second apron; I definitely didn't see him going to a division rival.

Mainly curious if Boston plans to start Mitch next season.

I have to assume the Knicks are going to have to trade to get a suitable backup for KAT since the remaining free agent bigs are third stringers and aren't proper 2nd big man material IMO.

the most impossible deal and it was done, and we have James Harden to thank (more on that later)

Dean Wade and Keon Ellis leave in free agency -->
Harden opts out -->
Dennis Schroeder moved to Charlotte for Tre Mann -->
(Cavs under 1st apron)
Max Strus moved to the Clippers (thank you, so now he's back with DG) -->

Peyton Watson is a Cavalier.

Denver gets the last pick Cavs can trade (2031 unprotected 1st) and a Kings 2nd that came via the Strus deal

Washington also sends Cam Whitmore in the deal to Cavs and Julian Reese to Denver (both expected to be waived)

Watson - 4 yr/$88M

Cavs locked at 1st apron BUT THEY NOW HAVE A 6'8" WING AGAIN!!!

Jimbo was resigned for three years, $97M with player option and trade kicker. His reward for helping the team out (apparently he also recruited Watson to Cavs)

Koby Altman was getting killed for not getting LeBron and letting everyone else go elsewhere.

But he's done this. Now I can actually watch the team with some sort of interest as we move on.

The $30 million fine is whatever; a rounding error for the team. But five draft picks, plus suspensions for Balmer, Zucker, and Frank are all heavy duty. Certainly lets the other teams know to tighten their shit up (I figure it's pretty much given that most, if not all, teams do this).

I wonder if the CLippers leaking, "oh, it's going to be a slap on the wrist..." factored into the punishment.

As in, the investigation found more, but couldn't fit it in this initial report.

If that's true and Wachtell Lipton is literally still investigating this whole nonsense, that means the league could have waited for the firm to complete its investigation before issuing the ruling.

That's very interesting to me. A small part of me wonders if Pablo Torre dropping all the episodes and showing all the documented evidence of the cap circumvention shamed the league into doing something before the season started.

This could be me being overly cynical, but I also have to admit I'm surprised Silver actually punished Balmer strictly because Silver as shown he's focused on increasing profits in terms of his priority as league commissioner. Punishing one of the richest owners in sports would seem to run counter to that, but I guess there was too much evidence for Silver to look the other way.

Lastly, this is a moot and minor point, but it's pretty hilarious to me that Paul George didn't get one single red cent of the circumvented money given how big of a deal it was at the time when he landed on the Clippers.

whether you love or hate what he did, there were A LOT of people saying "awww, this is all bullshit. nothing will happen."

It's kinda natural to think nothing will happen to the billionaires.

and wasn't doing a bit for the show, Amin Elhassan who was part of the Pablo Torre episodes about this whole debacle said himself during an old Le Batard show he was doubtful Silver would punish Balmer strictly because he thought Silver wouldn't want to offend one of the richest owners in sports.

It'll be interesting to see how Balmer operates once the dust settles from all this.

Also wonder if the league will actually punish Balmer and/or the Clippers front office more as yesterday's report intimates.

They've spent the last year carrying water for Balmer/Clippers. From the initial simpering interview with Ballmer to that egregiously stupid story they ran a couple of weeks ago fed to them by the Clippers front office that this was going to be a nothing burger. That story in particular featured bylines by a lot of people that should have known better (including a multiple time Pulitzer winner) who you would have thought would pushed back or done any sort of follow-up before printing the Clippers party line.

By settling and eating the $700,000 fine, they prevented this from going to arbitration and giving Balmer a potential out. Now, if he wants to fight it, he's going to have to sue. Now, legal costs won't be shit for Balmer, but he's going to have to decide if he wants to drag this out for years.

It's also interesting that the general assumption is now that the KAwhi to the Raptors trade goes through and he promptly gets signed one last big contract extension. Will the league allow that trade to go through considering, as of now, it would allow the Clippers to get two of their draft picks back.