Bulls trade Kirk Hinrich, James Johnson ($11.1M this year, $10.7M next year) Kings trade Kevin Martin ($10.6M this year) Why this works for the Kings. Tyreke Evans looks mostly like a wing player who would be well-complemented by a solid PG. The Kings don't have a solid point guard. It's unclear how well Evans and Martin will work together since they both appear to work best at the same position. Hinrich would fill the PG role and, because his salary declines over the next few years, constitute savings vs. Martin. Johnson is still a decent prospect, and if he turns out not to work, the Kings can save money by not picking up his options down the road. Why this works for the Bulls We are so screwed in the scoring department for this year it's not even funny. Martin seems like an ideal fit in that respect. He's a good scorer and a very good shooter from distance. In those senses, he seems like he'd be a very good player to fit between Deng and Rose. Defensively I don't think he's quite as good as Kirk, but I don't think he'd have a tangibly negative effect on team defense either. We'll live and die up front. In the longer run, this is essentially a push financially, so it doesn't kill the idea of getting a 2010 free agent. We'd still need to ensure Salmons opts out, or is traded to have significant cap space, but that's been the name of the game up to this point anyway. With Martin in the fold, however, our reliance on a risky plan would go down quite a bit. As mentioned in the other thread, Rosenthall's idea for trading for K-Mart is not a bad idea. But I don't know that Deng for K-Mart would do much for us. I sort of like the idea of Kevin Martin, but I don't know if trading Deng to get him makes us much different. He's rather less injury prone, but still pretty injury prone. I don't know if dollar for dollar he's much of a better risk than Deng. The best case scenario for that is we've recreated the devastating Salmons/K-Mart attack the Kings had going for them last year. Oh wait.... Maybe we're better off just ignoring the risk of everyone's injuries and trying to combine Deng and K-Mart. I'd like it better than the Salmons/K-Mart movie, which was a bomb the first time around. Beyond that, it fits into my thinking of a balanced offensive attack, by adding a true outside threat to complement Deng's mid-range game and Rose's ability to attack the basket. Getting Tyrus back and getting good production up front would be the ideal final step, but first lets focus on what we can control. Speaking of control and Salmons, a concern especially after this sort of trade would be our prospects for free agency next year. We need Salmons to opt out, or we need to trade him for expiring contracts. Also, we need to worry about depth. If we trade away Kirk and JJ, even getting back a guard leaves us with no real backup PG. Trading Salmons leaves our depth on the wings iffy. So the ideal situation would be a second trade that sends out Salmons -and, if we could manage it- pulling the plug on Pargo- and replacing them with real depth that could help us throughout the rest of the season, then be off our cap. With those thoughts in mind, how about Salmons for Keyon Dooling and Jarvis Hayes? Salmons and Jerome James (and potentially a 2010 protected 1st rounder) for Mike Miller and Randy Foye? Both of these trades would fill out the team with actual, somewhat capable depth without hurting our longer run position.
Reinsdorf would consider this a mistake in the making. Martin was sensational before his string of injuries. It's a huge bet he can become the player he was, and he's only getting older.
I like this trade for the Bulls, but Kmart for Kirk is a pretty serious downgrade in talent for the Kings, even considering the better 'fit.' I can't see them doing it, although they've made some weird trades the past few years. Kmart has had a PER of 20 and TS% of .600 for the last 3 years, and he's 26. That's Joe Johnson/Carmelo territory. Given his age and production, he's reasonably paid, even with his injuries. I'm not sure why a Deng for Kmart trade doesn't make much sense. The biggest difference in our roster this year is that we replaced Ben Gordon with Luol Deng. So far, I don't like what I see. This roster has serious holes in it this year that it didn't the last. Aside from height, Ben and Kmart are similar players, but Kmart is substantially better across the board. It also moves Salmons to SF, where he's much better suited IMO. The biggest downside to having Kmart is that it makes Dwayne Wade an awkward fit, and he seems like the superstar most likely to come over, but he's good enough that we can play Kmart at SF, I wouldn't care.
Why would you trade for an ok SG in a year when the bulls shot at a marquee free agent is at SG and their biggest weakness is at PF? Why aim for a nice 50 win team when you could build a contender? And if you don't think the bulls are interested in a contender, why would they go for an ok 50 win team that locks them into long term salary. And why would the bulls go for a guy who has played only 61, 51, and 5 games after being hurt again this year?
The last time the Bulls won 50 was 1997-1998. Since then, 13, 17, 15, 21, 30, 23, 47,41, 49, 33, 41 wins. Two seasons over .500. Why would anyone think that the plan is to somehow be a contender, given 11 years of history?
I think if we're going to criticize my idea, the more accurate criticism would be why would the Kings trade such a good player for Kurt Hinrich?
Yeah, it's sort of a stretch when ya put it like that, huh? This is true, but I basically look at it and think KMart+Deng would be much better than KMart+Salmons. If we're going all in on a risky move, we might as well try to do as well as possible. I miss the days when our problems consisted of having too many good players.
Don't get me wrong, I'd trade Kirk for KMart in a heartbeat, I just can't see the Kings doing it for the reasons I mentioned above. I'm just saying if that weren't possible, I'd trade Deng for Kmart as well. I'm not sure I consider trading a 29 year old 30 MPG/15 Per player for a 26 year old 40 MPG/20 Per player in a salary neutral trade 'risky.' I know there's injury risk, but weighted against everything else, it still seems like a no-brainer.
Aim higher. Joe Johnson. He's going to be a FA after the season, and he's exactly the kind of player we need at this point.
I wouldn't say KMart is that good. He's a nice player, but he isn't taking that team anywhere fast. And if they did it, it would be a salary cap move to open up room for Tyreke at the 2, which isn't out of the question for a team looking to cut salary and play youngsters. Swapping a good 4/$40+ for a decent 3/$26.5 player isn't unheard of for a rebuilding team.
How's about a comparison of K-Mart and Joe Johnson? Not just on the court, but K-Mart will cost just under $11M next year. He’ll turn 27 in February. Joe Johnson will cost something like $15-17M next year. He’ll turn 29 in June. Johnson is somewhat bigger, but not known as using it in great defense. He's a well above average distributor. Martin is a better shooter, gets to the line more, turns the ball over less, and is, perhaps surprisingly, a slightly better rebounder. It's interesting... I'd never really compared the two before.
Well, you're comparing career stats which don't tell the whole story, IMO. Johnson has been asked to play several different roles for the Hawks, like 2006-07 where he was asked to be one of the league's best scorers, and the rest of the seasons where he's made his teammates better. I don't think Martin's ever made his teammates better.
Johnson's teams have improved as he's had better players put around him. Josh Smith, Al Horford, Mike Bibby, Marvin Williams. And lest we sugar coat his tenure with the Hawks, they won 26, 30 and 37 games in his first three years. They've improved as they've matured and filled in the pieces required for any team to win around him. I don't see any evidence that Johnson made a bunch of crappy players better. When it was Johnson plus crappy players, it was a crappy team. Likewise with Kevin Martin. In his first two years as a full time starter, the Kings won 33 and 38 games. They fell off the map last year (and at the end of the season before) by trading away Bibby and Artest for, essentially, nothing, by having Shareef Abdur-Rahim completely fall apart and not play. And Martin himself, and Miller, before being traded, were hurt a lot. There's plenty of story there, but it doesn't add up to anything obvious in favor of one guy or another. The main knock I'd see against Martin in this is that he's been hurt a concerning amount.
I think you're creating false alternatives. For what they produce, KMart is probably more reasonably paid than either Deng or Kirk, and their salaries for next year aren't that different, so it wouldn't have to take away from our possibilities of signing a FA this offseason. More than anything, I think our biggest weakness this year is that we don't have anyone that can consistently score points, regardless of position. KMart obviously can't carry a team by himself, but he's also clearly better than Kirk IMO, even allowing that KMart's offensive output overstates his impact on the team, and Kirk's impact is understated looking only things like PER, Ortg, etc.
