Trade Talk (Part 15): Trade Deadline Day (and onwards!)

[shrink]

KAT is traded. Just business.
To NY is my prediction.
Something like Donte, Mitchell, Bojan, and future 1st
For
KAT, Wendell, 2nd rd

OK, I fully understand that a certain power forward in New York is not popular here....HOWEVER I just want to say that from what I've seen from the current iteration of an offensive gameplan here, I wonder if a driving/bruising forward would have more success than Towns. I know everyone thinks spacing is sorely needed, but I think this team at it's core is physicality. And to me, Randle represents that more than Towns, especially if additional assets come along with him in the trade.

Literally the #1 or #2 (the other is D'Lo) worst Playoff performs in NBA history relative to their regular season play...

What about this one?

FG 3-17, 3P 0-9, RB 8, AST 5, TO 4, 9 PTS

Spoiler:

That’s Ant, in last year’s Play In Game against the Lakers. MIN lost that one in overtime. It would have been great to get the #7 seed, because the Lakers had an easy path until they also had to play Denver. And for the record, Towns tired in the fourth, but finished

FG 8-12, 3P 2-4, RB 11, AST 5, TO 2, 24 PTS

[BlacJacMac]

OK, I fully understand that a certain power forward in New York is not popular here....HOWEVER I just want to say that from what I've seen from the current iteration of an offensive gameplan here, I wonder if a driving/bruising forward would have more success than Towns. I know everyone thinks spacing is sorely needed, but I think this team at it's core is physicality. And to me, Randle represents that more than Towns, especially if additional assets come along with him in the trade.

Literally the #1 or #2 (the other is D'Lo) worst Playoff performs in NBA history relative to their regular season play...

What about this one?

FG 3-17, 3P 0-9, RB 8, AST 5, TO 4, 9 PTS

Spoiler:

That’s Ant, in last year’s Play In Game against the Lakers. MIN lost that one in overtime. It would have been great to get the #7 seed, because the Lakers had an easy path until they also had to play Denver. And for the record, Towns tired in the fourth, but finished

FG 8-12, 3P 2-4, RB 11, AST 5, TO 2, 24 PTS

That's a 1 game sample. I'm talking Playoff career numbers.

[shrink]

Literally the #1 or #2 (the other is D'Lo) worst Playoff performs in NBA history relative to their regular season play...

What about this one?

FG 3-17, 3P 0-9, RB 8, AST 5, TO 4, 9 PTS

Spoiler:

That’s Ant, in last year’s Play In Game against the Lakers. MIN lost that one in overtime. It would have been great to get the #7 seed, because the Lakers had an easy path until they also had to play Denver. And for the record, Towns tired in the fourth, but finished

FG 8-12, 3P 2-4, RB 11, AST 5, TO 2, 24 PTS

That's a 1 game sample. I'm talking Playoff career numbers.

Ok, I didn’t understand that. But that’s even a harder argument to make for “worst playoff performance in NBA history.”

Towns’ overall playoff performance in 24 Playoff Games, is .487 FG%, .413 3P%, .805 FT%, 10.6 RPG, 2.3 APG, 18.7 PPG, and through the first six games of the 2024 playoffs, people have said it’s the best Towns has ever looked?

[BlacJacMac]

What about this one?

FG 3-17, 3P 0-9, RB 8, AST 5, TO 4, 9 PTS

Spoiler:

That’s Ant, in last year’s Play In Game against the Lakers. MIN lost that one in overtime. It would have been great to get the #7 seed, because the Lakers had an easy path until they also had to play Denver. And for the record, Towns tired in the fourth, but finished

FG 8-12, 3P 2-4, RB 11, AST 5, TO 2, 24 PTS

That's a 1 game sample. I'm talking Playoff career numbers.

Ok, I didn’t understand that. But that’s even a harder argument to make for “worst playoff performance in NBA history.”

Towns’ overall playoff performance in 24 Playoff Games, is .487 FG%, .413 3P%, .805 FT%, 10.6 RPG, 2.3 APG, 18.7 PPG, and through the first six games of the 2024 playoffs, people have said it’s the best Towns has ever looked?

Randle's career Playoff shooting: 34/28/76

[shrink]

Randle's career Playoff shooting: 34/28/76

Again, my misunderstanding. I thought you were talking about our side of the trade.

I agree, Randle has stunk in the playoffs. I don’t really understand him as a player, since he has a couple high end awards. Maybe I’ve mainly sampled “Playoff Randle.”

[BlacJacMac]

Randle's career Playoff shooting: 34/28/76

Again, my misunderstanding. I thought you were talking about our side of the trade.

I agree, Randle has stunk in the playoffs. I don’t really understand him as a player, since he has a couple high end awards. Maybe I’ve mainly sampled “Playoff Randle.”

Scores a lot of points and is in the East.

To be fair, he discovers his 3 ball every other year or so - but he's going to chuck it a ton regardless. Been above 31% from 3 only three years out of his career.

He gets assists, but that's because he absolutely has to dominate the ball to be effective. And with the assists come the turnovers.

Plays no defense and appears to be a pretty lousy teammate.

[thinktank]

What about this one?

FG 3-17, 3P 0-9, RB 8, AST 5, TO 4, 9 PTS

Spoiler:

That’s Ant, in last year’s Play In Game against the Lakers. MIN lost that one in overtime. It would have been great to get the #7 seed, because the Lakers had an easy path until they also had to play Denver. And for the record, Towns tired in the fourth, but finished

FG 8-12, 3P 2-4, RB 11, AST 5, TO 2, 24 PTS

That's a 1 game sample. I'm talking Playoff career numbers.

Ok, I didn’t understand that. But that’s even a harder argument to make for “worst playoff performance in NBA history.”

Towns’ overall playoff performance in 24 Playoff Games, is .487 FG%, .413 3P%, .805 FT%, 10.6 RPG, 2.3 APG, 18.7 PPG, and through the first six games of the 2024 playoffs, people have said it’s the best Towns has ever looked?

Shrink, we’re back to my old sig: Are you happy with 18 and 11 in the playoffs for 50 million per?

[jpatrick]

We may trade KAT but it won’t be for a player like Randle. It’ll be for a younger PF that can shoot and grow on the ANT timeline and hopefully a bit more.

Randle is a mediocre, expensive, and not on ANT’s timeline. But most importantly, he’s a poor shooter (outside one outlier season). Unless we’re moving Rudy too, the PF has to at least shooter upside.

If ANT has to try to drive into the paint with both Randle’s and Rudy’s (and maybe McDaniel’s if he doesn’t improve) guys just standing there, he will ask out sooner than any of us think.

[Klomp]

A-Rod mentioned that Towns had 17 technical fouls last season and 0 this season, also Towns showed extreme dedication and maturity in recovering from injury and keeping himself in excellent physical shape. This is basically the best version of Towns. Can Towns improve even more?

I think this is a very good analysis. Remember how excited the Warriors and their fan base were about Andrew Wiggins in that title run. And now they are realizing that it was probably the best he will ever be.

[Klomp]

We may trade KAT but it won’t be for a player like Randle. It’ll be for a younger PF that can shoot and grow on the ANT timeline and hopefully a bit more.

Randle is a mediocre, expensive, and not on ANT’s timeline. But most importantly, he’s a poor shooter (outside one outlier season). Unless we’re moving Rudy too, the PF has to at least shooter upside.

If ANT has to try to drive into the paint with both Randle’s and Rudy’s (and maybe McDaniel’s if he doesn’t improve) guys just standing there, he will ask out sooner than any of us think.

I think a trade would likely bring us someone younger, but it might not be a power forward as Towns' direct replacement. It's all about where the value in each offer comes through.

I don't think this trade concept would work without a third team, but one guy who I think would provide us a Target-value Towns could be Jerami Grant. I know everyone talks about him valuing individual role/shots over team success, but that was when he was essentially in a Naz Reid role off the bench for Denver. A lot of people expected Reid to do the same thing, so I'm not sure he should be faulted for that when it's essentially human nature.

[shangrila]

Towns has been excellent in the first six games of the playoffs, especially with ridiculously hard defensive assignments and coming back from injury early.

But it doesn’t take more than two losses for people to ignore that, and jump back to “KAT sucks in the playoffs!”

For the record, in 24 Playoff Games, Towns is .487 FG%, .413 3P%, .805 FT%, 10.6 RPG, 2.3 APG, 18.7 PPG

He needs to score more, and stay out of foul trouble, he is payed like a superstar he needs to show why.

To add to this; a guy like KAT cannot have a game like game 4.

If you consider yourself the greatest shooting big man of all time, if there's even a hint that you should be in conversations with the likes of Jokic, if you're paid like one of the top 10 players in the league, under no circumstances can you go 5-18 in a game like that.

Obviously the blame for that game isn't solely on him and is more or less shared equally between everyone outside of Ant, but that game is ultimately the exclamation point at the end of the argument for why KAT isn't a superstar.

[younggunsmn]

Julius Randle is hot garbage.
He is PF D-Lo.
The Knicks are SO much better without him.

[younggunsmn]

Towns has been excellent in the first six games of the playoffs, especially with ridiculously hard defensive assignments and coming back from injury early.

But it doesn’t take more than two losses for people to ignore that, and jump back to “KAT sucks in the playoffs!”

For the record, in 24 Playoff Games, Towns is .487 FG%, .413 3P%, .805 FT%, 10.6 RPG, 2.3 APG, 18.7 PPG

He needs to score more, and stay out of foul trouble, he is payed like a superstar he needs to show why.

To add to this; a guy like KAT cannot have a game like game 4.

If you consider yourself the greatest shooting big man of all time, if there's even a hint that you should be in conversations with the likes of Jokic, if you're paid like one of the top 10 players in the league, under no circumstances can you go 5-18 in a game like that.

Obviously the blame for that game isn't solely on him and is more or less shared equally between everyone outside of Ant, but that game is ultimately the exclamation point at the end of the argument for why KAT isn't a superstar.

KAT went 5/18 and the 2 opposing big men went 26/38.
Our starting frontcourt completely **** the bed while Ant and Mike dominated their backcourt.

It was a total system failure from our 2 tallest players, offense and defense.

Playoff KAT isn't just not a superstar, he's not even good.

We need to be paying extra special attention to who the guys are who play well when the lights are brightest and the pressure the highest, because those are the guys you should be building your team around.

We know for sure Ant is one of those guys.
Will anybody join him?

[Neeva]

Always make sure going forward if wolves are paying a player a super max that he needs to be a legit star both in regular season and the playoffs!!

[Klomp]

We need to be paying extra special attention to who the guys are who play well when the lights are brightest and the pressure the highest, because those are the guys you should be building your team around.

Agreed

Watch on YouTube

[m2002brian]

Jaden may be gone before Kat

High level defense with “offensive upside”
Some GM will overpay for the raw talent alone.

[karch34]

I think Jaden is more on the expected development path than the accelerated one Ant's on. Possible but I don't see them trading him.

[BlacJacMac]

I think Jaden is more on the expected development path than the accelerated one Ant's on. Possible but I don't see them trading him.

Its just frustrating that he took such a large step back this year.

[Guidus88]

We may trade KAT but it won’t be for a player like Randle. It’ll be for a younger PF that can shoot and grow on the ANT timeline and hopefully a bit more.

Randle is a mediocre, expensive, and not on ANT’s timeline. But most importantly, he’s a poor shooter (outside one outlier season). Unless we’re moving Rudy too, the PF has to at least shooter upside.

If ANT has to try to drive into the paint with both Randle’s and Rudy’s (and maybe McDaniel’s if he doesn’t improve) guys just standing there, he will ask out sooner than any of us think.

I think a trade would likely bring us someone younger, but it might not be a power forward as Towns' direct replacement. It's all about where the value in each offer comes through.

I don't think this trade concept would work without a third team, but one guy who I think would provide us a Target-value Towns could be Jerami Grant. I know everyone talks about him valuing individual role/shots over team success, but that was when he was essentially in a Naz Reid role off the bench for Denver. A lot of people expected Reid to do the same thing, so I'm not sure he should be faulted for that when it's essentially human nature.

Who are you thinking about? Evan Mobley?

[Klomp]

Is there a Leonard-to-Toronto trade possibility out there for us to take advantage?