Fresh Take Sports Blog

Carolina Panthers:

Coming off of one of their strongest seasons in nearly half a decade, the Carolina Panthers had a lot of optimism going into the offseason. The Panthers were never very deep at WR, but they could also get things done when needed. That type of resilience might not be there after just about all of the 2013 Panther WRs are gone. They’ve added Florida State WR Kelvin Benjamin in the 1st round of the NFL Draft, but have been forced to stick to the bargain bin WRs such as Jason Avant, Jerricho Cotchery, and Tiquan Underwood (The best flat top in sports outside of Norris Cole). The one addition that is going unnoticed for the Panthers was the addition of TE Ed Dickson. Though he’d been underperforming since he was drafted by the Baltimore Ravens in 2010, he’s a decent enough buy low candidate to warrant a shot to play in two TE sets and also brings us to the other defining issue of the Panthers’ offseason. With LT Jordan Gross and LG Travelle Wharton both not returning to the team, the Panthers the 3rd ranked LT and 5th best LG in the NFL (According to PFF). They are trying to replace Gross with former RT Byron Bell (-2.8 grading by PFF) and Wharton with Amini Silatolu (4.3 grading). Bell and Silatolu have a lot to prove in training camps. Another area to keep an eye on during training camps and preseason will be the secondary where the Panthers lost CB Captain Munnerlyn and S Mike Mitchell. Overall, the Panthers are trying to keep cap flexibility for extensions of QB Cam Newton and MLB Luke Kuechly which explains the bargain bin WR replacements and internal options at OL, but doesn’t brim with a lot of optimism for the upcoming season for Newton to be impactful in the passing game with retreads at WR catching his passes and replacement level fill-ins on the OL pass blocking for him.

Dallas Cowboys:

I try to keep my Dallas Cowboy rants to at least only once or twice a season. Owner Jerry Jones might be the worst owner in American sports and goes all the way back to the 1990’s when Jimmy Johnson was the head coach. Jones’ jealous of Johnson’s talent accumulation and searching for his spot in the limelight has brought GM Jerry Jones into the bad GM/Owners lore with the likes of Mike Brown (Though he’s been much better the last five years in drafting). Jones and Brown both have done fairly good jobs of scouting/drafting for their teams. The big difference between the two is the money that Jones is willing to spend to make the Cowboys competitive. One of my favorite sports adages is that you can’t buy you championships (Well, not in football at least. *Looks at the Miami Heat and New York Yankees). The Cowboys have given out some of the most confusing extensions to middling talent after one or two good-to-great seasons. The last few seasons have been tremendously effected by the aftermath of those contracts with the Cowboys’ trying to restructure long term contracts into bonuses and delaying the enviable for just one more year of mediocrity. Sooner or later, the Cowboys are going to have to bite the bullet and just field the equivalent of the 2013 Dallas Cowboy defense at just about every position (Cap Hell) just to fix their long term cap situation. Well, I feel better now. This should get me to at least midseason before I need another Cowboys rant. All in all, the Cowboys’ offseason is just a symptom of long term mismanagement. This offseason they cut LB DeMarcus Ware, easily their best defensive player with a large cap hit and a long term contract, while fielding an even worse defense for this upcoming season. The constant bright spot for the Cowboys over the last five years is still the offense, which got just a little better this offseason with the drafting of G Zach Martin in the 1st round of the NFL Draft. The Cowboys might have one of the best OLs in the NFL and makes the QB Tony Romo/ HB DeMarco Murray that much more dangerous.  

Tennessee Titans:

One note I keep running into when I read about the 2014 Tennessee Titans is that it’s a bunch of no-name players on a team with zero star power. The Oakland A’s have won a lot in the last decade with no-name teams with zero star power. All that matters is that a team is talented and has a scheme that utilizes that talent properly. The Titans had a good, but not great draft nabbing T Taylor Lewan and RB Bishop Sankey (My OROY) with their first two draft picks in the NFL Draft. Lewan makes a great OL even better and Sankey is just the change from RB Chris Johnson (WAAAAAAY too high expectations after his 2,000 yard rushing season) that the Titans need. The addition of DC Ray Horton (A favorite of mine) makes this defense even more dominant than it already was last season (8th overall according to PFF). The area to keep an eye on would be the secondary and how they replace CB Alterraun Verner. Overall, the defense is still in great shape with DL Jurrell Casey, CB Jason McCourty, and DL Derrick Morgan. The transition to more of a 3-4 defense is the biggest concern for the defense outside of the secondary. The offense is another story. HC Ken Whisenhunt likes his QBs to be tall, strong armed, and pocket passers. None of those qualities are QB Jake Locker. Locker looked good while healthy, but he’s hardly ever health enough to play half the games in the season (Coming from a UW fan, this kills me). You can criticize Locker’s accuracy or ability to stay healthy, but he gives everything he has to win the game for his team. If the OL can improve their pass blocking (Looking for comeback seasons from Chance Warmack and new RT Michael Oher) then Locker can have a good season with the talented Titans’ WRs. I’m looking for big things from WR Kendall Wright and WR Justin Hunter (He’s still raw, but he’s just so tall and so quick). When Locker gets hurt (He will), backup QB Charlie “Clipboard Jesus” Whitehurst will be next in; He has all of the qualities that Whisenhunt covets even the lack of any accuracy. He should be every Titans fan’s worst fears. The biggest reason that the Titans are in the offseason loser’s list is the hiring of HC Ken Whisenhunt. For a team that doesn’t have an established QB and that needs to rely on the running game, he’s going to force his system on the team. Whisenhunt will want a 60-40 or 70-30 pass to run ratio, which with having Locker and Whitehurst as the top two QBs on the depth chart makes me very nervous;  Neither QB is (or should try to be) gunslingers like Kurt Warner or Brett Favre. This team has the chance to have an outside chance at being in the playoffs this season if everything goes right, but will need to rely on the defense and hopefully more running game than Whisenhunt’s reputation would allow.

Honorable Mention: Johnny Manziel Haters

Photo Credit: Espn.com 

The Jacksonville Jaguars are pretty terrible in a lot of different ways as a franchise. They’re in one of the smallest markets, the 2nd lowest valued franchise as ranked by Forbes, and have one of the lowest attendance averages n the NFL. Being one of the worst franchises gives the Jags owner Shad Khan lots of breathing room in terms of what he can try in order to fix attendance, revenue, or the overall team quality (All reasons why I chose to write about the Jaguars for this upcoming season for First Stop Fantasy).

Shad Khan is well known for the other team that he owns, Fullham F.C., which is a boon to one of the strategies that the Jaguars and the NFL are trying. The NFL has set about trying to expand the game globally through the Buffalo Bills hosting games in Toronto, the 49ers & Rams having played games in Mexico City, and the NFL has its yearly game played in London. For a franchise that has terrible attendance and a poorly constructed team, playing in London for a captive audience thirsting for any type of live NFL game is a great way of augmenting your revenue streams. During the Jaguars’ State of the Franchise presentation, revenue was down by 18%, but because of the London game they broke about even. With that one London game, the Jaguars also became the 9th most popular NFL team in United Kingdom as well as increased the domestic endorsements by 14% and overall by 30%. For a franchise with a limited population to tap into for a fanbase, this is an enormous resource. The Jaguars have signed an agreement to play a London game or games for the next 4 years.

The Jaguars are also looking into make EverBank Field into a more tourist driven destination with the addition of 2 state of the art jumbo screens to help improve the fan experience. The Jaguars are also sticking with their ticket pricing levels, which are still the lowest in the NFL. Jags President Mark Lamping says that the ticket pricing is “Unsustainable…. We can’t follow the playbook of every NFL team, because our challenges are different than every other NFL market”. The low ticket revenue and the low cost of the players help with keeping this model sustainable in the present.

Photo Credit: Geewall.com

1st Round, 6th Overall—T Jake Matthews:

Consider me one of the few people that are glad the Atlanta Falcons selected LT Jake Matthews from Texas A&M with the 6th overall pick. There were many rumors before the draft about the Falcons trying to trade with the Houston Texans for the 1st overall pick to draft Jadeveon Clowney. The price to make that trade would’ve been too steep even for a once in a generation talent like Clowney.

The Falcons hope that Matthews is the solution to one of their biggest problems: the OL. Matthews isn’t the sexiest of picks even by OL standards. He’s not the athletic freak that is Greg Robinson and he wasn’t even the clear cut second best tackle. Many draft pundits didn’t think there was much difference between Matthews and Michigan T Taylor Lewan. Matthews biggest selling point is that he was a 4-year starter for the Aggies and his deep NFL football linage from his father, Hall of Famer Bruce Matthews. Even with some perceived negatives, Matthews is a great pick for the Falcons. Matthews has the highest floor of the top tackles in the draft this year. He might not have the highest of ceilings, but he can start from Day 1. Moving Sam Baker over to RT would be the best change for the team and finding some consistency from the OL. In 2013, the Falcons’ OL was 23rd in WPA and 19th EPA according to Advance Football Analytics. Matt Ryan was also pressured about 43% of his drop backs, sacked about 23% of those drop backs (sacked 43 times last season), and was the most pressured QB on passes. For a team that couldn’t run the ball at all successfully last season struggling to pass protect compounded the offensive issues. Just imagine just how poorly the Falcons could’ve been if they didn’t have Matt Ryan. Matthews can bring the experience of a 4-year starter who blocked for probably one of the hardest people to pass block for, Johnny Manziel.

With the addition of Mike Tice and a switch to a zone blocking scheme, I’m not completely sure just how Matthews fits into that scheme. He isn’t athletic, but is nimble for someone his size (Zone blocking schemes like smaller, quicker OL). The Falcons can say that got better today with the addition of Jake Matthews and by the fact that they didn’t mortgage future drafts by trading up in the draft makes this draft a success so far.

2nd, 37th Overall—DT Ra’Shede Hageman:

Just about any DL or defensive player would’ve been a good pick for the Falcons. Hageman is a specimen at the DT position. At 6’5”, 310lbs, he’s a stud. He’s very agile for his size and is a plus versus the pass/run.  Hageman has had some run-ins with the law as well as a very rough childhood, but with a veteran team like the Falcons he should be able to keep focused and successful. He has the potential to be one of the best DL players taken in this draft.

3rd Round, 68th overall—S Dez Southward:

This wasn’t my favorite pick for the Falcons. He plays a position that isn’t a huge need (starter William Moore is firmly entrenched at FS), but he is such an explosive athlete showing good range and coverage ability that this pick has decent value.  Southward shouldn’t be starting for the Falcons if everything goes according to plan, but he should be a good backup at SS or on special teams.

 4th Round, 103rd overall—RB Devonta Freeman:

I’ve seen him a bit with all of the Florida State games that were nationally televised this year. He’s not a special physically (5’8”, 206lbs & 4.58 40-yard), but he can play the RB position. He’s durable (didn’t miss a game at Florida State) and he can be a very solid 2nd string or 3rd down RB. He can do just about everything well, but nothing is outstanding.

4th Round, 139th Overall—OLB Prince Shembo:

Shembo defines exactly what the Falcons seem to be going for in this draft: Players that won’t lose games for them, but won’t be the one making the touchdown saving interception or game winning touchdown. Shembo is an average athlete, strong work-ethic, and didn’t miss any games while he was at Notre Dame. He’s a good tackler with good range which would play well on 3rd downs as well.

 5th Round, 147th Overall-- CB Ricardo Allen:

Allen continues the Falcon’s “Good football player, but average athlete” drafting philosophy. Allen is good in coverage and versus the run though he tends to gamble on tackles at times. He’s small even for a CB (5’9”, 187lbs), but was extremely productive in his 4 years at Purdue with 13 INTs.

5th Round, 168th Overall—OLB Marquis Spruill:

Physically, Spruill is just about the top of the Falcons draft class. He has good speed, a lean/muscular body, and started all 51 games he played at Syracuse. Spruill true specialty comes from his ability to play close to the line, his vicious hitting ability, and his strong work ethic. He could be a good player if he develops more of an overall game rather than just as a pass rusher.

7th Round, 253rd Overall—ILB Yawin Smallwood:

Smallwood was exceptionally productive at his time at Connecticut (5 Forced fumbles, 3 Fumble Recovered, 16 Passes deflected, and 2 INT). That ends just about any positive about Smallwood. Not good in coverage, versus the run, or tackling. His productivity was against lesser competition. He projects as more of a special teamer and would be lucky to be anything more than that.

7th Round, 255th Overall—OLB Tyler Starr:

Productive and with a strong work ethic, Starr looks to be a special teamer and possibly a pass rush specialist as a ceiling. He has good size (6’4”, 250lbs) , but was extremely slow in his 40 yard dash (4.95) which hinders a lot of his upside.

  Overall, I was kind of disappointed in the Falcons’ draft. I judge a great draft to have at least 3-4 immediate starters or Pro Bowlers. This group doesn't have a whole lot of upside or immediate starters from this draft other than Matthews,  Hageman or possibly Southward. I’m usually a fan of Thomas Dimitroff’s drafts and his ability to find good players, but this draft might just be one of his worst so far as a GM.

  Photo Credit: gettyimages.com

Consider me one of the few people that are glad the Atlanta Falcons selected LT Jake Matthews from Texas A&M with the 6th overall pick. There were many rumors before the draft about the Falcons trying to trade with the Houston Texans for the 1st overall pick to draft Jadeveon Clowney. The price to make that trade would’ve been too steep even for a once in a generation talent like Clowney.

The Falcons hope that Matthews is the solution to one of their biggest problems: the OL. Matthews isn’t the sexiest of picks even by OL standards. He’s not the athletic freak that is Greg Robinson and he wasn’t even the clear cut second best tackle. Many draft pundits didn’t think there was much difference between Matthews and Michigan T Taylor Lewan. Matthews biggest selling point is that he was a 4-year starter for the Aggies and his deep NFL football linage from his father, Hall of Famer Bruce Matthews. Even with some perceived negatives, Matthews is a great pick for the Falcons. Matthews has the highest floor of the top tackles in the draft this year. He might not have the highest of ceilings, but he can start from Day 1. Moving Sam Baker over to RT would be the best change for the team and finding some consistency from the OL. In 2013, the Falcons’ OL was 23rd in WPA and 19th EPA according to Advance Football Analytics. Matt Ryan was also pressured about 43% of his drop backs, sacked about 23% of those drop backs (sacked 43 times last season), and was the most pressured QB on passes. For a team that couldn’t run the ball at all successfully last season struggling to pass protect compounded the offensive issues. Just imagine just how poorly the Falcons could’ve been if they didn’t have Matt Ryan. Matthews can bring the experience of a 4-year starter who blocked for probably one of the hardest people to pass block for, Johnny Manziel.

With the addition of Mike Tice and a switch to a zone blocking scheme, I’m not completely sure just how Matthews fits into that scheme. He isn’t athletic, but is nimble for someone his size (Zone blocking schemes like smaller, quicker OL). The Falcons can say that got better today with the addition of Jake Matthews and by the fact that they didn’t mortgage future drafts by trading up in the draft makes this draft a success so far.

This is just a little something that I wrote as a sample for a sports blog that I'm interested in writing for. It's a list of my favorite Jaguar signings from the offseason. Enjoy!

The one consistent thing about the Jacksonville Jaguars the last couple seasons is how consistently bad they’ve been. From Special Teams to the defense, take your pick and the Jaguars were probably pretty terrible. Last season, there were some signs of life with David Caldwell taking over as General Manager and Gus Bradley coming down from Seattle to become the Head Coach. This offseason was the next step in GM David Caldwell’s turnaround and things are starting to look brighter for the Jaguars.

I’ll only focus on a small group of the signings that have happened for the Jags over the offseason, but overall, I’ve been extremely impressed with their financial restraint and their selections of free agents.

TOBY GERHART: This was my favorite signing for the Jaguars. They spent a little over market value for Gerhart (3yrs @ $10.5 million with $4.5 million guaranteed), but was extremely productive in his limited carries. Gerhart was the 2009 runner up for the Heisman Trophy he holds the Stanford records for most rushing yards in a season (1,871), most touchdowns in a season (28), and most touchdowns in a career (44). According to Football Outsiders, Gerhart would’ve been the 16th best RB in the league last year if he had reached the 100 rush attempts sample size and ranked just ahead of Chris Johnson and Danny Woodhead. Advanced Football Stats ranked Gerhart as the 12st best RB based on Win Probability Added/Play and 9th in Expected Points Added/Play. All this means that he was extremely productive in his limited touches. With a RB of Gerhart’s size, he’s hard to tackle as well as punishing in the way that he runs.

RED BRYANT/CHRIS CLEMONS: I’m lumping the two Seahawks players together mostly for the fact that they give the Jaguars a lot of similar features. Gus Bradley was the defensive coordinator for the Seahawks (2009-2012) and runs a very similar aggressive 4-3 defense with the Jaguars which utilizes the same Leo position and run blocking DE as the Seahawks have continue to use. Clemons (4ys @ $18 Million) was a bit of an overpay based on his productivity the last two seasons, but it seems that his familiarity with the defense and the comfort level with Gus Bradley were keys as well as his productivity in 2009-2011 (5th best DE in both WPA & EPA for Advanced Football Stats). Red Bryant brings a lot of the same thing (familiarity with the defense/ Gus Bradley) except that his contract is a steal for the Jaguars. Bryant’s 4ys @ $19 million is a bit of a steal since it’s guaranteed for $5.255 Million. Bryant was the 15th rank DE by Pro Football Focus. Bryant’s strength lies in his run stopping ability mainly since he has a hard time of blitzing the QB, which makes him the perfect player for Bradley’s 4-3 defense which needs a run stopping DE opposite of the LEO.

CHAD HENNE: There isn’t much to say about the signing (2yrs @ $8 million) other than the fact that Henne isn’t Blaine Gabbert and that Henne would be a great backup on a playoff or Super Bowl team. He’s good enough not to lose games (Completed 60.6% of his attempts, compiling 3,241 passing yards and 13 touchdowns to go along with his 14 interceptions), but he won’t win many for the Jaguars and given the status of the Jaguars, that’s a good thing.

CAP FLEXIBILITY/ CONTRACT STRUCTURES: Other than the Gerhart signing, my favorite aspect of the Jaguars offseason was how they structured a lot of the contracts. Many of the contracts aren’t guaranteed for much money and are heavy in performance based bonuses as well as early outs in the contracts. An example of this would be Red Bryant’s contract which is guaranteed for $5.225 million. Bryant, as well as Chris Clemons, has had a hard time fighting off the injury bug, but has been extremely productive when on the field.

Another benefit of the pay-for-performance contract structures would be that it keeps the Jaguars open in the future to spend some of the money they’re saving as well as not being tied down to paying older players on long term contracts. Football isn’t like the NBA or MLB where you can buy your way into contention. A lot of teams make this mistake after trying to take the long term team building approach (….. Oakland Raiders…..), but the Jaguars, who don’t have a devoted fan base like the Raiders, can take the long term approach since they don’t have the same kind of expectations. The added bonus is that the Jaguars can try different ways of building a team by being innovative and creative in the way they scout, sign, or train their players.

Though I don’t expect the Jaguars to be in the playoff hunt, I do expect them to be more competitive then past season (helps that Blaine Gabbert is gone). The Jaguars approach of using free agency to create depth rather than signing expensive impact players shows the type of patience and rational thinking that the Jaguars ownership and front office have come to have since David Caldwell and Gus Bradley started last season.

                 As of today, the Portland Trail Blazers are 33-13 and the 2nd seed in the Western Conference. The Blazers didn’t win 33 games last year. The 2012-2013 Blazers were a team that wasn’t expected to do anything close to making the playoffs. With a terrible bench (both defensively and offensively which is why the bench averaged 13.3 mins per game), the starters played heavy minutes and kept the Blazers in most games. While the 2013-2014 Blazers weren’t expected to be much more than the 8th seed in the playoffs, this Blazers’ team has become deeper on the bench and become a better overall offensive team (leading the league in points per game).

While expectations were low for Portland this season, the opposite was expected in Brooklyn. With a team with the largest payroll in the NBA and filled with veterans, the Nets have fizzled for half of the 2013-2014 season. Rookie head coach Jason Kidd has had his fair share of experience the rookie HC learning curve added on to the fact that he has never coached before in his career. Though the Nets have struggled early on in the season, they still are projected to make the playoffs and are currently the 7th seed.

The common theme between these two teams is that they’re both in the hunt to win an NBA Championship and with that comes making trades at the trade deadline. The Trail Blazers may have the best offense in the NBA, but they have one of the worst defenses. The addition of Robin Lopez has added some defensive rim protection, but they still have poor midrange and 3 point line defense. The Nets have been an overall average team until they started tweaking their player rotations. Then, Enter the Toronto Raptors and the Atlanta Hawks. Both teams are overachieving this season based on their preseason projections. The Raptors helped themselves by trading the brick king, offensive black hole that is Rudy Gay to the Sacramento Kings for a bunch of role players and solid bench depth. With Gay gone, the offense and defense has improved to the point that the Raptors have the 7th best defense in the NBA. Meanwhile, the Hawks have been playing well through the first two months of the season until Al Horford aggravated his pectoral injury from last season and are expected to miss the rest of the season.

The Raptors and Hawks are both franchises that stuck in the NBA version of purgatory; Too good to be in true contention for the NBA Championship, but not bad enough to take advantage of the draft lottery. That point leads us to the fake trade I’ve engineered.

As of this moment, here’s the breakdown of how these four teams are projected to finish the season according to baseketballreference.com

All of the teams are projected to make the playoffs with the Raptors/Hawks being the 3rd and 4th seeds and the Blazers/Nets being the 4th and 7th seeds. In the proposed trade, the Blazers would add 5 wins and the Nets would add 4 wins. To the added bonus of the Nets, two of the teams ahead of them would also drop out of contentions. The Nets main goal in this trade is to avoid either the Pacers or the Heat.  Getting the 5th or 6th seed would accomplish that. The Blazers would move up to the 2nd seed in the West and would get to play an easier opponent and solidify their bench.

In this proposed four team trade, the Blazers would receive Paul Milsap from the Atlanta Hawks, the Hawks would receive Meyers Leonard and Victor Claver plus the Nets 2014 1st Round pick, the Nets would receive Kyle Lowry from the Raptors/ Will Barton from the Blazers, and the Raptors would receive Jason Terry from the Nets/ CJ McCollum from the Blazers and the Blazers 2015 1st Round pick (Top 5 protected). Let’s dive into this trade!

Let’s start with the Blazers. Portland receives Paul Milsap, one of the most underrated big men in the NBA. Milsap signed with the Hawks over the last offseason for what was widely pointed out to be a huge discount for the Hawks signing at 2 years for $19 Million. Many NBA analysts projected something more in line with what Al Jefferson, Milsap’s former Utah Jazz teammate, received from the Charlotte Bobcats. Jefferson signed for 3 years for $41 Million. Milsap’s deal makes him a very nice trade asset for a playoff team such as Portland.

Milsap has long been a stat guys’ type of player since college: Highly efficient, great offensive player who can play inside or drift out to shot 3’s, great defensive rebounder and creates turnovers with a high number of steals. Milsap is a bit undersized for a PF, but it rarely affects his play if he’s playing with a big center.

Portland has had its issues on defense mainly with mid ranged and 3 point shots. Milsap wouldn’t defend 3’s overly well, but he can help with mid ranged shots with good shot blocking and steal skills. Ideally, the Blazers would try to trade for someone who can has very good on the ball defense and can shoot 3’s well, such as SG Thabo Sefolosha, SG CJ Miles or SG Andre Iguodala, but many of those types of players are already on playoff teams or would require an even higher price than the Blazers would pay for Milsap.

The Blazers are last in the league in opponent turnovers and with the addition of Paul Milsap, 12th overall in steals per game in the NBA, would help give the defense more opportunities to score. The contributions from adding a player of Milsap’s caliber on defense is even bigger since the Blazers have the offense that has the least amount of turnovers.

However, there are a couple issues with adding Milsap to the Blazers. Firstly, he couldn’t play with the starters since LaMarcus Aldridge plays a very similar style of game and Milsap’s lack of size would make him a poor fit to start at center over Robin Lopez. If Portland went to a smaller lineup with Aldridge at center, Milsap has diversified his game enough to play a stretch PF or SF with his ability to do catch & shoot from the 3 point line. Secondly, the minutes that Milsap would receive would need to be something akin to a 6th man role off the bench, which is already occupied by Mo Williams. However, this issue can be fixed with the departures of Leonard, McCollum, Claver, and Barton.

Here are the Blazers and Milsap’s shot charts. Milsap doesn’t add much inside, but he has a slightly better corner 3 shot, can help out around the top of the key and can drive the the basket well.

In the trade, the Blazers would lose CJ McCollum, Victor Claver, Meyers Leonard, and Will Barton. Rotation wise, Portland is only really losing McCollum and Leonard as Claver and Barton hardly have played this season. They’re all good young players, but with the Blazers going “All In” for a championship this season they have no room on a bench that needs to add overall better players with established skills.

Kevin Pelton of ESPN NBA’s Per Diem blog has created a Wins Above Replacement Projection (WARP) system that projects the first five years of a players career in the NBA based on his stats from college. The projections (http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/draft2013/story/_/page/PerDiem-130625/how-warp-projections-fared/refresh/true) have proven to be a pretty good way of seeing which players are worth drafting and where they should be picked in the draft.  Of the Blazers prospects that are being traded, only CJ McCollum is projected to be impactful in his first five seasons as he was projected to be 5th best prospect from the 2012-2013 draft (http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/draft2013/story/_/page/PerDiem-130624/ranking-prospects-warp). This isn’t to say that none of the other guys could be useful in the future, but are good prospects based on their physical tools (Leonard & Barton) or their past overseas performances (Claver). McCullum is the prize that gets the Raptors mainly involved in this trade other than the 1st round pick from the Blazers.  McCullum was one of the most efficient players in college basketball for the 2012-2013 season being the 3rd most efficient player behind the likes of Anthony Davis and Damian Lillard. He was injured for a portion of the following season and has taken some time this season, in the NBA, to get completely healthy. Jason Terry is the price that Toronto has to also pay to receive the 1st round pick plus McCollum, which is in line with previous trade rumors that the Raptors have had for a Kyle Lowry trade proposals with the Knicks.

Delving deeper into the trade, we have the Brooklyn Nets. The Nets receive Kyle Lowry and Will Barton while giving up Jason Terry plus a 2015 1st round pick to Atlanta. Brooklyn has been chasing Lowry all season in hopes of upgrading their PG position. With Deron Williams suffering from injuries consistently this season, having a starting-caliber backup PG is valuable to the Nets. Lowry can then contribute even more than just that too since he is one of the best two-way PGs in the league.

He is a great distributor (something the Nets badly need with mainly Williams as the only player on the Nets to create for themselves and the team), can drive toward the basket, great with steals, and is an asset with catch & shoot (2nd in the NBA).  This is an added boon for the Nets since they can play both Lowry and Deron together in a smaller lineup, which they tried to do this year with mixed results.  For this trade to really benefit the Nets, they’re going to need to have Andray Blatche continuing to play at the high level he has been playing during the month of January. The better interior defense and more efficient offense that Blatche brings, the only problem Brooklyn needs to address is on offense in the back court. Will Barton, the other half of their returns, is basically included in the trade for salary purposes, but Brooklyn can always use him since they need more youth, being one of the oldest rosters in the NBA.

The stories for Toronto and Atlanta are very similar; neither team wants to be in the playoffs and in the long term it’s better for them to be bad this season in order to pick higher in the draft. In order for this trade to be plausible, they both need to decide to tank. Both currently have a 99% probability of making the playoffs as currently constructed. The nine wins that Toronto would lose would still have them projected to make the playoffs, but I would expect them to make another trade to make them bad enough for the higher end of the draft lottery. Though losing Lowry could have a larger effect given that he leads the Raptors with a 7.3 Win Share. The second largest win share on the Raptors is DeMar DeRozan with 4.3 Win Share. Win Share is basically just what it sounds like. Win Share calculates the number of wins (positive or negative) a player is worth out of the number of wins said team has won. Tanking is much easier for Atlanta since two of their best players are gone (Milsap to Portland and Horford hurt for the season). 

Atlanta already has a draft pick option with the Nets from the Joe Johnson trade for2014 and 2015.

Making the trade straight up for the 2015 1st round pick instead of the option to switch would be something that Atlanta would do especially if they decide they’re tanking this season.

Portland owes Charlotte a 1st round pick in the next couple of seasons, but it’s Top 12 protected so they’ll end up trading the 2014 1st round pick this season. Their 2015 1st round pick can be protected as Top 20 and then protected for Top 5 for 2016 since it’s against the “Ted Stepien Rule” where teams can’t trade 1st round picks in consecutive years.

Portland’s picks owed to teams in the next couple of seasons.

  The basis for this trade heavily relies upon the Raptors and Hawks to decide to tank. Tanking is never easy on a franchise since losing on purpose is a hard concept to understand in the sporting world where wining in is paramount.  With basically everyone in the Eastern Conference tanking (or sadly just terribly constructed) this season, losing isn’t an easy process. There is projected to be at least 3 teams with sub-.500 records in the playoffs in the Eastern Conference.

Billy Beane, the GM for the Oakland A’s, has a saying about how he hates making deals around the trade deadline because it makes intelligent men make rash and terribly nearsighted decisions. For all parties involved, this trade is practical and essential to them accomplishing their goals. Portland doesn’t lose much in the form of young players not playing many minutes, but gain efficient/productive big off the bench.  Brooklyn continues to mortgage their future. In baseball, they have what is called a “Win Curve” (http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/win-curves-and-player-pricing/) which basically is a team is willing to spend or trade whatever assets they have when they closer to winning a championship. Brooklyn is near the top of the curve and need to do whatever they can to justify the already record Luxury Tax payment for this season ($80 Million). Portland is on the upper end of the “Win Curve” too, but isn’t so far buried in the Luxury Tax or lacking 1st/ 2nd round picks to be as desperate as the Nets. Atlanta and Toronto are completely focused on the future and talent accumulation. Whatever the cost, in the short or long term, all of these teams are focused on winning a championship. 

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