From Luol to Love - Trade Season

Halfway through 2014's first month, the NBA regular season's inching through a relative lull; that annual stretch after the early-season excitement, just before the All-Star break, where plenty of focus shifts to the trade wire. Teams like the Spurs and Heat are pacing themselves, others are waiting to heal up, and a good portion of the League is still trying to figure out whether they should be winning games. The season's most exciting stretch won't truly begin until after the Trade Deadline and ensuing (or in Andrew Bynum's case preceding) waived-player frenzy.

Look for next month's Deadline to be much more aggressive than last year's anti-climactic dud. Not only are a few intriguing players being openly shopped around, but with several teams in You Should Probably Trade Your Star Mode, the potential for big names to shift the NBA's landscape along with area codes is very viable. Hell, if Luol Deng can be had for cap relief and a bunch of non-lottery picks, it might be open season.

- The Deng trade was an unfortunate means to an end for the Bulls, whose season was destroyed along with Derrick Rose's meniscus, and were owned by someone too cheap to give a two-way All-Star the same kind of money as Carlos Boozer. So instead, with Deng almost surely bolting in the summer, the Bulls cashed him in for a chance to dodge the Repeater Tax and get a head start on the rebuild.

I don't think I'm stretching much here when I say the Bulls could've, and should've, got more out of this deal. Had they waited closer to the deadline, this offer from the Cavs - who are kind of up Shit's Creek right now - would've still been there, and more than likely trounced by a team looking to do more than transplant Deng for a few months, totally unsure if he'll re-sign.

Chicago screwed themselves twice (well, three times if you count the Boozer signing) by souring Luol, and then panic-trading him too quickly for returns that are unlikely to ever equate what Deng brought to the table.

- The late picks/swap rights Chicago got back for Deng call to mind an element of analysis that I've found usually missing from NBA coverage in this era of advanced metrics, especially amid the Tank Brigade, and with all the rage about the CBA, small market teams, Moneyball, Moreyball and everything else:

Draft Picks and Cap Space need to be valued within the context of the GMs that wield them, and very seldom is this discussed viably as a catalyst in trades. Not all tools are equal in different hands, and the weight these things carry in trades seems to be very general.

Take for example, the Oklahoma City Thunder. They got lucky to land Durant, but have also nailed every pick under Sam Presti, from board-toppers like James Harden and Russell Westbrook, to late-first-round steals Reggie Jackson and Serge Ibaka. They've built a top-tier team almost exclusively from the Draft, especially considering they've gotten the worse end of their biggest trades.

Then there's the contrast, say the Immortal David Kahn, or even former Raptors GM Bryan Colangelo, who has enough connections and reputation-bloating that he'll likely be back in a front office at some point. Colangelo scored relative hits with DeMar DeRozan and Jonas Valanciunas, but reached for Andrea Bargnani first overall (when this guy was the likely top pick), drafted Roy Hibbert and immediately traded him, and took Terrence Ross when Andre Drummond had inexplicably slid into his lap. All during an era where Toronto was crying for any kind of interior presence.

Put simply: Some teams are much better than others at drafting, and this has to be kept in mind when evaluating every transaction. A "Presti Pick" is much different from a "Jordan Pick". Lottery Picks aren't infallible, and even a late selection is worth a lot more, say, to the Spurs, than it would be to most franchises. (Basically, if you trade any draft pick to the Spurs, you're a moron).

This goes even more so for Cap Space, which is a far more calculated gamble, as teams have much better concepts of a player's value, and aren't relying on ping-pong balls to make or break them. Again, this measure should be mostly appraised by a front office's ability to pick the right players, and in some cases the team's location and reputation.

The room to maneuver and sign free agents is worth a lot more to crafty grinder with a plan like Daryl Morey or Masai Ujiri, than to someone like Joe Dumars - who's now twice tried to re-build the Pistons through Free Agency without really improving them either time - or whoever might be running the Knicks at the time.

It's all relative, and in an era where motion-sensor cameras are now quantifying every facet of the NBA, I'm surprised this concept hasn't become more standard.

- Back to David Kahn, as he's now haunting the Minnesota Timberwolves from the grave, having not only given them a shorter clock within which to build around Kevin Love, but damaged his star's relationship with the team seemingly beyond repair, even after his firing.

Love lashed out at the under-achieving Wolves last week, the latest in a Thabo Sefolosha's-Arms-long line of public criticisms that stemmed from Kahn's um, management, but appear to still be paving the runway for Love's escape.

(KAAAAAHHHHHHNNNNN!)

The move for Minny now should clearly be to trade The Love Below this season, before a team with many glaring flaws attempts to rebuild around an unhappy player who's leaving them in 18 months. Love wants to contend, the Wolves are far from it, and the longer they hold onto him, the more opposing GMs can take advantage of them, their leverage decreasing as his departure inches closer.

Acting now gives Minny the edge, capitalizing on the many teams that want Love's services, and forcing suitors to up the ante rather than calling them with a "You're Losing Him For Nothing This Summer, Take What You Can Get" kind of offer. This guy is a borderline Top-5 player; trading him now sucks but he's by far the most coveted "available" asset in the NBA right now. Minnesota can set themselves up very well for the future, and this would be a huge hand to misplay...