The Bucks made a stupid trade yesterday, unless they came to the decision that Andrew Bogut is too injury prone to be relied upon and therefore it is time to just tear the whole team down. If that was the case, they were successful. If this was meant to be some sort of “improvement” move, they were wildly unsuccessful. My hunch is that the thinking was somewhere in between.
I started blogging the day, or month (I can’t remember) after the Bucks won the lottery and earned the right to draft Bogut. I had so much optimism then. No more. I’ve kind of drifted away from the Bucks since then. As I texted to someone earlier today, the Bucks have officially hit rock bottom. I may renounce my BucksNation citizenship.
Here are the numbers from yesterday’s trade. The first sets are the win numbers from this season. The second set are the win numbers from the last two seasons combined.
| M Ellis | 5.24 | 7.39 | -1.08 | 0.319 | 1.8__3.8 | -1.1 | 0.8 | |||
| E Udoh | 6.93 | 11.56 | -2.31 | 0.109 | 0.3__3.1 | -1.4 | -1.1 | |||
| K Brown | 11.03 | 11.47 | -0.22 | 0.465 | 0.3__0.5 | -0.1 | 0.2 | |||
| S Jackson | 1.68 | 5.85 | -2.08 | 0.148 | 0.4__2.9 | -1.3 | -0.9 | |||
| A Bogut | 11.27 | 13.41 | -1.07 | 0.321 | 0.5__1.0 | -0.2 | 0.3 | |||
| M Ellis | 6.09 | 7.84 | -0.87 | 0.354 | 6.8__12.5 | -2.8 | 4.1 | |||
| E Udoh | 6.19 | 13.16 | -3.48 | -0.088 | (-0.6)__8.1 | -4.3 | -4.9 | |||
| K Brown | 11.05 | 11.64 | -0.29 | 0.452 | 3.6__4.4 | -0.4 | 3.2 | |||
| S Jackson | 4.28 | 6.98 | -1.35 | 0.273 | 3.1__10.3 | -3.1 | 0.5 | |||
| A Bogut | 13.54 | 10.71 | 1.41 | 0.742 | 8.2__2.9 | 2.7 | 10.9 |
March 14, 2012 at 8:06 pm |
I feel for you. This does seem like a ‘cut the baby in half’ kind of move. Perhaps the thinking was that Bogut isn’t just injury prone, but is in fact broken; it’s a reasonable position to take. (I wonder if he and Biedrins could make a solid two-headed center in GS?) Either way, they gave up the only player in the deal with a shot at sniffing ‘adequate’ for zip in return.
March 15, 2012 at 12:33 am |
Especially heartbreaking given that reports indicate they could have received the much more palatable Steph Curry, but Hammond’s clownish eagerness to unload Jackson got the better of him, leading us to the miserably unproductive Mr. Ellis.
If this is what Bogut gets us, for God’s sake, Hammond, just hold on to him!
March 15, 2012 at 10:25 am |
Are you saying Golden State would have given Curry if they would not have had to take back Jackson?? Wow, that would have been much better. Basically, Hammond traded Bogut to make up for his earlier mistake acquiring Jackson. Nice…
And I agree with your second paragraph. What was the point of the trade? That was all you could get for the team’s only decent producer?
It reminds me of that song by John Lennon “it’ll be just like starting over”
I can’t take many more “relaunches”. The halcyon days of Paul Pressey and Sidney Moncrief seem like two lifetimes ago now…
March 16, 2012 at 11:44 pm
That’s the claim – apparently the Ellis swap came at the last moment when GS finally agreed to take the Jackson contract.
In spite of his health problems, it seems like there is no question that Curry is the superior player.
Couldn’t we have just let Jackson expire after next season instead of diluting Bogut’s trade value?
It’s especially inexcusable given that Hammond dropped 12 spots in the draft to acquire this guy last June.
What we’re left with is two and a half more seasons of below-average Ellis at 11 million per year rather than one and a half more seasons of absent Stephen Jackson at 10.
Seems like yet another step backwards.
As you said, it’s all pretty disheartening.
But, from a Bucks fan who enjoys your analysis, I hope you don’t hang up your hat quite yet.