NBA Rumor Mongering, Intercepts: Jaren Jackson Jr. Is The Real Prize
Trade rumors and hearsay
Hi! Before you get started, I have a strong correction below that needs noted because I erroneously reported that Klutch was advocating for their client Deandre Hunter, who they do not, in fact, represent. You can see the full correction below and
OK, it’s that time of year.
As a reminder, I do not pretend to be Shams, Chris Haynes, Vinnie Goodwill, Marc Stein, Jake Fischer or Sam Amick. I have a few people I talk to and a few other people who talk to other people.
I’m also of the opinion that about 80% of all slop is outdated. It’s something that was discussed and then probably abandoned. The amount of times I’ve called about something only to hear “Yeah, that conversation was had… months ago” is pretty high.
With that said, here’s the latest trade rumors I’ve heard that I think have some legs.
THE MEMPHIS MELANGE
This is the secret thing about the Ja Morant conversation: Ja’s value is in the toilet, but Jaren Jackson Jr.’s is not.
Ja Morant is:
on a huge contract for a smaller guard
injury prone
loaded with an attitude and, according to the many people willing to yell about it, has not changed his off-court habits to elicit confidence in his ability to stay out of trouble
It’s been reported Minnesota is a pass on Morant. I surveyed a handful of informed folks about where they expected Morant to land and the answers landed:
Miami
Sacramento
And a surprising answer: Phoenix
Two different league sources said this week that the Suns had done exploratory work in recent weeks on a point guard addition. The trade candidates include Trae Young before he was swapped to Washington, LaMelo Ball, and Morant.
Whether or not that work yielded a decision to actually pursue any of them is unknown. It’s possible they did their due diligence and said “We’re good,” considering Phoenix has the best vibes in the league right now and is currently above Kevin Durant’s Rockets squad in 6th in the West.
SPECULATION ALERT: The idea of making a move for one of those guards has to be intriguing for Phoenix, though. Teams are way more likely to make moves out of opportunity than desperation. The Suns are due to get back Jalen Green this week and it’s possible the fit is seamless and Green lives up to his potential and forms a new star duo with Book.
But if not, trading Green in a deal for Morant or Ball would provide an opportunity to add another name to1 the marquee without destabilizing the team (hopefully).
Collin Gillespie has been terrific for Phoenix, but has still started just 19 games out of 39, and that’s without Green in the lineup.
Miami makes a lot of sense. If they don’t want to extend Tyler Herro, you swap him out by taking a risk on a former MVP candidate2. The risk is obviously “Do you really want the guy who has trouble going to clubs and pulling out his gun on South Beach” but Miami also doesn’t put up with stuff as a rule and outside of Jimmy Butler’s particular brand of nonsense, has had success with holding an accountable culture.
If Morant realizes the opportunity he has of getting to live in South Florida and make millions, and buys in, the training staff can probably help him get back where he needs to. It’s a great fit for both sides.
Sacramento is mostly “It can’t get worse for either of us, so le't’s swap problems.”
But Morant, honestly, is so far away from being a positive impact player that he’s not even worth the amount of ink I’ve spilled on him3, even if I put way more blame at the feet of the front office’s coaching meddling than on Morant.4
But the way more interesting question involves Jaren Jackson Jr.
Multiple league sources have asserted something whispered in the wind for a long time:
The Boston Celtics would love to add Jaren Jackson Jr.
There is no team I’ve heard with more interest for Jackson.
The problem, of course, is what kind of deal that looks like. When Shams Charania reported on the Ja situation coming to a head, he included this:
So on the one hand, that’s a shot across the bow.”We’re very open to building around Jaren and value him highly.” On the other hand, by saying you’re open to it and not only open to it, you also invite the possibility of trading for him.
(If I were Jaren, I would want out. Enough of this nonsense and a coaching staff that has built a system where he’s at career lows while they plan to build around a second-year plodding center. Go get yours, Jaren.)
For Boston, obviously, the Anfernee Simons contract is a starting point. I think Boston was open to more… radical options last summer, but I have no reason to think they’d include any of the key guys outside of Payton Pritchard, and that would probably be hard.
You’re obviously not going to include Jaylen Brown, given that he’s played at an MVP level. Tatum’s a no-go. There’s little way to justify trading Derrick White for Jaren.
But if Boston loads up a pick-heavy trade package with some nice talent or tradeable contracts (Jordan Walsh, Hugo Gonzalez) for a Memphis team that would be starting over, does that get them there? Is anyone going to beat that offer for Jaren? is Jaren’s value better in a year under Iisalo and next to Edey, or worse?
For the Celtics, he doesn’t address their rebounding problems. They would still need to find a long-term center who can rebound to go next to him (though the numbers are pretty good with Queta).
But if you want to get back to being a five-out elite defensive team, Jaren is a great add. He would absolutely crush in the Celtics’ switch-all scheme, and could spread the floor ably enough (36% this year, 37.5% last season) to add new dimensions. He’s also likely to make big jumps as he gets older and finally stops getting an absolute garbage-can-on-a-hot-day whistle from the officials.
Maybe this is all summer talk that’s cooled and Boston is good considering that I have them projected as the most likely team to win the East. But teams often times have longer view than fans do. They look beyond how they’ve played this month, this season, and towards what they want to build long-term.
JJJ in Mazzulla’s system could be an outrageously good fit.
KLUTCH THROTTLES
MASSIVE CORRECTION THAT I SCREWED UP IN SPECTACULAR MANNER: I screwed up pretty big here in that Hunter isn’t repped by Klutch. I was under the mistaken impression that he was and it would have taken me like 15 seconds to confirm and I didn’t, and that’s my mistake.
Hunter is under Thad Foucher at Wasserman, Gabe Vincent is with Bil Neff.
What I had heard from multiple people is that
a. the Cavs were looking at Hunter deals
b. Klutch was interested in getting one of their clients to Cleveland (where they have obvious long-standing connections)
And I made a jump in logic based on what I’d heard instead of doing the necessary confirmation work. It was just poor work by me.
Among the things I tend to squint skeptically at is when someone says “that guy wants out bad.” NBA players do tend to have pretty good perspective that they make tens of millions to play basketball and that their worst situation is still pretty good.
But there’s a lot of smoke around the idea that Deandre Hunter would prefer he be somewhere else. But league sources have said Klutch Sports has expressed interest in Deandre Hunter a package involving Jared Vanderbilt and Gabe Vincent to the Lakers or to Charlotte for Miles Bridges.
It’s not like Hunter has done anything but be a pro this season and is having an OK season for a team trying to find itself. The noise was loud enough, though, that I think it has to be discussed.
There are variations of the deal that could get the Cavaliers under the second apron line, freeing them up to make other moves. On the other hand, there have been more team-level signals that the Cavaliers are looking to keep this team together to see what they look like when fully healthy for a while.5
Speaking of Bridges, the Hornets forward— who should absolutely not be in the NBA and who has a -2.5 on-court net rating and -8.5 on/off split— has drawn interest from Milwaukee as they continue to try and troll for an upgrade to magically unlock some version of the team that keeps Giannis from leaving.6
Two sources indicated they were confident Bobby Portis would not be with the Bucks past the deadline. Of course, two different league sources told me that last year… and yet two more personnel execs said the same thing two years ago. Bobby just hangs around.
WHY DO WE TALK SO MUCH ABOUT JONATHAN KUMINGA
I do not understand why we have to talk so much about a player who gets DNP-CD’d. No matter how much you might hate Steve Kerr7, if Kuminga were actually as good as the amount of conversation he creates, there would be no way to keep him off the floor.
But I digress.
Here’s what I think I think about the situation:
Steve Kerr realizes this team can’t win a title and that the only way for it to win a title is with yet another star. That’s not really doable in the current CBA structure, but Kuminga provides a window.
They probably would have looked at Anthony Davis closely before the hand injury8, but that window has closed, and the Mavs are expected to hang onto him.
The Kings are basically the only team that we can assume will actually want Kuminga.
The Mavericks very wisely are not looking for older players and instead would rather go for prime or younger talent, if not draft capital.
There was probably a pretty good construct around a three-way deal with Dallas, Golden State, and Sacramento sending Kuminga to the Kings, AD to the Warriors, and Sabonis and pieces to the Mavericks, but the money also doesn’t work unless the Warriors were to give up the ghost on Draymond.
So, that’s how we get to the MPJ talk.
Everyone I’ve talked to is certain MPJ will get moved before the deadline, because he’s been too good and the Nets understand what the assignment is, even if Jordi Fernandez continues to sabotage it by being too good. Kuminga is exactly the kind of player the Nets can take a flyer on in exchange for picks.
I don’t think MPJ puts the Warriors into the tier they want to be in, but there’s a scenario where he helps them make the Conference Finals or Finals before they get absolutely killed by a serious team.9
The other teams said to have at least called about Kuminga are Portland and Washington, but it sounds like none of that went anywhere.
QUICK HITS:
The Hawks are going to keep Kispert, no interest in swapping him back out after a few teams called
Giannis stays through the deadline, gets traded this summer, everyone’s treating it like a fait accompli at this point, but of course some team could offer something crazy to change that and accelerate things10
Because teams do so much of their reshaping in the summer now instead of at the deadline, Tobias Harris’ expiring contract is one of the most valuable pieces on the market
The Wizards will likely extend Trae for two more years after next year, whether he opts into his player option or out. Short-term, big money makes sense for both sides.
As a Memphis fan, I’m thrilled that I’m going to wind up watching a team built around Anfernee Simons, Jalen Green, and Zach Edey. This is fine. I am fine with the events that are currently unfolding.
Morant was a top-five finisher back in 2022
This makes me terribly sad. It didn’t have to be like this!
Taylor Jenkins died for this!
They should not, this team has problems that go beyond continuity and chemistry and there’s no guarantee they will get this team all playing well at the same time like last year ever again.
“Oh, adding Miles Bridges. Yeah, that’ll do it!”
Who by the way is the only reason the Warriors became the Warriors. Before Kerr showed up the Warriors were a first-round out to the Clippers. Kerr unlocked how to use Curry and reshape NBA history. He’s a pretty good Goddamn coach as if the FOUR NBA titles were not proof.
Yet another sterling job by the Mavericks front office to not move him immediately.
There are only three serious teams in the East, but still.
That team would most likely be Houston
good stuff -- idk why but I feel like all roads lead to some sort of Ja/Herro swap. maybe the Grizzlies can convince the Bucks sometime this summer to bring Herro home with the Kuzma/Portis + '31 1st?