The Trae vs Luka trade fully reverses next year

[AHF]

7 hours ago, macdaddy said:

Can Luka do it once?  

 

Exactly.  Both are superstar talents, IMO.  Only one has actually proved it in the playoffs by both performing exceptionally and leading his team on a deep run.  
 

Trae may have the best playoff credentials of any player in the league under 26 years old.  (Trae is 22 as of the date of this post).

[Dejay]

19 hours ago, macdaddy said:

Can Luka do it once?  

 

He's got a point. Media and even mainstream folks love to move the goalposts around in their constant need to be right. But all I heard back when Nique was playing was...

'Well, he put up a bunch of points and all but he doesn't help his teammates...' 

'His teams never did much in the playoffs so he's not in the upper echelon of all-time players...' 

No one cared that the East was loaded back then with some of the baddest alpha dogs in the league's history throughout his prime (Dr. J, Bird, Moses, Isiah, Ewing, Jordan, Barkley), along with plenty of other viable players to contend with along the way (Toney, Cheeks, McHale, Ainge, DJ, Parrish, Dumars, Laimbeer, Jeff Malone, Aguirre, Pippen, Dantley, Cummings, et al) while the best Nique had riding shotgun with him was old Reggie Theus and an older Moses whom were both set in their ways.

Now why I mentioned Nique? It's because of what we're now hearing from Luka fans in the media and mainstream today when his playoff performances isn't enough to sniff the Western semis while Trae's debut damn near got him a ring...

'Aw, the West is full of contenders and Hall of Famers while the East is soft...' 

'Trae has all of those weapons around him to look good. Luka has no help!!!' 

Oh, the irony...

Edited September 9, 2021 by Dejay

[AHF]

40 minutes ago, Dejay said:

He's got a point. Media and even mainstream folks love to move the goalposts around in their constant need to be right. But all I heard back when Nique was playing was...

'Well, he put up a bunch of points and all but he doesn't help his teammates...' 

'His teams never did much in the playoffs so he's not in the upper echelon of all-time players...' 

No one cared that the East was loaded back then with some of the baddest alpha dogs in the league's history throughout his prime (Dr. J, Bird, Moses, Isiah, Ewing, Jordan, Barkley), along with plenty of other viable players to contend with along the way (Toney, Cheeks, McHale, Ainge, DJ, Parrish, Dumars, Laimbeer, Jeff Malone, Aguirre, Pippen, Dantley, Cummings, et al) while the best Nique had riding shotgun with him was old Reggie Theus and an older Moses whom were both set in their ways.

Now why I mentioned Nique? It's because of what we're now hearing from Luka fans in the media and mainstream today when his playoff performances isn't enough to sniff the Western semis while Trae's debut damn near got him a ring...

'Aw, the West is full of contenders and Hall of Famers while the East is soft...' 

'Trae has all of those weapons around him to look good. Luka has no help!!!' 

Oh, the irony...

I'd say the East looks like a rougher fight to the top this year than the West.  And I don't think either of the top contenders in the West (according to pre-season prognosticators those are GS and LAL) would be in the top 2 in the East so that seems like a bit of a myth.  East has won two of the last three championships and is likely to make that three of four this season, imo.

[Dejay]

1 hour ago, AHF said:

I'd say the East looks like a rougher fight to the top this year than the West.  And I don't think either of the top contenders in the West (according to pre-season prognosticators those are GS and LAL) would be in the top 2 in the East so that seems like a bit of a myth.  East has won two of the last three championships and is likely to make that three of four this season, imo.

Agreed. Just illustrating what a lot of Luka fans were crying the blues about after their boy was sent home (again) while Trae was helping his team advance to the ECFs...

[JayBirdHawk]

 

[Iman]

We did fine on the Trae-Luka trade.  But we sorta got lucky because we did trade away a superstar.  To say we won it or will win it is still a ways off to me. 

Let's just look at Luka, he was #6 in 2021 MVP voting.  Maybe that was high but he's still viewed by most of the NBA as in that top 10 type category.

Trae is harder.  Break down which point guards if you throw out their contract or craziness you'd rather have over Trae.  Curry, Irving, and Lillard for sure for me.  If for some reason Trae demanded a trade, would he get us back Ja Morant or Jamal Murray?

So until Trae does what he did the last half of the season and playoffs again, Trae is not as valuable as Luka.  Then if Cam becomes the second best player on our team, for sure that would swing that Memphis or Denver trade.  But would Trae and someone better than John Collins get you someone valued up there in that top 10 category?

[marco102]

5 minutes ago, Iman said:

We did fine on the Trae-Luka trade.  But we sorta got lucky because we did trade away a superstar.  To say we won it or will win it is still a ways off to me. 

Let's just look at Luka, he was #6 in 2021 MVP voting.  Maybe that was high but he's still viewed by most of the NBA as in that top 10 type category.

Trae is harder.  Break down which point guards if you throw out their contract or craziness you'd rather have over Trae.  Curry, Irving, and Lillard for sure for me.  If for some reason Trae demanded a trade, would he get us back Ja Morant or Jamal Murray?

So until Trae does what he did the last half of the season and playoffs again, Trae is not as valuable as Luka.  Then if Cam becomes the second best player on our team, for sure that would swing that Memphis or Denver trade.  But would Trae and someone better than John Collins get you someone valued up there in that top 10 category?

MVP is a narrative and popularity contest. So you are basing your idea based off of media and not play on the court? 

How about Luka does what Trae did and get his team to the conference finals?

If the Hawks wanted to trade Trae, they could get any point guard outside of Curry probably and they may be able to get Curry if GS is looking to the future. 

Luka's top 10 is subjective.  Trae being 15 is subjective.  You look at what they do on the court and the success they've brought their team.  Luka had the edge the first two years even though  Trae's supporting cast wasn't stellar. Trae took it to another level in the playoffs and got his team to the ECF.  Something Luka hasn't done.  So outside of media hype, what has Luka accomplished to make you need to see more from Trae?

Edited September 10, 2021 by marco102

[AHF]

10 hours ago, Iman said:

We did fine on the Trae-Luka trade.  But we sorta got lucky because we did trade away a superstar.  To say we won it or will win it is still a ways off to me. 

Let's just look at Luka, he was #6 in 2021 MVP voting.  Maybe that was high but he's still viewed by most of the NBA as in that top 10 type category.

Trae is harder.  Break down which point guards if you throw out their contract or craziness you'd rather have over Trae.  Curry, Irving, and Lillard for sure for me.  If for some reason Trae demanded a trade, would he get us back Ja Morant or Jamal Murray?

So until Trae does what he did the last half of the season and playoffs again, Trae is not as valuable as Luka.  Then if Cam becomes the second best player on our team, for sure that would swing that Memphis or Denver trade.  But would Trae and someone better than John Collins get you someone valued up there in that top 10 category?

First, Trae is already a superstar in my mind.  In fairness, Luka is as well.  I think they are both generational players.

Second, which PGs would I trade for Trae? 

Curry - Curry is a no because of age.  The bulk of our team will be reaching their peak in 5 years or so when Curry is 38 years old.  If you are talking about just for this season, then I can see a valid argument for this.

Irving - F no.  First, Irving has a long history of health issues.  Second, Irving is someone who excels as the second or third banana on a team.  He was something of a disaster as the lead guy for Boston and has performance in Boston was very unimpressive.  

Kyrie Irving as the #1

Trae as the #1

Trading Trae for Irving would be a huge downgrade for any team that is looking for their leader. 

In defense of Irving, I do think a good case can be made that Irving is the better fit for the Nets, though.  They have two people ahead of him on the pecking order there and so he just needs to hit open shots and do his thing with the defense focused on stopping Durant #1 and Harden #2.  Irving has been a very effective and efficient scorer as the #2 or #3 guy when a defense is primarily focused on stopping someone else.  

But trading for Irving for the Hawks would be an epic failure by Travis Schlenk.  You sacrificed your long-term future to take on more injury risk and take a downgrade on your team in 2021-22 even if healthy.  Lose/lose.   Just hand in your resignation now TS.  You done ****'d up your build

Lillard - Nope.  What are you hoping to get from Lillard that you don't already get from Trae but at age 22 instead of age 31?  This doesn't fit our team's timeline at all and is a lateral move even for the immediate future.  (The two of them are pretty comparable in terms of impact on their teams today.)  For the long-term future, it isn't close.  Portland would trade the unhappy Lillard (when is he going to demand a trade?  the clock is ticking and Portland knows it) for Trae in a hot second.

 

It is hard to see any of those trades making even a little sense for the Hawks.  That would be like Dallas trading Luka for LeBron (Curry), Butler, or George.  Would make no sense for the long-term and would be an active downgrade even for the near term in some cases.

[macdaddy]

In terms of career results (not exact style) i think the question is going to be is Trae more like Dame or Steph and is Luka more like Harden or Lebron.   I know my answers.   

[Iman]

I still think everyone on this thread is viewing Trae from the perspective of him being on our team.  I didn't say trade Trae for Curry or Irving I was bringing up the trade value of Luka vs the trade value of Trae.  Also you can see why Trae is prone to getting left off all NBA or even all star teams when you direct compare him to other point guards.

Let's just break it down as far as what this team achieved this year.  Do you think if you put Luka on the same Hawks team this year that we would have went further or less far in the playoffs.  I think we would have went all the way myself.  But then again the reverse argument is we were missing Cam this year, and what about what he develops in to in the future.

[macdaddy]

5 minutes ago, Iman said:

Do you think if you put Luka on the same Hawks team this year that we would have went further or less far in the playoffs.  I think we would have went all the way myself. 

I don't honestly.  And maybe I am just  homer but I don't see Luka raising the level of the team around him the way Trae did this season.   Maybe he will at some point.   Literally no one said the Mavs supporting cast sucked before the season started.  Quite the opposite.   And their #2 player was unhappy playing with Luka by the end of it.    Maybe it was just chemistry or something but it remains to be seen if Luka can elevate a team to greatness.  But Trae has done it. 

I look at it this way.   Was our non-Trae playoff rotation of Bogdan, Heurter, Lou, JC, CC, OO, Gallo even a playoff calibre team?  Because these guys + Trae beat the #1 seed in the east without home court advantage.  

[Spud2nique]

1 minute ago, macdaddy said:

I don't honestly.  And maybe I am just  homer but I don't see Luka raising the level of the team around him the way Trae did this season.

I think they reversed the perception of the type of players they were supposed to be. Trae was supposed to be a guy that shot a ton and was more of a scoring point guard and Luka was supposed to be a Luka Magic, he is turning more into ISO Luka. Seriously when I watch games, they isolate him like JJ way too much. 
 

 

[kg01]

This isn't 2k.  I don't think one can simply drop certain players into every team and assume they'd elevate the group.

If we're being honest, LD with this group would be much the same as the Mavs.  One guy with great numbers, everybody else fending off the scraps.  That doesn't lead to wins, so it's debatable to suggest the Hawks would've advanced as far.

I also wish folks would also stop ignoring the fact that LD isn't coachable.  No idea why he gets no blowback from running off a supposed championship-level coach.

[Spud2nique]

4 minutes ago, macdaddy said:

And their #2 player was unhappy playing with Luka by the end of it.   

Also, it was strange to me about how Goran didn’t sign with them. Goran is probably most familiar with Luka’s game but for whatever reason didn’t want to join him in Dallas, that seems off to me, something really strange about it. It’s kind of signaling that Luka is a d!ck and so was his dad which is why Vlade said  I’ll go with Bagley. 
 

The verdict is in: Luka is mean to his teammates and doesn’t share the ball when it’s needed most and is somewhat selfish in doing so imo. A fake unselfish guy to me.

[macdaddy]

1 hour ago, Spud2nique said:

Also, it was strange to me about how Goran didn’t sign with them. Goran is probably most familiar with Luka’s game but for whatever reason didn’t want to join him in Dallas, that seems off to me, something really strange about it. It’s kind of signaling that Luka is a d!ck and so was his dad which is why Vlade said  I’ll go with Bagley. 
 

The verdict is in: Luka is mean to his teammates and doesn’t share the ball when it’s needed most and is somewhat selfish in doing so imo. A fake unselfish guy to me.

Lol.  But this is the point right.  It's not that this is necessarily true or will continue to be the case but that so far he hasn't proven that it isn't true.   They made Trae prove it just to be considered not a 'bust'.  At least make Luka prove it before calling him the next Lebron. 

[terrell]

On 9/8/2021 at 12:07 PM, Iman said:

The key to rebuilding is not messing up the draft and Schlenk has went way beyond not messing up.  I think if the current NBA GMs went back and redid the 2018 draft, Luka would easily be the top pick, I presume by each GM.  Luka is easily currently a top10 NBA player.  Whereas even with his playoff performance, Trae is still widely viewed.  So we drafted then traded off a superstar.  Generally you can't do that and not call that a mistake.

If Cam becomes an all star and Trae is still viewed as just all star level, we still lost the trade.  So really the key is one of them must be viewed as a superstar.  Another post season like this last one would actually practically push Trae past Luka on the superstar scale.  The key is can he do it again.

Either way, it's cool that it's debatable, and we traded away a superstar.

I think people miss BIG things in that trade. Atlanta also got Cam like you said, meaning Dallas gave up a 1st round pick. Dallas has not had a real pick in the draft since that trade and thus has not really improved as a team. Meanwhile, Atlanta is currently one of the deepest teams in the league and just went the ECF. So who won the trade doesnt even matter to me......Because we're Winning....

Edited September 11, 2021 by terrell

[MarylandHawk]

I tell you what, if there is a Hawks Mavericks finals, it will be the highest rated finals ever. The NBA is winning. So long to those old LBJ, Kevin Durant, curry narratives. New Kids on the block. 

[Spud2nique]

1 hour ago, MarylandHawk said:

I tell you what, if there is a Hawks Mavericks finals, it will be the highest rated finals ever. The NBA is winning. So long to those old LBJ, Kevin Durant, curry narratives. New Kids on the block. 

I’m rooting Hawks Grizz and I predicted that 2 years ago for 2024. Sac Kings would be kinda cool too. Somebody new though for sure.