Incoming powder keg?

[MrGoat]

Thanks for this detailed reply, Mr. Goat. Interesting thoughts. 

You appear to be making an argument on a fan-to-fan basis, which is what we are, of course. My question is not so much whether a twinkle-in-our-eye case can be made for the trade as what would tempt the actual Mavs/OKC front offices to see it as beneficial. As fans, we don't have to care how much a player costs versus his value, we can say we might as well go all in on a fading, oft-injured star because the front office is incompetent to make use of alternative opportunities anyway, etc. The owners will not be thinking that way. 

Afaik, the source for this Paul-to-the-Mavs idea seems to be an article suggesting that this might be an great trade, where a guy was just noodling around, rather than reporting anything. Do you know of something suggesting that either front office is actually interested in this in real life? 

I don't doubt that OKC would be open to trading Paul. I think that was the idea when they got him. But so far, they have reportedly resisted throwing in much at all in the way of sweeteners to compensate for taking on Paul's contract, even though they received a bunch of draft picks and swaps for doing so themselves. If they do decide to pull the trigger, I can't see that they would want Lee and Hardaway, who both have bloated contracts as well. But who knows?

I would be surprised if either team's ownership/management group finds a Paul/Lee-Hardaway trade by itself as attractive. If you have reports otherwise, I of course am always open to being convinced by facts. You say Paul wants to come here? I readily admit, I have been surprised before. 

All this aside, it is interesting as a fan to come up with ideas to add talent, and I am not intending to throw cold water on any creative thoughts in that direction. And as you say, this is one of many propositions on the burner. A lot of proposals that might look like long shots today can evolve into realistic possibilities once the time comes for pulling the trigger.

I guess we'll see what happens! 

Appreciate the response!

Oh I'm sure the owners aren't thinking that way right now, especially on Dallas' side who I fear may already may have started producing a cartoon for Giannis knowing their history. But I do think that could change by January or February depending on where these teams are. The scenario would be that once our schedule toughens up we falter a bit to the point where Luka is frustrated but we are still good enough that we're not out of the playoff race yet and adding a boost before the deadline looks tantalizing. For OKC they would have to be mediocre but not terrible and have failed to find any takers for that CP3 contract to that point (and they'd be looking for one). A CP3 buyout would be awfully expensive, taking on Lee and Hardaway would save them 6M this season, 23M next season, and 44M the season after that, or more than that if Gallo gets hurt before he's tradable and OKC staring at a luxury tax bill. I think the much tougher part of the sell would be convincing Dallas to punt on 2021 (or at least have a very large expiring to find a way to dump if they do somehow convince Giannis to come)

CP3 didn't say he wanted to come to Dallas, he said he found the idea of having the keys to Rick Carlisle's offense ala Jason Kidd intriguing, but that was years ago and he's already passed up two chances to come here in free agency since saying it so I'm not sure if it means anything at this point.