NBA TRADE TALK: TDL over

[mvossman]

Good stuff.  The quibble I have here is Harris is replacing Powell in the starting lineup.  So, the proper trade-off is how much that hurts the D among your starters vs. how much it helps your O.  The opinions regarding Powell's D are wide ranging and the stats are not exactly conclusive.  Harris can create his own shot and distribute.  Maybe the D suffers, but the offense is more diverse and it will be really difficult to play off of any of Harris, KP, Luka or Brunson.

On the bench, you are adding Powell and creating more time for Green (both help the D).  I think DGreen and Bullock are roughly a wash.  We don't platoon so you have to think of lineups always having one of the PG's, but for comparison sake, is column one an improvement over column two or not in terms of your top nine?

Powell       KP
KP            Harris
DFS          DFS
Luka         Luka
Brunson    Brunson

Maxi         Powell
THJ          Maxi
JGreen     JGreen
Bullock     DGreen

My counter argument to this is that you could improve that starting lineup without the trade:

KP
DFS
Bullock
Luka
Brunson

If you say we need Powell in the starting lineup to "protect" KP, I say that Tobias Harris does really provide that either.