(04-07-2025, 12:55 PM)Knutsen Wrote: I‘m not sure about that one - who knows how he could have performed on the Mavs without Luka and without Kyrie?
Yeah, hindsight is 20-20. But at the time of the trade, the realistic view at that point was that if they kept him, Grimes was going to play very limited minutes - that's what we would have seen.
When they chose to trade him, Kyrie was quite healthy and the starting PG, with Klay set as the starting SG. PJ was sliding to the 3 as the starter. Exum was about to be back and playing backup minutes at guard (with SD behind him). Christie had just been added as a wing, and Marshall was still going to get a regular chunk of minutes. There was very very little left for Grimes or Hardy to split.
In addition, the mythical SNT you keep imagining means that you have to take back SALARY to match Grimes salary -- which, again, was more salary than they could afford to put on their payroll! If the Mavs couldn't afford to pay Grimes 14M (and they couldn't, it just doesn't work), then they couldn't afford to pay the SNT player 14M either. Every team in the league understands those dynamics, and if Grimes was getting paid much more than 9M, they all knew they could get him away by signing him to an offer sheet that the Mavs simply wouldn't be able to match. We still may see that play out the same way with Philly, as he's potentially worth more to a going-nowhere team with lots of minutes and shots to offer (just like Philly was this season).