Trade & FA 2023-24: Stein-Ingram Trade Inevitable| LAL Want Lebron Back On Any Terms

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Wiggins and PJ both look like crap so far this season.  Both have the potential to be buy-low swings that can pay off nicely.  Both have the potential to just be dead weight on the cap.  Given what we might be willing to give up, these two seem more likely than DFS.  IOW, Wiggins/PJ is a different type of conversation than DFS.

Neither Wiggins nor PJ is a game changer...small incremental change depending on the outgoing.  But, the outgoing shouldn't be that much in the case of PJ and you might even get an asset for taking on Wiggins.  PJ is a declining salary that runs the same length as Kyrie's contract.  You can get him with less outgoing salary (need $9.35mm) versus Wiggins (need $16.8mm).  The Wiggins deal runs a year longer and escalates.  He's a bigger financial risk, but peak-Wiggins is the better defender on a team that needs more D.

My guess is the PJ deal would be Holmes and an asset (Holmes plus Hardy keeps Dallas barely under the tax).  He hasn't played well enough to garner much more than that.  I like the Hardy fit with Ball, Miller and Williams.  Wiggins would probably be Holmes/GWill and maybe something coming back to Dallas.  I could see GS doing this if Holmes was expiring.  If that were the case, they could lower salary while letting GWill take on the role Wiggins fills for that team.  Maybe GS pays someone like Washington to take a year of Holmes in their TPE.  People can add 2nds and other players around the fringes, but that would be my guess in terms of the base assets to be dealt if something like this were to happen.

Wiggins is broken and I think there are too many red flags there to risk taking on that contract.  Among players this season with more than 700 minutes, Wiggins has the 4th worst EPM in the NBA.  He has been equally bad on offense and defense.  His shooting percentages are terrible. 

If he were recovering from a significant injury, there might be some hope.  That hasn't happened though.  There is something else going on there.

I think his leave of absence last season is also a concern.  He missed two months of the season with the explanation that he was taking care of his father.  That seems admirable but I do think it's odd that no details were released of his father's illness.  I think that raises the possibility that it was an excuse for a different issue that Wiggins was dealing with.  If Wiggins were playing better this season, it would be an afterthought.  It's the combination though that is worrisome.

Wiggins from a couple seasons ago would be an amazing addition here.  I worry that we'll never see that player again and I wouldn't want his contract.  Ben Simmons may possess the only worse contract in the NBA.