With the trade deadline less than a week away, no other team in the NBA is going to have a bigger question mark than the Los Angeles Clippers.
After dealing away the face on the franchise this past week, all bets are off on what the LA Clippers can do in a few days. For the last few weeks, DeAndre Jordan‘s name has been all over the rumor mill. The Clips find themselves in a tough position. Do you keep DJ with the hopes of him re-signing? Or do you part ways, and continue to build for the future?
The front office has only a few days to answer that question. In the mean time, let’s take a look at the best potential trade packages involving Jordan.
Clippers get: Tristan Thompson, Iman Shumpert, 2018 First Round Pick (via Brooklyn)
Cavs get: DeAndre Jordan
The Cavaliers are the team with their name attached to Jordan the most, and it makes sense. They lack a true center. With the possibility of LeBron James leaving this season, Cleveland needs to be in a win-now mode. With the addition of Jordan, the Cavs would be a threat once again coming out of the Eastern Conference.
Thompson and Shumpert are both players with contracts you’ll have to eat, unless you trade those later on. Shumpert has one year left worth $11 million, and Thompson has two years left worth $35 million — yikes. However, the valuable part of this trade is that first round pick. The Cavs acquired that pick from the Boston Celtics last offseason. The pick, however, is the Brooklyn Nets’ pick, which at the moment, has the potential to range anywhere in the top eight.
This would be a huge get for the Clippers, who are trying to desperately add youth to their team. In an upcoming draft featuring a plethora of talent, this pick will be extremely valuable. There are reports the Cavs won’t part ways with this pick, instead include their own first-round pick in a trade. If that’s the case, expect the Clippers to stay put. The pick will most likely be in the late 20’s, which is far too low if you’re losing a player of DJ’s caliber.
Clippers get: C.J. McCollum, Jusuf Nurkic
Blazers get: DeAndre Jordan
Another team that has attached their name to the DJ sweepstakes are the Portland Trail Blazers. Although Portland has one of the best guard duos in the week, it simply isn’t working. They can’t seem to ever get higher than the fifth seed, and it doesn’t appear that it’s going to change anytime soon. C.J. is under contract for three more seasons, making about $80 million. Obviously, there’s some work the Clippers will have to do there. Nurkic is still under contract for another year, and is a cheap option to fill in at center.
For Portland, this seems like a win-win scenario. Either they convince Jordan to re-sign and build around him and Lillard, or they let him walk, and have lots of cap room to go after other top tier talent.
Clippers get: Jabari Parker, John Henson, Milwaukee’s 2018 First-Round Pick
Bucks get: DeAndre Jordan
Parker will be a free-agent this summer, and Henson is under a fairly reasonable contract for the next few seasons. Parker is going to be looking for a larger contract come summer, and it’s unclear if the Bucks want to offer him that kind of money. The Bucks’ defense is in the bottom tier in the NBA, and adding a guy like Jordan would help bolster their team dramatically.
Clippers get: Kelly Oubre Jr., Marcin Gortat, Jason Smith
Wizards get: DeAndre Jordan
This is a trade that just overall benefits both teams. The Wizards, who are desperately trying to make an Eastern Conference Finals push, add Jordan to a defense that’s right around the middle of the pack. The Clippers get a replacement in Gortat, who at age 33 is still a viable center to have. Oubre is only 22 years of age, and still under contract for a while.
What do the Clippers do?
I honestly have no idea. I still don’t think the Clippers are quite sure what they want to do either. With the trade of Blake Griffin, it’s evident this front-office is going in a new direction. Although DeAndre has been with LA his whole career, you have to do what’s best for your team going forward. The Clippers want to get younger, as well as pick up pieces that will still help them compete, and there are plenty of different roads they can take in order to achieve that. At this point, all we do is wait.