Danny Ainge looking to benefit from other teams' trade activity

http://www.masslive.com/celtics/index.ssf/2015/01/boston_celtics_trade_rumors_20_155.html



Boston Celtics trade rumors 2015: Danny Ainge looking to benefit from other teams' trade activity


Jay King | mjking@masslive.com By Jay King | mjking@masslive.com

on January 21, 2015 at 3:15 PM




Armed with a bevy of trade exceptions, the Boston Celtics will try to benefit from organizations looking to drop salary or complete multi-team trades before the deadline, according to Grantland's Zach Lowe.

Lowe reported Wednesday that "Boston has been calling around the league over the last week, reminding GMs that Philly isn’t the only team with salary space to rent out as we approach the February 19 trade deadline."

Why would the Celtics rent out salary space? Just look at Tyler Zeller. Boston's starting center was acquired (along with what will likely be a 2016 first-round pick) for basically nothing because the Cleveland Cavaliers desperately wanted to find a spot for Marcus Thornton's contract. Using a big trade exception, Ainge capitalized then in the same manner he would like to do so before the deadline.

In a rebuilding year, the Celtics should be open to adding all types of expiring contracts for future picks/assets. They will also surely listen to any offers for expiring veterans Brandon Bass, Marcus Thornton and Tayshaun Prince.

Though already above the salary cap, the Celtics own a bundle of trade exceptions -- including two big ones from Rajon Rondo ($12.9 million) and Brandan Wright ($5 million) -- that will allow them to take on additional money. Boston probably doesn't want to pay taxes in a rebuilding year, but has about $11 million of wiggle room under the luxury-tax threshold, by my estimation.

So yes, of course Ainge wants the Celtics to be a dumping spot. He desires all the picks.



bob
MY NOTE: ALL OF THEM! DO YOU HEAR ME!! I WANT ALL OF THEM!!!! (Cue Mad Scientist laugh)


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This is just Ainge making every effort to better assist his rebuilding plan.

He may make some mistakes in player judgement at times, but no one can fault him for working all the time to help his team get better and better.

wide clyde wrote:This is just Ainge making every effort to better assist his rebuilding plan.

He may make some mistakes in player judgement at times, but no one can fault him for working all the time to help his team get better and better.

Clyde,

It is clear to me now that Danny is "cashing out".  What I mean by that is he sees draft picks and TPEs as "cash", which can be easily traded/exchanged for other things of varying substance (i.e.  picks + TPE for player, smaller and less poweful TPEs bundled for one bigger, longer term TPE, TPE for players like Zeller and Thornton) while players, because of their specific size/skills/age/contract/other teams' needs are not as easily traded/exchanged.  So, he is trading less "liquid" assets (players and their contracts) for more "liquid" assets.  Because he doesn't have a title contending core to build around he is going for maximum flexibility.


Bob



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bob,

This is the type of stuff that every GM should be doing for his team-basically searching under every little rock for an advantage of any kind and amount.

Not every other GM is in Ainge's current situation so he may be able to do more with this approach than others, but I think that it shows that he is working hard to make the re-build at least a little bit faster.

It will be interesting to see what he can accomplish before the trade deadline, but then I would like to see the roster set for the remainder of the season and also for Stevens to shorten his rotation.  Whomever is on the roster after Feb. 19th and is deemed not part of next year's team may just have to ride out the last 35 games on the bench whether they are 10 day contract guys or full NBA vets.

Bob,

Good description based on liquidity of assets.

Sam