It's just odd to me that Danny passed on guys like Cousins, George, and Butler. All of those guys were cheaper, and more well-rounded. The perception was that Danny passed because of a variety of flaws, whether they be character-related, due to financial issues, or just not being good enough to cash in our assets for.
Instead, we get Kyrie, who:
* Stopped talking with teammates in the playoffs, and has clashed with coaches and teammates throughout his career (most notably, Waiters);
* Is injury prone;
* Is terrible at defense and mediocre at passing;
* Has not been successful as "the man", both prior to Lebron and during games Lebron misses.
I'd rather have IT and Jimmy Butler than Kyrie, and it's not close. Same thing with IT and PG13, or IT and Boogie.
We traded IT for a bigger, more brittle IT 2.0. For that "upgrade", it cost us Crowder, Zizic, and a potentially generational talent (Bagley, Porter). It's a price that is pretty much unprecedented in recent NBA history. Chris Paul -- a 26 year old with three All-NBA teams and multiple All-Defense teams -- didn't bring that value. KG and Ray, combined, didn't have that value. Not Carmelo, not Howard, not Shaq, not Harden... I can't think of a trade in the past 25 years where a team gave up this much present day value, and we did it for a guy who isn't that much better (if at all) than the guy we already had on the roster.