Jaylen Traded to PHI for PG, 2 First Round Picks & 2 Second Round Picks

[PAOBoston]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

[No Nickname]

Signed, another guy who's negotiated contracts for 30+ years.   

There really is an "art of the deal".

Absolutely.  And sometimes, even if you do everything by the book, you can fail. 

All it takes is a bad actor on one side, or an ignorant one, and you still fail to come away with the best outcome.

But with this Jaylen Brown deal, gosh, I just keep going back to "Sometimes the best deals are the ones you don't make."

That being said, I will get some entertainment value out of having these extra picks and imagining what can be done with them, and other picks, and other players, to make another championship contender.

[Neurotic Guy]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Good will?

[Celtics2021]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Good will?

It is possible he quietly asked Philly to trade him this offseason and said he would waive his kicker.

[Who]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Good will?

It is possible he quietly asked Philly to trade him this offseason and said he would waive his kicker.

It might have been a pre-condition of completing this deal. That is how this normally works.

[radiohead]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Good will?

It is possible he quietly asked Philly to trade him this offseason and said he would waive his kicker.

It might have been a pre-condition of completing this deal. That is how this normally works.

This is most likely the reason.

[vjcsmoke]

OK, final thoughts on this trade.

The Players:  I expect Paul George to be better than a lot of people think.  Not as good as Jaylen Brown, but somewhere in the range of Al Horford to Derrick White, or more aptly, a combination of these two.

The Picks:  It really is the equivalent of two firsts with potential to be lottery picks.  I look at the swap as having the value of what it would take to trade up from say pick 25-27 to pick 8-10 (if this is how it goes).  If not a swap, it is just two picks.

Cap Impact:  With George declining the trade kicker, BOS actually saves about $3.6M.  That makes a big different right about now.  We'll see what they do with this flexibility.

All that said, the team is not better for this trade in my view.  Best case, maybe only a little less good this season and then with some decent picks to help with near term or future team building.

Trading Jaylen Brown in his prime 29 year old 5 time all-star coming off his best season for a 36 year old Horford level veteran is a huge LOSS on the Talent in the trade period. This is cope. The primary benefit is the salary dump and getting under the apron.

Even given the salary benefits I really would have preferred Brad wait and get a better deal that could have returned a young player with upside in addition to the picks. This is not All-star Paul George we're getting back. This is hanging on to the NBA just to get paid, will probably retire in 2 years version of him.

[PAOBoston]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Good will?

It is possible he quietly asked Philly to trade him this offseason and said he would waive his kicker.

It might have been a pre-condition of completing this deal. That is how this normally works.

This is most likely the reason.

Must be wild to be rich and be like I don?t need this 4 mil. I don?t think I?d ever give up any money in that situation.

[Roy H.]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Good will?

It is possible he quietly asked Philly to trade him this offseason and said he would waive his kicker.

It might have been a pre-condition of completing this deal. That is how this normally works.

This is most likely the reason.

Must be wild to be rich and be like I don?t need this 4 mil. I don?t think I?d ever give up any money in that situation.

He's also going to be paying about 3% more in income tax, which will be around $1.5 million.  There is no way that I'm giving up $4 million to facilitate a trade that is going to cost me $1.5 million, ha ha.

[ozgod]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Yet we expect players to give up big money, like Jaylen Brunson who gave up $113m in guaranteed money with the Knicks - the main reason, contrary to what a lot of people thought, is he wanted to lock in a contract giving him generational wealth earlier, at the cost of a lower number, but yes it also helped the Knicks avoid the second apron. For context his career earnings right now are $120m, so he basically gave up the chance to double that. But in two more years he's probably going to get a supermax, so there is that 

It's tough for us to realize because we have teeny weeny salaries with expenses in line with that salary - but these guys generally have much bigger expenses, they have a whole entourage of people they are supporting, and they have investment opportunity just not available to us. But there are still different tiers to wealth...even someone like LeBum who is a billionaire still can't buy his own team the way someone like Jerry Jones or even the Grousbecks...and of course Elon is in a different stratosphere to all that, he can probably buy his own country 

Good will?

It is possible he quietly asked Philly to trade him this offseason and said he would waive his kicker.

It might have been a pre-condition of completing this deal. That is how this normally works.

This is most likely the reason.

Must be wild to be rich and be like I don?t need this 4 mil. I don?t think I?d ever give up any money in that situation.

[ozgod]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Good will?

It is possible he quietly asked Philly to trade him this offseason and said he would waive his kicker.

It might have been a pre-condition of completing this deal. That is how this normally works.

This is most likely the reason.

Must be wild to be rich and be like I don?t need this 4 mil. I don?t think I?d ever give up any money in that situation.

Yet we expect players to give up big money, like Jaylen Brunson who gave up $113m in guaranteed money with the Knicks - the main reason, contrary to what a lot of people thought, is he wanted to lock in a contract giving him generational wealth earlier, at the cost of a lower number, but yes it also helped the Knicks avoid the second apron. For context his career earnings right now are $120m, so he basically gave up the chance to double that. But in two more years he's probably going to get a supermax, so there is that 

It's tough for us to realize because we have teeny weeny salaries with expenses in line with that salary - but these guys generally have much bigger expenses, they have a whole entourage of people they are supporting, and they have investment opportunity just not available to us. But there are still different tiers to wealth...even someone like LeBum who is a billionaire still can't buy his own team, or participate in certain investments the way someone like Jerry Jones or even the Grousbecks...and of course Elon is in a different stratosphere to all that, he can probably buy his own country 

[Kernewek]

Can someone who is smarter than me explain why George would decline his trade kicker? I assume rich people are typically not in the habit of declining millions of dollars just because. Maybe a scratch your back of scratch mine type of situation where the Cs get some extra breathing room this year and then give George some extra financial security with an opt out/extend in the offseason?

Good will?

It is possible he quietly asked Philly to trade him this offseason and said he would waive his kicker.

It might have been a pre-condition of completing this deal. That is how this normally works.

This is most likely the reason.

Must be wild to be rich and be like I don?t need this 4 mil. I don?t think I?d ever give up any money in that situation.

Yet we expect players to give up big money, like Jaylen Brunson who gave up $113m in guaranteed money with the Knicks - the main reason, contrary to what a lot of people thought, is he wanted to lock in a contract giving him generational wealth earlier, at the cost of a lower number, but yes it also helped the Knicks avoid the second apron. For context his career earnings right now are $120m, so he basically gave up the chance to double that. But in two more years he's probably going to get a supermax, so there is that 

It's tough for us to realize because we have teeny weeny salaries with expenses in line with that salary - but these guys generally have much bigger expenses, they have a whole entourage of people they are supporting, and they have investment opportunity just not available to us. But there are still different tiers to wealth...even someone like LeBum who is a billionaire still can't buy his own team, or participate in certain investments the way someone like Jerry Jones or even the Grousbecks...and of course Elon is in a different stratosphere to all that, he can probably buy his own country 

Athletes are also fairly unique in that most have a very short window to maximise their earnings, which isn't true of most people in more traditional lines of work - your earning potential doesn't fall off a cliff the moment you hit 30.