14 Trades Involving Kenneth Faried and a Western Conference Team
By Tim Hart
New Orleans Pelicans
Trade Machine Results: Nuggets +2 Wins, Pelicans Unaffected
This trade would give the Nuggets a significant immediate boost. For the Pelicans, this trade would payoff in the future, without hurting their chances in this coming season.
Why the Pelicans would do it:
Anthony Davis seems like the one thing keeping the Pelicans afloat. However, he may actually be holding the team back. His salary is quite high, and building around him has left the team rather stunted. If they were to consider this trade, it would be for the sake of the organization’s future.
This trade would probably help the Pelican’s get more wins. It certainly shouldn’t hurt their record. But, even with this as an accepted truth, there would certainly be backlash from fans. Anthony Davis is a star, and giving him up would take some guts. Still, adding three quality players to their line-up, for less money, might be the smarter move.
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Their immediate offense would switch towards operating around Holiday and Gallinari. Harris should retain his status as a starter, as he has shown great improvement, and brings a versatility that the Pelicans need. Faried would need to step up his game, as the starting PF spot would probably be his, and with big shoes to fill. Although, there would be the option to have Faried come off the bench. With CJ Miles and Danilo Gallinari, the Pelicans could make a run at some small ball.
Essentially, this trade would diversify the Pelican’s offense. As it stands, they pretty much rely 100% on Anthony Davis every single night. And even though his stats are incredible, they haven’t translated into wins for the team. Tyreke Evans is solid, but he simply does not perform to the level of his salary. Harris could be a huge part of their future, and Gallinari should be able to hold the team together for now. Plus, Holiday, Harris, and Gallinari sounds like a good fit.
Also, this deal would save them about $7 million in cap space. This could be used to add another significant weapon to the team. The organization would have a lot to consider in this proposal. They would need to weigh understandable backlash against logic-based strides towards improvement.
Why the Nuggets would do it:
They would have Anthony Davis! His incredible stats may have been a bust for New Orleans, but they could launch Denver into playoff talks. Losing Gallinari would be rough, but the Nuggets do have a second starting SF on retainer in Wilson Chandler.
Harris for Evans seems like a wash for Denver. Evans brings a similarly defensive-minded presence to the SG position with more experience and finesse. However, his full potential seems to be reached, where Harris is continuing to improve. Still, as a team with so much youth, some fully reached-potential could be refreshing. Plus, they would still have headlining prospects in Mudiay and Murray.
Imagining a Denver starting 5 of Mudiay, Evans, Chandler, Davis, and Jokic is exciting. The Nuggets, Cunningham could make for a third floor-spreading PF behind Davis and Arthur, and the Nuggets would be in great shape.
They would lose some reliability from beyond the arch. But, they never really had much three-point reliability anyways, so who cares? At the very worst, they would be a jacked-up version of last season’s Nuggets, who did pretty well considering their circumstances. Although, they would now have three floor-spreading power forwards. This would make everything run more smoothly. Oh, and did I mention Anthony Davis?
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