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| Boston Celtics v/s Washington Wizards April 11, 2011 (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
The Boston Celtics ended up completing a trade a few hours before Thursday’s deadline, but no member of the Big Three was involved. Boston sent Leandro Barbosa and Jason Collins to the Washington Wizards for Jordan Crawford.
Barbosa, who tore his right ACL earlier this month, proved to be a nice trade chip with an affordable, expiring contract. There were whispers that the Celtics were floating Fab Melo in talks, but it was clear that Ernie Grunfeld didn’t want any future salary commitment.
Collins also has an expiring contract, while Crawford carries a $2.16 million salary for 2013-14 and can be issued a qualifying offer of $3.2 million in 14-15. It was expected that the Celtics would re-sign the Brazilian Blur, but Danny Ainge now will have some work to do with close to $72 million already committed for next season.
The Wizards essentially dealt Crawford for two bodies and a small amount of cap savings. Barbosa is still waiting for his MCL to calm down before undergoing surgery on his ACL and Collins will have Emeka Okafor, Nene and Kevin Seraphin ahead of him on the depth chart. The move accomplished two things for Grunfeld -- ridding himself of the somewhat enigmatic Crawford and saving more than $2 million next season. Washington now has a little more than $65 million committed to 11 players (including Trevor Ariza’s $7.7 million player option and the $7.8 million amnestied deal of Andray Blatche).
There may have been underlying issues between Crawford and Washington, but it’s somewhat surprising that they couldn’t turn him into some sort of tangible future asset. However, the Wizards have relied on better ball movement since John Wall returned from injury and a one-on-one player like Crawford simply doesn’t fit with that scheme. That made it clear the 24-year-old wasn’t a fit now or going forward.
Grunfeld himself mused that he couldn’t get much in return for Crawford, but in actuality he should have been able to land at least a late second-round pick. I mean, wouldn’t Melo (a project big man due $1.3 million next year) be at least something? Crawford has been an average NBA player over the last two seasons (at the very least in terms of PER).
http://basketball.realgm.com/article/226292/Grading-The-Deal-Celtics-Trade-For-Jordan-Crawford
