Ben Simmons for Zach Lavine? Would the Brooklyn Nets consider this trade?

Ben Simmons for Zach Lavine? Would the Brooklyn Nets consider this trade?

coming up as the NBA Works towards the finals and ultimately the draft later this month news around Zack LaVine and a willingness to basically salary dump his contract it’s a reminder of can go wrong when you commit money in the wrong places but also a curiosity as to whether or not Brooklyn should try to flip Ben Simmons we get into it all coming up next you are lockon nets your daily Brooklyn Nets podcast part of the locked on podcast Network your team every [Music] day yo ah yes my friends it is the lockon Nets podcast right here in the lockon podcast Network it’s your teams every single day he’s Doug Nory I’m Adam arre we thank you as always for making us your first listen of the day we are 100% free on all those great platforms and let you know today’s episode is brought to you by fan du make every moment more right now new customers can get $1 $150 in bonus Bets with any winning $5 bet 150 bucks with any winning five bet visit fanduel.com locked on to get started and Doug long winded cold open here because there’s a lot of layers to Zack leine onion in regards to the Brooklyn Nets yeah so it comes out that not too surprisingly the the uh Chicago Bulls are trying to get off the Zack LaVine contract which just for the uninitiated has him making uh 46 $43 million this year $46 million in 2526 and then a $49 million player option in 2627 uh he’s gonna be picking that up I think so and that’ll be in his age 33 season so you know not surprising that the Bulls who kind of ended the year better without Zack LaVine F following an injury last year after sort of a trade deadline where it looked like they were trying to maybe move off the contract already but then he got hurt and um and so like that kind of submarined and of those plans if they were even going to be available now head to the offseason thinking about possibly salary dumping him with the little caveat that they might be taking Pennies on a dollar or might not be able to move off of it all because teams just look at this and say $49 million for Zack LaVine three years from now no thanks and yeah once again in example Infinity of the cautionary tales around going sort of like Max contrac is money on guys who aren’t Max contract players yeah and the bind it can get you to into and unfortunately the Nets have a very similar uh contract on their books currently not as much money but fraught with almost as much Peril as Zack Lan and that’s Ben Simmons yeah and we know Ben Simmons obviously coming into the final year of his contract so the brets like they’re about to get out from underneath a problem that they’ve been having but even inside of that when you hear Chicago talk about what they’re willing to do with Zack LaVine so much that is the conversation that Nets fans had over the last couple of Seasons with Ben Simmons well go ahead just you know oh send him here put him over there trade him at the deadline and it kept coming back to who’s going to look contract and go oh baby if we could have that money on our books that would really solve our problems and with Zach LaVine specifically here you me about getting to the place where what team is going to look at him I mean over the course of NBA last whatever decade when money’s really gotten massive in some of these contracts there are teams that always will look and say oh well bad Mone for you can be good money for us or a player that doesn’t work for you can work for us Zack LaVine right now represents the the worst of Both Worlds the team was better without him and I don’t know a a roster out there right now that with the contract would say it’s worth risk like you have to account for injuries you have to account for the money and whether or not you’re going to be able to send out the adequate you know whether it’s picks or otherwise to get them the plus side here Chicago is basically saying if you take them we don’t care we need nothing in return we just want to move on from them do you feel like it’s gonna be possible for Chico to do that because this might be one of those we always come back to rare occasions of what does the buyout look like at a certain point Chicago say we might pay you a lot of your contract just to not have you here anymore on this roster I mean as with Ben Simmons they’re not buying him out there’s just too much time left in the contract you would never I like you’d be crazy if you’re a LaVine to buy like buy outs don’t buy outs don’t work in these cases like they yeah I know everyone kind of defaults you’re not but people default to like oh just buy them out but remember buyout takes it takes two to tango on a buyout like you need the team to want to buy you out and then you need the the player to accept a buyout and players like this and buyouts always come at less money so why would you ever do it I wouldn’t name me a situation where you would just take less money just to go go do whatever you wouldn’t do it especially when it’s $50 million four years from now or three years from now there’s like a very few situations that it could work like you know you look at Philly and you’re like okay could it be a good third piece next to Maxi and speed and they overpay a little bit there but everything else in the roster super cheap right because they have like nothing on their books could it work in that situation it’s a close call short of that kind of situation it’s really hard to be able to see any team willing to go this direction because like I mean look the stats I mean it’s clear as day like with LaVine on the court last year almost 900 minutes the team was at minus six net rating with him off the court they are basically even uh for 3,000 minutes so it’s just like he didn’t help them now can he not help any team if he’s the third Creator and he like there’s a clear pecking order for him sure but again like you’re in such Dire Straits because remember when you’re pushing 30 years old and you’re already a Reclamation project and that’s very expensive yeah it’s like unlikely to get so much better right it’s actually much more likely worse it’s but it’s much more likely to get way worse that and and um which is like unplayed playable hurt whatever it is and because we see many more examples of that than the $ 45 million dollar oh he got it all back together here when he’s older after injuries like that just doesn’t really happen in the NBA so I just don’t see a market now if you’re the Nets I mean do you look at that situation and You’ think that Simmons is such a disaster I mean it I don’t know I we’ll talk about the Simmons piece of this the contracts line up to be able to do it yeah although I wonder if like LaVine I don’t even wonder LaVine is one of these examples of like is Ben Simmons the worst contract in the NBA not anymore he’s not right he’s just not it’s not a good contract it’s not Val there’s no value on it it’s a negative asset but it’s not the worst contract and that’s why also throwing in there with Chicago you have a team and organization telling you they don’t believe in your talent they don’t think your is worth the money and you probably have Zack LaVine saying I’m so much better than what Chicago has afford me to be right all of these things create a very acrimonious departure what we look like be eventually here from Chicago as Doug mentioned though coming up next Ben Simmons for Zack LaVine what is the upside of that transaction for Brooklyn and what would be a potential Pitfall with two and three years of money buil on the books we’ll get into that in just one moment all right before we get to that tell you about our friends over at fanduels winner take all all time in the NBA I mean literally win or take all time in the NBA heading into the finals FanDuel giving you a shot to bring home a big win of your own right now new customers on FanDuel you’re gonna get $150 in bonus Bets with any winning $ five bet it’s $1 150 bucks sped on spreads money lines player props so much more right now we’re heading in to the finals Celtics minus 220 favorites over the Mavs kind of like that I I think the Mavs with the nice story here but Boston’s been such a juggernaut all year probably getting the little bit too that the road to the east through the East has been easy minus 220 on the Celtics and is it is it a hot pick no is it the right pick probably that’s what you’re going to get over there on FanDuel you to visit fanduel.com lockon you’re G to make every playoff shot count FanDuel America’s number one sports book all right so as we continue today’s lockdown Nets episode a friendly reminder that my commitment our commitment to doing episodes 5 days a week for you people also involves sometimes being on the road so if over the course of this episode you see me coming and going a little bit getting Frozen with emotion that’s just internet connections on the road baby it’s all we can do LaVine the contract from a Brooklyn Nets perspective what’s the upside of making this move now in the final year of Ben Simmons contract in your mind Doug upside I mean the upside man I I wouldn’t use that word what could be a possible benefit like this year of the of the Zack LaVine thing is that if you think Simmons is totally dust that you are going to go you know you’re in the room with him you see I mean work out IG workout videos aside you see that like this year is going to be very similar to last year you’re still sort of in wanting to win now mode you need another scorer with with we’ve seen like you know on ball creation be a real problem for this team and scoring be a real problem for this team and you say to yourself LaVine helps us a little bit now assuming he’s healthy remember he was injured last year and it helps us win now and we’ll deal with the Fallout later that is about the only case I can make like the because again just to go back to what we were saying before with Simmons the Great Value the great um promise around the Simmons contract at this point is that it ends it’s over after this year like you’re done clean cap finished kaput it’s done the the experiment didn’t work the trade was a failure they lost it big time it’s been a disaster but at least it’s over after this year and I think like the Nets are probably just holding tight to that scenario so it’s sad battling because I’ve SE we’ve seen this thrown out by people like oh maybe LaVine they you know they swap him here and it’s just actually a guy in the room that can actually play and the Nets were kind of short on guys who could even play last year right and so um I think that’s like a part you could squint and see it but for me it’s like it’s very obvious that this the LaVine contract the Bradley Beal contract these are total disasters for these teams and you’re just sidling yourself or saddling yourself whichever you’re doing with one of saddle on it’s just it’s a team killer it’s a team killer like you can’t do anything and to just think about a $50 million player option three years from now I don’t know get out of the Simmons thing it didn’t work but don’t don’t really consider this kind of move well this would be the you know we thought Don maybe we can’t ultimately get him you know from Cleveland he’s going to stay there okay fine and this pivot is is a no cost pivot in terms of assets right you keep all your picks still dry from everything that you got from Phoenix you say okay we’re still in the same time frame we are from that standpoint and then we bring in an oncore Talent healthy that we think can help our team I I agree with you that I wouldn’t make this move or even consider making this move but this is if you’re the front office and you think you want to be winning now well then Zack line could represent a move in the right direction along with male Bridges and Cameron Johnson this isn’t our philosophy but it might line up with the way the organization thinks about things over the next you know two and three years right it’s very hard right now to get a handle on like sort of what the Nets plans are right like I think that like that has been this has been a very difficult thing to discern right like for a while it was Stars Rob bust right and it’s you know we’re gonna we’re gonna bring in stars and guys stars are guys that Mel Bridges wants to play next to and um or want to play next to m Bridges and and we’re going to have a clean cap and Brooklyn’s a destination and all this other stuff we’ve had we’ve heard like surprisingly less of that as the as this like sort of offseason goes on if you’re looking at sort of spin doctor quotes and then you look at Jordy Fernandez’s staff which is kind of like trending a little bit more Player Development right I it’s got Jawan Howard but mostly it’s it’s a Player Development approach and you start to think to yourself well I mean are they like thinking about a pivot here like has the has the ti kind of turned on like what the plan is it’s just quiet because this is the finals and it’s kind of hard to get a sense of where they’re going are they not sure I think there’s a lot of balls in the air here I I do wonder if we if things have moved in the NBA a little bit away from where they thought it might go with this group and now they’re they’re maybe positioning themselves to possibly re soft reset I’m I’m not sure I I I just wonder I I do think that the the the the quotes on the team have changed a little bit like the tenor has changed a little bit like there’s been a little bit more of you know rebuild talk there’s been a little bit more of you know we’ll sign Claxton and kind of see what happens there’s been obviously the bridges stuff has been floated out there at times mostly from other teams I don’t know I I I think no matter which way you slice it though when it comes to LaVine specifically like he doesn’t fit any of it right like he like that contract doesn’t fit if you’re you’re trying to if you’re trying to be good in two years he doesn’t really fit it if you’re trying to be bad now but not take on more assets or not take out more bad money he doesn’t fit it so I I just think it’s just not it’s probably a non-starter yeah it’s weird because I guess if I painted a picture where you know again understand the context I’m putting this in if I painted a picture where it made sense for Brooklyn to do it they’re trying to sell Cs on it it would be that okay he’s a 25 point a game you know night score I if healthy went on the court you put him in the back court with Cam Thomas that’s a really nice Dynamic there and you go ahead and you play out these next two or three seasons because we believe that our reset is coming in 27 28 29 so in sense whatever we do from now until then doesn’t matter you know house money kind of until we get to that place because we’re not getting our own picks back at least as it stands now that would be the the way you look at it is not mattering the other side of it would be 2025 where you say but now we do have 45 4 committed on our cap we get no more Ben Simmons from a year ago but we still have big money occupied was that the player that we would go and invest in if open market opportunity to sign any free agent that we want right so you know you can look at it kind of that way not spending assets and still having opportunities down the road it really does come down to a little bit short term what do the Nets want to do when they have a lot of money next year in free agency Zach Le would be if it was it was Z lean on a one-year contract and you were trying to be bad like that’s not the worst guy guy to bring in right if it’s one year and you’re kind of you’re thinking about the 2025 draft because you want to kind of not be that good but you have a guy who can score and has some highlight real stuff on on his resume right and can kind of just put up a high usage but can be a little bit of a tank commander then I think actually Zack line is not the worst guy in the world because it’s like I don’t know he’s like has some he has some plays but you’re not really winning much if he’s your you know one or onea scorer for sure I mean that’s proven out over the over the minutes for him over the Bulls for the last two years but that’s just again not the situation because you it’s you’re tied into the Future these contracts that these teams signed with some of these guys that go out way into the future and I get why teams do this by the way I get it it’s not a good decision but I we’ve talked many times about how teams motivations are sometimes different than fan motivations teams have to sell tickets teams know that not every guy is going to come there in free agency teams know that not every draft pick you’re going to get is going to be is going to be a star and so some point you got to pay some and there’s a salary floor you got to pay somebody and sometimes the guy you have in the building is just a little easier to pay than try than thinking about going out and finding the guy elsewhere and that’s how you end up with the Zack LaVine contract that’s how you end up with the Bradley Beal contract it’s how you end up with Tobias Harris making a ton of money right it’s and and and and it being really a bad decision two years later I get it and you just have to hope that your team isn’t in this mode right like you have to hope that your team doesn’t get into this mode because you just see it sets your franch franchise back years when you do it years and lavine’s like a total test case for that yeah and that’s why coming up here in a second not only from a chemistry standpoint inside of the Brooklyn Nets organization but even a high level why philosophically jumping the gun when you hear a name brand player brought up for trades or Acquisitions or otherwise almost always comes back to bite the organization in the butt we’ll get into that in just one moment all right let you know this show is sponsored by better help look we’re all carrying 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10% off of your first month that’s betterhelp each.com lockon MBA all right so as we wrap up today’s lockdown Nets episode talking about Zack LaVine the potential of the Brooklyn Nets wanting to be in a trade for him not so likely certainly not by this podcast standards but there’s there’s a through thread here about you you mentioned you need to sell tickets and you do so you go and you sign guys maybe and you pay them more money than you’d like to but in Chicago and not unlike in in Brooklyn by the way too you have these sample sizes of but what do fans love even more winning basketball or Scrappy basketball the opportunity of Chicago fans are still frustrated with the results there but they loved supporting the Zack LaVine Less Chicago Bulls they were a overall team together fans for Brooklyn loved supporting the Spencer dewitty D’Angelo Russell Carris L Jared Allen Nets why because they were a fun overall team it’s always results oriented and those results always get ratcheted up once you bring in and start paying players massive contract that’s you start to hit that trying to thread the needle that sometimes the fan base goes no thank you we’d actually prefer you not have brought in these Stars if it means this type of on Bo yeah it’s always hard right up until you pay the guy too much money this is what happens every time is what happens every time is that it’s all fun when guys are on cheap contracts then they are good and they outplay those cheap contracts and then they’re up for the next contract and they want as much money as possible which by the way is correct God and fans demand and fans demand you pay them that contract like don’t let him go don’t let these guys walk out the door you know nine times out of 10 they want you to pay them and keep them there but then it becomes the results after yeah right so then and then you’re and then you’re a little overleveraged on guys who just aren’t good enough and you just get yourself into a real real bind um and look there’s a there’s a complete push and pull when it comes to this stuff and it’s I admit or I acknowledge not admit I acknowledge that it’s very very difficult from a GM perspective and an ownership perspective because you want to be competitive you want to sell tickets you don’t want to lose money you don’t want to bot him out for 10 years and like that’s just like that’s a really really hard thing to sell um but it just it’s it becomes sort of an existential problem more than anything else because you are then sort of sometimes negotiating against yourself for these guys that you know guys people have already bought their jerseys they’ve already you know they’ve been around for two years like they don’t want to see that guy go the Jersey becomes worthless when the guy goes out the door like there’s other stuff that kind of ends up becoming problematic the Nets fans are going to see this happen possibly down the line here right like bridg is going to be up for a contract cam Thomas is up for an extension we already know claxton’s up for an extension or excuse me up for up in free agency like there are other things coming down the pike here that the Nets will have to deal with themselves around like what guys are worth on the open market compared to what it’s worth keeping you inhouse they just did it with Cam Johnson arguably overpaid there right like it’s just it gets it gets super super tough you just have to try to avoid it at all costs and most teams can’t like most teams can’t avoid it most teams do it eventually right it’s just a matter of sort of like when not if remember you know Jared Allen traded away at the time then he gets a you know $20 million a year at the time a $100 million contract and a lot of Nets fans then from a far say ah what a relief I we wouldn’t have paid him that if he had been here then but you know we would have kept him not for that money so you always this is you say GM but everybody it’s a push and pull across the entire board here for the fan base for ownership for GMS you’re always trying to find this right balance often times it not oftentimes every single time it’s always results oriented pay a massive contract win a bunch of basketball games turns out it was perfect we’re so glad we made that choice make massive trades and give away a lot of assets and players to acquire a talent team falls apart no Championship what a disaster they never should have done that so it always becomes about that and revisionist history happens too my my last thought would be on do you think that Donovan Mitchell Falls closer spectrum of you know two three years down the road not entirely worth it versus oh they should have done that and that’s not about whether or not Mitchell actually become available it’s that level of player that you and I have talked about right maybe not elite elite Superstar but certainly a very talented player that has mostly a track record of being available oh yeah he’s he’s way better than LaVine like so I don’t think obviously he’s way better than LaVine but from a money standpoint right going forward that one’s closer I think you can go into you can have a good team with him on the max or close to the max right like I think that that’s a team that can still win games I don’t think you’re going to be better with him off the by and large be better with him off the court than on the court right so um he’s a dynamic scorer we’ve seen him do it in the playoffs like he has he checks a lot more boxes obviously than LaVine like big stage playoff performance like he just he just basically did that I mean he got hurt eventually but like before that he was good in the playoffs and I think you can run offenses through him so I put him on a different level um than LaVine for sure it gets a little tricky with the a right because he’s like getting you sign him to he actually is he’s a candidate for what can happen next right like he’s a candidate for what can happen next because he has a player option in year age 29 and if you Max him at that point four years let’s say now you’re into like age 33 34 on a combo guard yeah and that can go wrong so it’s like right now no next contract maybe maybe um and so these are the guys that sometimes don’t age spectacularly like when the burst is when you know you lose a little burst it’s a little harder to get to the rim right like it’s a little hard to just sort of shed your man then then all of a sudden you know $50 million for Donovan Mitchell in year four or five and now we’re watch Rin repeat on the conversation about like where we are and so and that’s the other hard part too because sometimes you pay now you’re like I’ll pay now and I’ll deal with the Fallout later sometimes you get out of it like with be and Washington the total Miracle they get out of it sometimes LaVine probably not going to get out of it right like probably stuck with it and sometimes you hope to get lucky that the guy can hold on just long enough that some other team doesn’t mind doing it because the owner wants to win then and other times it’s just like sorry man you’re stuck holding it because you’re just there’s just you’re not getting out of it now and all the nonsense aside with Kevin Durant you watch Phoenix you go maybe the Nets got out of it at all the right times and got men’s value you watch Kyrie Irving you go ah well if we had a superstar like Luka looks like it the you know perfect time for Dallas to make that acquisition the Clippers and Harden right so all these things are swirling right around the Brooklyn Nets as it stands in this moment so all these tent PS out there across the NBA to say right move wrong move good decision bad decision until your point it might feel good right now and then two three years from now you saying if only we had so interesting to see how the Nets go ahead and approach this obviously it’s just another layer this off season for the Nets and for the NBA as the as the approaches like some by the way I’ll say this last note some team’s going to do it some team’s going to look at Zack LaVine on a salary dump and say if he can be healthy it’s G to help our team go from Contender to you know maybe get into the finals or whatever level you think they want to get to it probably won’t work out but you’ll convince yourself of and you’ll take your shot Philly striking out on Paul George could be that team I I still don’t think so because I think B’s like pretty prudent with this stuff and I think that but that could be a situation where they’re like oh we just got to do it here we got a small window on embiid there’s nobody else available we can’t draft it and so we just got to go out there and get a guy who can score like I could see that happening and even that is feels a little a little wishcasting okay we are going to get out of here much appreciated everyone rocking with us through the offseason here internet uh Hotel internet connections aside uh make sure that you were subscribed over on lockon Nets YouTube make sure you subscribe we every listen to podcast go over to we got nets.com we have more coming at you over the offseason and then into the season next year on we got nets.com I think that success is having fun why that is Bruno Mars oh one of the alltime great posts we back in tomorrow talking more Brooklyn NS basketball basketball basketball basketball basb

The Chicago Bulls are reportedly ready to move off of the Zach Lavine contract and might not ask much if anything in return. Would the Brooklyn Nets consider this at all when it came to their own bad contract, Ben Simmons? The Locked on Nets discuss the possibility of this trade, whether Sean Marks would even consider it and how teams can get themselves in a bind with long-term deals.

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