Assessing Petrie's trade history (split from Evans/Rubio thread)

Capt. Factorial · Jun 26, 2009

Interesting that you seem to be attributing to me a belief I have never stated and then calling me delusional for holding it. But let's try to look at Petrie's trade record over the past 5 years and see what comes out:

1/10/2005: Traded Doug Christie to the Orlando Magic for Cuttino Mobley and Michael Bradley. I loved Doug Christie as much as the next guy, but we bailed out on that sinking ship at the right time. Christie played a total of 796 minutes in his post-Kings career and racked up 0.0 win shares. Mobley alone more than doubled that minutes total and got us 3.0 win shares in half a season before leaving in free agency. We also got out of a whole extra season of Christie's contract. That's a good trade.

2/23/2005: Traded Chris Webber, Michael Bradley, and Matt Barnes to the 76ers for Kenny Thomas, Corliss Williamson, and Brian Skinner. The infamous "movable pieces" trade. Webber, of course, was a shell of his former self after his knee injury. He contributed a total of 8.9 win shares in 166 games after leaving the Kings. Michael Bradley added another 0.2 win shares, and Matt Barnes didn't play for Philly at all -- on that contract. Due to knee tendinitis he didn't suit up the rest of that year, then signed a free agent contract with the Knicks, who later him, allowing him to return to Philly. So no extra credit for Barnes, who may just as well have bolted Sac as a free agent anyway. On our side, Corliss got us 3.0 win shares, Brian Skinner a further 2.9, and Kenny Thomas a shocking 9.0 and counting. Wait a minute - on talent alone, did we win that trade? I wouldn't have thought so, but it looks like we did! There's also the monetary aspect - we ended up paying out about the same amount of money over a longer period of time (and I think we saved ourselves some luxury tax payments). I'll admit that KT's contract has hampered us a bit financially the past two years, but when compared to what we saved in Webb luxury tax payments, it's probably a push. I'm shocked to say I think we won that trade.

Spoiler reveals more lengthy discussion...

I see that this is the most controversial of all of the trades (obviously), and since this got moved into its own thread I'll expand a bit on it. On the sentimental side, we lost the trade. Big time. It would have been great, nay ultimate, for Webber to retire as a King, no doubt about it. On the basketball contribution side, we actually won. It wasn't by a lot (just under 6 win shares -- for reference, Kevin Martin's best season was 10.5 win shares), but it is a clear margin. From the financial side, it's more complicated. I'm not sure where to find the exact numbers, but we were paying the luxury tax on a fairly regular basis back then. Webber, Bibby, and Miller all had big contracts with several years left on them, Peja had several years with a large but more reasonable salary. There's little doubt in my mind that we would have been paying luxury tax every year until we broke up that core. So we were faced with a three-way choice: 1) Pay luxury tax to keep Webber around on the gamble that he would return to form. That gamble would not have paid off. 2) Trade Webber to get out of the tax burden, and try to build a contender around Bibby, Peja, and Miller. 3) Blow up the clown, right there, right then. We picked 2), and it didn't turn out so great. But 1) wouldn't have worked, either, and would have been more expensive. And 3) would have alienated the entire fanbase. It's hindsight, not foresight, that's 20/20, and in 2005 that would have been a disastrous decision, derided forever. So the question may come down to whether the last year of KT's contract really hurt us -- because Webb wouldn't have come off the books until last summer. Well, last year we weren't in any shape to make a major free agent splash given our roster, and I don't imagine it would have been any different if Webb had stuck around. So I think financially, we did come out better for making the trade. It's only the sentimental aspect I think we lost.

8/2/2005: Traded Bobby Jackson and Greg Ostertag to the Grizzlies for Bonzi Wells. We should be careful to note here that when we traded Bobby, he only had one year left on his contract. The same goes for Ostertag. Bobby had a good year in Memphis with 3.3 win shares, and Ostertag ended up getting redealt back to Utah for a 1.2 win share season before retiring. Bonzi had a nice 3.4 win share season, and helped us to the playoffs where he averaged 23.2 points and 12.0 rebounds before listening to a stupid agent and turning down the contract offer of a lifetime. Still, despite the slight deficit in win shares, it's hard to say we lost that trade.

8/2/2005: Traded a future second round pick to the Bobcats for Jason Hart. That second round pick ended up being Ryan Hollins. Ryan has 2.2 career win shares in 1161 career minutes. Jason Hart played an uninspired 918 minutes in Sacramento, racking up 0.4 win shares. We may have lost that trade, but it's not a real big loss.

1/25/2006: Traded Peja Stojakovic to the Pacers for Ron Artest. Peja, of course, bailed from the Pacers the following off season, but contributed 5.5 win shares in the short time he was there. Ron Artest was in Sacramento for two and a half seasons and contributed 14.0 win shares. We clearly got the best of that deal.

2/23/2006: Traded Brian Skinner to the Blazers for Sergei Monia and Vitaly Potapenko. Skinner didn't fare as well in Portland as he did in Sac, with only 0.3 win shares to show for it before leaving for free agency. Monia and Potapenko played a combined 52 minutes for the Kings (-0.1 win shares!) but hey, at least we all got to fawn over the oiled-up chest of Monia in that creepy glamour shot. This trade was a wash.

2/16/2008: Traded Mike Bibby to the Hawks for Anthony Johnson, Tyronn Lue, Shelden Williams, Lorenzen Wright, and a second round pick (Sean Singletary). This was Petrie's first trade in two years, and the first true "rebuilding" move. Our goal in this trade was clearly not to win on the talent level, but to save money. And save money we did. This year we saved $11.5M on Bibby's salary (relative to Shelden's) and since we were an inch under the luxury tax, we saved ANOTHER $11.5M in tax payments for a grand total of $23M in savings. For a franchise in financial trouble, that's a godsend of a trade. And it's not like we were going to be competing. For a rebuilding trade, that $23M savings could have saved the franchise. That trade certainly helped our long term.

8/14/2008: Traded Ron Artest, Sean Singletary, and Patrick Ewing, Jr. to the Rockets for Bobby Jackson, Donté Greene and a future first round pick (Omri Casspi). Another rebuilding trade, and one that sent noted malcontent Ron Artest out of town. Given the sheer number of voices here clamoring for an Artest trade at that time, the fact that he was shipped off should have been enough. In addition, we have some future potential talent in Greene and Casspi. It's a bit early, but it's hard to say we got beaten on that trade. (Houston is probably happy as well, but that's not our concern.)

2/17/2009: Traded a conditional 2015 second round pick to the Celtics for Sam Cassell and cash. Why did we do that again? Basically doing Danny Ainge a luxury tax favor. I'm willing to pretend it never happened, because for all intents and purposes, it didn't.

2/18/2009: Traded John Salmons and Brad Miller to the Bulls for Drew Gooden, Andres Nocioni, Cedric Simmons and (via Portland) Ike Diogu. This was another rebuilding/financial trade that took $24M in future salary owed to Salmons and Miller ($18M next year) and turned it into $21M spread over the next three years (Nocioni). This in effect saves us $11M this year and brings us under the salary cap -- we would have been over otherwise. It's tough to argue with this trade, either -- it accomplished its goal and moved us forward in the rebuilding process.

2/19/2009: Traded Bobby Brown and Shelden Williams to the Timberwolves for Rashad McCants and Calvin Booth. In the end, this one was pretty much a wash. However, we at least had the opportunity to watch McCants play some fun minutes. (We also won the win share battle 1.0 to 0.5.) McCants was also a candidate to return next year as a free agent, though the acquisition of Tyreke Evans in the draft probably precludes that.

2/19/2009: Traded a protected 2014 second round pick to the Celtics for cash. Ho-hum.

6/25/2009: Traded the #31 pick (Jeff Pendergraph) to the Blazers for the #38 pick (Jon Brockman) and Sergio Rodriguez. Obviously far too early to tell on this one, but it's hard to complain about a decent backup point guard.

That's the extent of the trades that Petrie has pulled off in the past 5 years. I'd say we did pretty well. We clearly won two of them, and accomplished financial goals in three of them. Another four were complete pushes, and one tiny win and one tiny loss offset each other. The remaining two, it's too early to tell how we did. "Hasn't pulled off a good trade" in 5 years? Looks to me like he hasn't pulled off a BAD trade in that time frame.

Section 101 · Jun 26, 2009

Capt. Factorial said:

The Webber trade also extended them trying to win and not rebuilding sooner. If we had Webbs contract comming off the books we could have have money in FA sooner.

Artest turned the season around when he came. Which was great. But they didn't being Rick back the next year to see if it was going to continue. If they don't make this trade we stink it up the rest of the year and maybe they blow it up that summer instead of going forward with rebuilding on the fly.

They traded Miller too soon. He could have been a good chip for this summer/dead line. They didn't get enough in this deal for both players.

Merdiesel · Jun 26, 2009

Sorry Captain...
I quit reading after you had said we won the Webber trade. You keep telling yourself that.

VF21 · Jun 26, 2009

Merdiesel said:

Before you dismiss his post so cavalierly, perhaps you should read it again. He made a very good argument for saying we actually may have come out better than it appeared.

I loved Webber, still do. BUT the Webber that took the court for Philadelphia and then Detroit was NOT the Chris Webber of old. It would have been very ugly to watch him decline further and start to suffer the anger of some of the more rabid fans.

So, with hindsight and all that, I think Capt. Factorial has made a valid point about the Webber trade although it still breaks my heart.

BUT this tread isn't really about Webber. I'm tempted to break that post - which is excellent BTW, Capt - out into its own thread for discussion.

EDIT: I broke this discussion off into its own thread for the simple reason I think it's worth it.

steelevt · Jun 26, 2009

you can list a bunch a facts and numbers to support the trade...but i think if we had the chance to redo the trade, 99% would reject the trade. but maybe that 1% might have done it after looking at those numbers. not only did we lose webber in that trade, we also lost barnes who did well if not decent for the warriors and the suns.

AriesMar27 · Jun 26, 2009

the best trade in that list is the last one trading the #31 for sergio... the webber, christie, peja and bibby trades sucked.... we could have kept them and we wouldve been under the cap back in 06. the artest trade was cool only because we got donte and the #23 pick which we wasted. bobby was an expiring just like artest. if we had kept webber we wouldve been even further under the cap now than we are or will be. trading miller and salmons didnt help bcause now we are stuck with nocioni and miller wouldve been an expiring next season just like thomas.

petrie was a great gm, but he hasnt been one in quite some time. this summer will probably suck and we will add some lame/middling player like we do every year...

Gary · Jun 26, 2009

Merdiesel said:

I agree. I liked the trade when it happened, but was DEAD wrong on it. We got a salary handicap named KT..

What will make the trade better is if that KT expiring brings us in a piece to the puzzle midseason.

Entity · Jun 26, 2009

Gary said:

I have a feeling that may very well happen. may not be a present star but at least a potential contributor.

captain bill · Jun 26, 2009

VF21 said:

I don't think anyone would argue that point- winning or losing that trade isn't about Webber at all. It's about KT and his mammoth of a contract. It is very probable that something better could have been gotten for him. I'll grant 100% that the trade is a wash, given where we are now and where we might have been had we held on to Webber. Youth, maybe? Picks? Unfortunately as soon as we ask that it become a question of whether the whole rebuild on the fly was a good thing in the first place, and whether that can be attributed to Petrei the Maloofs or the FO in general (which from a fan's perspective should really be irrelevant since we never know for sure how ANY decisions are made).

I do tend to believe that something better might have been gotten , if not from a talent perspective then at least from a contract perspective.

Yes, no matter how you cut it it's a best-of-a-bad-situation scenario. But not all bad situations are the same. It is still possible that trading Webber had to be done, that we weren't gonna get anything great for him (on par with his former level) and yet still that the Philly package was absolutely not the best deal and maybe not even better than holding on to Webber, who would be gone by now anyways and might have played a couple decent years more.

VF21 · Jun 26, 2009

Your comments make total sense, captain bill. I think Capt. Factorial's post makes valid points, though, too. I think the Maloofs panicked and told Petrie to pull the trigger on the Webber deal, precluding any other possible offers that might have come along. I cannot honestly view this objectively, especially when I remember back to that night when it was first announced Webber had been traded. I may never be able to view it without my emotions getting in the way. Kingsgurl and I even talked about finding jobs in Philadelphia and following Webber!

Vlade4GM · Jun 26, 2009

Section 101 said:

The Webber trade also extended them trying to win and not rebuilding sooner. If we had Webbs contract comming off the books we could have have money in FA sooner.

Artest turned the season around when he came. Which was great. But they didn't being Rick back the next year to see if it was going to continue. If they don't make this trade we stink it up the rest of the year and maybe they blow it up that summer instead of going forward with rebuilding on the fly.

They traded Miller too soon. He could have been a good chip for this summer/dead line. They didn't get enough in this deal for both players.

This.

Capt. Factorial · Jun 26, 2009

steelevt said:

You're talking as if I went into this post intending to defend the Webber trade. I didn't. I went in trying to take an objective look at Petrie's trade history over the past five years, and I fully expected that he'd come out looking bad on that one. I was surprised at how much value KT brought to the team (while he was actually playing) and at how little Webber did from Philly on out.

Look, I'm as surprised as anybody that I can't find a single trade that I would jump to undo if I had the power.

You're right, I did completely forget to add in the Barnes and Bradley (if any, for him) contributions, which could even things up, especially if Barnes had a good run in Philly. I'll go look up the numbers and edit that in.

steelevt · Jun 26, 2009

Capt. Factorial said:

after rereading my post, it might have seemed that i was accusing you of defending the trade. i apologize since that was not your intent. and appreciate the work put into getting together all the trades. maybe im still a little bitter about the webber trade so i focused on that one. my point was even though stats might show it could have been in favor of the kings, the ramifications of future capspace, production, emotional letdown, etc might still be too much for most kings fans to agree that it was in the best interest of the kings. overall though, i agree that after looking at all the trades petrie did in the last 5 years, petrie didnt do that bad of a job

Capt. Factorial · Jun 26, 2009

steelevt said:

And I apologize for misreading it.

I certainly don't expect that everybody will agree with my assessment of the trade...honestly it's only thinking about it here that brings a new perspective on it, and I HATED it at the time. I still see the sentimental aspect as being the biggest downside of the trade, by far. I added some more thoughts in the original post in light of the spirited discussion here, if you care to look back!

swisshh · Jun 27, 2009

re the webber trade:

Webber may not have come off the books until last year, but we could have traded him as a cap relief a year earlier to that and his salary dump would have been worth quite a bit, maybe an extra pick thrown in.

I mean the guy was out of the league and we were still paying Kenny Thomas' bunk contract.

On top of that, the best player/value in that deal turns out to be Matt Barnes and we never got him back. Partially because we were stuck with loads of lame contracts. (No disrespect to Corliss. )

I would say it was a bad trade for totally unsentimental reasons. I would even say it was a bad trade for both teams that hurt both teams.

Sptsjunkie · Jun 27, 2009

Section 101 said:

I agree with you on the Webber trade. So far that one is a loss, although if Petrie turn's K9 expiring contract into something good, there's still the potential for that to change.

The Artest trade though was an absolute win. Instead of bleeding talent watching Peja walk for nothing (which would have driven the fans nuts) or the Maloofs wanting us to resign him to stay competitive, we got a talented player who we managed to turn into basically two first round picks. If either Greene or Casspi turns into an important cog for us, than the trade turns into a blowout in our favor.

Sptsjunkie · Jun 27, 2009

Section 101 said:

This we don't know. We can guess the Maloofs might have been willing to rebuild sooner. However, it's also very possible that they would have wanted us to sign players to put round Bibby and Miller to try to continue winning, even if we weren't contenders. That was the Maloofs mindset. We can't assume it would have changed just because Webber's contract was expiring.

Section 101 · Jun 27, 2009

Sptsjunkie said:

If we trade KT now we lose his cap space for free agency. Unless he's part of a trade for say Bosh/Amare etc it was a waste.

Artest was a win for that first season only. If the trade is not made maybe the full rebuild starts then. No Salmons signing, no Mikki Moore. Trade Bibby and Miller 2 years sooner.

Section 101 · Jun 27, 2009

Sptsjunkie said:

But that's the point. We would of had 20+ mil coming off the cap or as an expiring to work with. You could have potentially got a superstar type to replace one instead of many parts for 1. I've never been a fan of the many for 1 trades unless your getting the 1.

Vlade4GM · Jun 27, 2009

Section 101 said:

That would've been the best thing IMO.

Sptsjunkie · Jun 27, 2009

Section 101 said:

But that's a big assumption. The Maloofs wanted to win "now." We may not have started rebuilding. Also, Salmons was young when we signed him. He probably still would have been signed. Potentially even Moore too. We had no bigs when we signed him. He got a partially guaranteed 3 year deal and was a placeholder at PF/C until we got young players there. He didn't affect our cap either, because we were way over when we signed him.

Sptsjunkie · Jun 27, 2009

Section 101 said:

You may be right. I guess my point is that we just don't know. The Maloofs wanted to win. That was their mindset. We could debate all day if having Webber come off the cap would have changed their shortsighted views or not. We might have gotten a superstar or since we are a small market and were trying to win, we just as likely could have signed 2-3 solid veteran players and competed for the 7-8 seed.

And I'm agreeing with you on the Webber trade. It was a bad one for us. I just don't think you can say that it would have changed the direction that the Maloofs wanted this franchise to go. They had to learn the hard way.

fnordius · Jun 27, 2009

I'm always at a loss as to how we can give Geoff any truly objective grade on much of anything since 2002, because it's unclear how many of those decisions are ones he made, or wanted to make. The general direction seems to have been to cut costs while avoiding a rebuild, and that may have been entirely the Maloofs' call. Or not. I'm sure that it wasn't Geoff's idea to cut costs, whether the years of delay on the rebuild was an idea that he embraced or not is something we can only speculate about.

All we know for sure is that the team has steadily declined WRT profitability, butts in the seats, and W-L record. We're rebuilding now, although with the Arco deadline only 9 months away, the timing seems very unfortunate, and I find myself doubting that the rebuild can be completed with the same location and ownership/management.

I can give the owners and FO a combined low grade, because they've failed to keep the fan base happy enough for the franchise to stay viable as a business. But I really have no hard evidence as to how much of that was Geoff's idea. For all I know his contract has gone unrenewed because he's lost interest in doing it anymore.

KP · Jun 27, 2009

Merdiesel said:

I kept reading, and unfortunately it didn't get any better... kind of like the Kings ever since the day Webber was traded.

Capt. Factorial · Jun 28, 2009

KP said:

I guess my analysis must have been pretty horrible, since you came out of a 50-week-long posting hiatus specifically to insult it.

Any constructive criticism, or are you content to just dump on it?

KP · Jun 28, 2009

Capt. Factorial said:

To be honest I don't have the energy. If you really want my opinion, check the archives... there is a whole book in there.

Sptsjunkie · Jun 28, 2009

Capt. Factorial said:

Well for what it's worth, I thought it was really good. As you may have already ascertained, I disagree with us winning the Webber trade. Although I understand where we may have done well from a win score perspective relative to Philly, I still think it set the franchise back. However, I find it hard to argue with much else in there.

VF21 · Jun 28, 2009

Capt. Factorial said:

I think you did a great job, Capt. I think evaluating the trade this far removed from the initial reactions puts a valid and different perspective on the whole thing. I think some, however, haven't budged in their initial reaction and simply don't feel like rehashing it. I don't want to put words in KP's mouth, though, so I'm merely saying what I think he might have meant.

CruzDude · Jun 28, 2009

When Merdiesel states that GP hasn't made a decent trade in 5 years (2005-2009), I think he should have taken a look at what the Kings had (not much to build on), where they were going (downhill after their peak in '02) and who would have given the Kings anything of value for what they had or were willing to trade in 05-06-07. Trades made for financial reasons are pure business not basketball related especially those done the past 18 months.

The Artest trade was good for both sides netting the Kings cap relief and two very promising rookies, Greene last year and Casspi this year, excellent choices for a rebuilding team. If all or most of the other trades netted cap relief then they were a success from a business standpoint. The first 2 of the last 5 yrs the Kings were drafting in the 20's, then 12, 10 and 4. Those last 3 are major success drafts but it takes a few years to build back up.

GP is still the best GM in the NBA IMHO. Letting Adelman go was a mistake in retrospect but a small mistake compared to Musselman and Theus who set back the team a year or two each.

So lets start from now and see how the Kings do this year and next. I think it will be 1998 all over again!!!

Löwenherz · Jun 28, 2009

What I take from the Captain's exhaustive and, I must emphasize, much appreciated anaylsis isn't so much that he is using the stats to argue we necessarily won the Webber trade or even that it was a good trade on Petrie's part (because I think we've reached the point in almost universially agreeing it was an unmitigated disaster).

What I see it illustrating is an element typically forgotten when discussing the trade: it was not only a disaster for both the Kings and Sixers, but in actuality, it was even more of a disaster for Philly.

Now that does little to excuse the terrible move, but it shows that unless we wanted to watch Webber play as a shadow of his former self for the past several seasons all while earning a superstar's salary submarining the team's competative and financial viability and continuing to have the fanbase viciously turn on him, a trade had to be made.

So, in essence the stats merely show the strategy of trading Webber was sound, the tactics used to actually pull it off were not.

Assessing Petrie's trade history (split from Evans/Rubio thread)

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