After every transaction in the NBA there’s always a rush to figure out who won the deal and who got the short end of the stick.
It’s rare that you get a trade that comes through the grapevine and feels like an immediate win for both sides but that’s what this new deal between the Hawks and Timberwolves sending Jeff Teague back to Atlanta feels like.
Once you finish processing the weird four year trade loop with Jeff Teague that was just completed (that takes a while), you realize start to realize that this deal makes a lot of sense on both sides.
Let’s get in to the details. The Hawks are trading Allen Crabbe to the Timberwolves for Jeff Teague and 3-and-D prospect Treveon Graham, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reported.
Now, the details.
The Hawks finally have a backup point guard
The Hawks are a bottom feeder even when Trae Young is playing on the court. When he sits, as you can imagine, things really start to go bad.
When Young is on the floor the Hawks have an offensive rating of 108.2. When he sits that number tanks all the way to 90.7, per NBA.com’s stats tool. That’s dreadful.
Teague gives Atlanta a veteran presence at the guard spot behind Young who has shown he can manage, at least, a below average NBA offense.
Plus, they’re getting back a Hawks legend.
The Hawks just traded for 20% of the January 2015 Eastern Conference Player of the Month.
— Andrew Joseph (@AndyJ0seph) January 16, 2020
The Timberwolves have wiggle room
By moving both Teague and Graham, the Timberwolves just opened up wiggle room to make some sort of trade down the line.
Teague was a fine player in Minnesota, but he didn’t move the needle at point guard. He had a -3.9 net rating in 34 games played in Minnesota this season. It was a move that, from the beginning, didn’t make much sense and never really worked out.
It didn’t cost them anything to move Teague, either. Teague makes $19 million and Crabbe made $18.5 million. Throw in Graham’s small $1.65 million deal and they actually shave a bit of money. Plus, they have another opportunity to upgrade their roster.
Let’s be honest here for a second, though. The real winners are the rest of us. I think speak for us all when I say I missed the Hawks’ arena announcer yelling Jeff TEAAAAAAGUE every time he scored. The NBA wasn’t right without that. Now it’s back.
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