Everybody talks about Andre Iguodala getting traded from the Grizzlies soon. I won’t go into a huge amount of depth here about my feelings on the matter, but it boils down to, why does a fringe All-Star type dude who was carried to rings by better players and is the worst FMVP of all time get to decide that he doesn’t want to play for a fun young team like the ‘Zlies?
Anyway, Iguodala is obviously getting moved, but Jae Crowder also seems like a good candidate to get shipped away around the trade deadline or even earlier. In fact, the ‘Zlies signed him to a one-year deal probably for just that reason. There’s this amorphous concept in trade talks of “contenders” or “a contender” or “a playoff push”…Crowder could easily go to a contender or a team trying to make a playoff push to provide a temporary boost, and the ‘Zlies would get some useless G-League prospects and second-round picks out of the transaction. Not bad for a guy they randomly signed to provide half a season of veteran leadership and…mentoring for Marko Guduric maybe?
Whether or not Crowder actually provides a boost or not is up for debate, but the ‘Zlies can easily convince teams that he would provide a boost, and that’s all that matters. They can waltz right up to the negotiation table and say “just three years ago, Jae Crowder was a vital part of some cohesive and successful Celtics teams, and his impact both on and off the court for us has been perfect for our young guys”. Just don’t let the negotiators on the other side look at his season stats and see that he’s shooting below 30% on threes and just 37% from the field.