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By Andy Livingston
At the great Canius Hoopus blog, Key Dae examines all the available trades for Kevin Love.
Dae proposes Kevin Love to Washington for Bradley Beal, Nene and two future first round picks.
Where it works:
No longer an offensive weakness in the Power Forward position and outside of knuckle pushups, no more under-60 game seasons in that position. A frontcourt of Marcin Gortat and Love does sound enticing and Love getting some defensive tutelage under Randy Wittman would seem to push him even more into perennial all-star status.
A PF who averages a double-double and is strong enough to bring down rebounds like that on a nightly basis could propel the Wizards to the top of the east (at least to face the Heat in the conference final).
Where it doesn’t work:
Losing Bradley Beal might be a loss too much to handle for some Wizards fans. Beal is very young and very amiable and his ceiling has yet to be defined. His playoff series this season earned his name dropped in every teams Most Wanted list, but is KLove worth breaking up the House of Guards? There has been a lot of chatter that Beal’s value will never be higher than it is now and capitalizing on that to gain a top-5 star in someone like Love is too much. However, given Beal’s youth and his ability to be a star on the floor right now, it’s too hard to make that switch. His ability is still growing and who knows how many more moves he can develop teaming up with John Wall.
It also doesn’t work in the two future first round picks. The Wizards lost a first round this year to the Suns in the Okafor for Gortat swap and maybe that is the best for them now. Given the amount of Free Agents they need to resign, juggling all that and a top pick would push them into losing one or another in a big way. However, the Wizards draft record has been improving, the options on those first round picks might result in some other essential trade and the field of options in the draft is too big to consider giving up two of them for one player.
This is also a trade for only one year. Love will become unrestricted after next season and the Wizards are poised for a good playoff run next year, but they’re not quite there to be able to rent a superstar for a year. Many teams are looking for Love to re-sign for longer before they even trade, but he does not seem to be entertaining that as much as he just wants out of Minnesota.
Final Verdict: No.
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