[...] For their part, Milwaukee, as recently as this week rumored to be considering parting with their 22-year-old leading scorer, has seemingly decided to pair him with a player a little too similar for comfort. Their backcourt is now the undersized, inefficient, defensively questionable and poorly spaced lynchpin of everything they are trying to do. Nevertheless, Ellis gives the Warriors the isolation threat that they otherwise haven’t otherwise had, and a genuinely precocious offensive talent. The fit is very awkward, more so than the bonus of Udoh and the saving of salary offsets, and the long term prognosis for the team is harldy clearer, but the talent infusion is most apparent, most evidently in the short term. As duplicable as the backcourt is, it’s a good one. On balance, of the two teams, it appears Milwaukee comes out as the trade’s winner.
Neither side can be argued as being an emphatic winner, though. The Warriors are hereby committed to a short term future of three not-quite-All-Star players, one of whom incessantly suffers different injuries, and one of whom incessantly suffers the same injury time and again. Meanwhile, the Bucks commit themselves to a backcourt of two undersized, inefficient ball-dominant scorers, a series of useful wings who can’t create any offense, an excellent young forward whose contract expires in three months, and a front court consisting of Drew Gooden and a bunch of shot-blocking specialists. And probably lose their Aussie fanbase along the way.
[...] This, of course, isn’t it for either team. By making this deal, and deliberately putting themselves in a position where the only center on the roster is the mere shell of the once capable Biedrins, and gifting away their best player for someone injured long term, the Warriors seem to be setting themselves up for a tank job. (And if they’re not, they should be. Playoff experience is valuable, but Stephen Curry’s ankle is invaluable.) Additionally, the fact that Brandon Jennings is being kept through the deadline does not necessarily mean he is being kept through the whole of his rookie deal, and with Scott Skiles about to hit the four-year anniversary mark, he is about to test his own shelf life. Milwaukee has more to do and they know it.
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Why the Bucks-Warriors trade doesn’t really make sense
