Next up, the LaMelo Ball trade. This one was a true shocker, as it was mere scattered Twitter rumors 24 hours before the Shams notification made it official. The Charlotte Hornets, after their best season in a decade - they were one of the best teams in the entire league after January before a disappointing showing in the Play-In - decided to ship out their franchise player. LaMelo will be just 25 years old when next season tips off, and has already been an All-Star. His contract isn’t terrible - 2 years left at roughly $40 million a pop.

But he has a well-earned reputation for being unserious and reckless, both on the court (one-legged three-point attempts that make me want to pull my hair out) and off it (a slew of video clips showcasing his very dangerous driving in a variety of gauche cars). What I have realized recently is that despite his negative characteristics, LaMelo is an analytics darling. This past season his net rating was +8.9 (92 percentile), and he ranks #7 in the league in EPM (Estimated Plus-Minus, which “predicts a player's contribution to the team in points per 100 possessions” (dunksandthrees.com)). There’s great statistical evidence that shows how much he improves his teammates’ shot quality. So why would Charlotte pull the plug? Do they know something we don’t about LaMelo? Are they betting that Coby White and Kon Knueppel can replicate that production? Was it more financially motivated? To me, it seemed fishy. Perhaps the Hornets are trying to accumulate draft capital for a bigger fish…

On the flip side, I was equally baffled by the Minnesota Timberwolves. This transaction was preceded by salary dumping Julius Randle to Brooklyn (recipient of my inaugural and prestigious “Guy Who Needs To Be Launched Into The Sun” Award for his poor postseason play) in order to create cap space to resign Ayo Dosunmu (winner of my “Trade Deadline Hero That Every Other Team Regrets Not Trading For Because He Was Very Available” Award). 5 years for $112 million for a guard isn’t unreasonable - but now he’ll be coming off the bench behind LaMelo and Anthony Edwards? At the same time, Minnesota sent out cult hero and former 6th Man of the Year Naz Reid in addition to draft capital. So now, the Timberwolves have a loaded backcourt and a very thin frontcourt. Odd, especially considering they have to compete with a plethora of elite Western Conference big men (Wembanyama, Jokic, Holmgren… Clingan?)

After more sober reflection, I like it for Minnesota. It didn’t cost very much, and the addition of Ball will take a lot of pressure off of Edwards. At the same time, if it goes poorly (which there’s a more than decent chance), Edwards might be the next of a long line of Timberwolves stars to request a trade after years of futility (Jimmy Butler, Kevin Love, Kevin Garnett, etc). If Minnesota can round out their frontcourt (go get Rui Hachimura), I’ll like their offseason a lot more. I’m more questionable on the Hornets side of things.