Chris Paul is Joining the Phoenix Suns
The NBA offseason is officially heating up, with the second “Woj/Shams-Bomb” coming to fruition today. Two trades have gone down, and both are involving the Oklahoma City Thunder.
The Thunder have traded Chris Paul and Abdel Nader to the Phoenix Suns for Ricky Rubio, Kelly Oubre, Ty Jerome, Jalen Lecque, and draft compensation.
What an absolutely wild trade. In just two days the Thunder have cleared out their backcourt, making way for Shai Gilgeous-Alexander to be the centerpiece of the future. They just sent Dennis Schroder to the Lakers yesterday, and now their All-Star point guard, Chris Paul, is moving to Arizona to play with Devin Booker and DeAndre Ayton.
Suns Perspective
Starting with the Suns point of view, this is an absolute win. They were playing their best basketball of the year in the bubble, where they didn’t have Oubre. That made him extremely expendable, especially with the contract he’s currently signed to. As for the rest of the guys involved, it’s just a straight upgrade at that point. Rubio and Paul are very similar in the sense that they are pass-first point guards, the only difference being a massive increase in talent with Paul. He can defend at an elite level, he’s proven that he can lead a team to the playoffs, and his leadership skills are unmatched. With him on the team, the Suns are a legit playoff team and Booker and Ayton have a guy to help give them all the skills and intangibles they need to succeed in the NBA. Great value for the Suns here.
Thunder Perspective
As for the Thunder, this is another trade that may seem like a head scratcher to most casual NBA fans. In a similar fashion to the Schroder deal, there’s seemingly very little value in this deal, especially for a guy whose value is as high as it’s been in almost eight years. However, everyone who paid any attention to the Thunder in the past few weeks knew that Paul was on the block and going to get traded. This diminished his value a little bit, but the Thunder are so committed to a rebuild that this deal shouldn’t be considered poor value.
They get Rubio, who although he is on a larger contract can either play alongside SGA in a similar way that Paul did, or be used as pretty solid trade bait. Jerome and Lecque should be seen as projects, as neither have done much of anything in the league so far. Jerome is the more established one of the two, but neither is ready to contribute right away. Then last but not least there’s Oubre, who I would argue is the most valuable piece the Thunder got in return. He was playing some of his most productive basketball in Phoenix, and now has the opportunity to be one of the leading scorers in OKlahoma City. I think that we could see him average around 20 points a night next year alongside Gilgeous-Alexander.
The loss of Nader isn’t something to go unnoticed as well, as he played a solid role for the Thunder. Unfortunately, he was just a throw-in to this deal, but could surprise some Phoenix fans with the skills he brings to the table.
