Why Bill Simmons’ overrates Greg Monroe’s trade value
By Dan Feldman
Bill Simmons published his annual trade-value column, and a few Pistons were included.
As a reminder he are the rules:
- Salaries matter. Would you rather pay Serge Ibaka $12.4 million a year or Chris Bosh $20.6 million?
- Age matters. Would you rather have Dirk for the next three seasons or Boogie for the next 12?
- Contract length matters — a newish wrinkle in an era defined by shorter guarantees, swollen caps and forward-thinking GMs who hoard cap space like it’s Walter White’s crystal meth recipe.
- Pretend the league passed the following rule: For 24 hours, any player can be traded without cap ramifications, but with luxury-tax and next-day-cap ramifications. If Team A tells Team B, “We’ll trade you Player X for Player Y,” would Team B make the deal?
- Concentrate on degrees. For instance, a Klay Thompson–Dwyane Wade swap ain’t happening, but Miami would at least say, “Wow, Thompson’s available?” while GSW would say, “We can’t trade Klay for someone who’s eight years older.” That counts in the big scheme of things.
- This list runs in reverse order. If Thompson is no. 18, then players 1 through 17 are all players about whom GSW’s braintrust would either say, “We hate giving up Klay, but let’s have a meeting ASAP,” or, “Done! Call this deal in!” And GSW wouldn’t trade him straight-up for any player listed between nos. 19 and 60.
Brandon Jennings (pre-injury) received honorable mention, Greg Monroe cracked the top-60 list:
"59. Greg MonroeFor an earlier draft of this piece, I wrote that “if Greg Monroe was a junk food item, he’d be Pop Chips’ sweet potato flavor.” In other words, he made you spend an inordinate amount of time wondering why his flavor doesn’t work. Who doesn’t love sweet potatoes? Who doesn’t love lefty big men who post up AND pass from the high elbow? But then the Josh Smith trade happened and Monroe not-so-magically started ripping off 20-13s after the Pistons finished their basketball chemo treatments. And now he’s absolutely a market max guy. Josh Smith is like Haley Joel Osment in Pay It Forward."
Simmons underrates just how much Monroe accepting the qualifying offer torpedoed the forward’s trade value – both for the Pistons and other teams.
For the Pistons, this signaled Monroe’s desire to leave town. Not only did he sign the qualifying offer, he did so well before the deadline. If he were interested in a long-term extension, he would have waited until the last possible moment in hopes the Pistons caved and offered one.
So, he’s less valuable to Detroit – and more difficult to trade thanks to his veto power on a deal.
He’s also less valuable to other teams, who wouldn’t receive his Bird Rights and would need cap space to re-sign him. That limits trade partners to contending teams that want a rest-of-season rental and teams with cap space next summer, the latter of which would be taking a big risk – and therefore wouldn’t offer the Pistons as much.
I’d trade Monroe for many players listed below him on Simmons’ rankings, including:
- Chandler Parsons
- Jrue Holiday
- Gordon Hayward
- Aaron Gordon
- Julius Randle
- Kemba Walker
- Shabazz Muhammad
- Dennis Schroder
- Nerlens Noel
- Michael Carter-Williams
- Tobias Harris
- Taj Gibson
- Dante Exum
- Harrison Barnes
- Donatas Motiejunas
- Steven Adams
- Mason Plumlee
- Marcus Smart
- Elfrid Payton
- Ben McLemore
- Derrick Rose
- Brandon Knight
Of course, the Pistons could be operating on more information than I have about Monroe re-signing. But even if he says he’ll stay, plans can go awry. A pledge from Monroe to re-sign would dramatically shrink that list, but it wouldn’t erase it.
I’m a big fan of Monroe’s game. He’s young. He plays hard and effectively. He fits with Andre Drummond.
I hope he’s a Piston next season.
But the risk is too high he’s not, which really diminishes his trade value.
Next season, likely on a long-term deal in Detroit or elsewhere, Monroe should belong on Simmons’ list. Not this year, though.