Grade the trade: Pistons move up in lopsided B/R trade proposal

Detroit Pistons: Draft trade with the Charlotte Hornets

Swartz suggests that the Pistons might do this trade in order to draft Brandon Miller, who would be the perfect fit with their young core on paper.

But are we even sure Miller is the guy? We’ve not heard much about him in recent weeks, as guys like the Thompson Twins and Taylor Hendricks have moved up draft boards. The Pistons would be sacrificing two valuable veterans for a guy that they may not even have that high on their big board.

If the Pistons thought they could get a player they had ranked in the same tier as Miller without giving up anything, then this trade makes no sense for them.

However, if they thought Miller was in a higher tier, and that he would be the perfect mixture of talent and fit, then this makes a whole lot of sense. Hayward isn’t a huge drop-off from Bogdanovic when he’s healthy and the Pistons could probably flip him at the deadline or use his contact to make a splashy trade.

Bogdanovic only has one guaranteed year on his deal, and Burks is on an expiring once the Pistons pick up his team option for next season, so it’s not like either of them are part of the long-term plans.

This would give Detroit one of, if not the best, young cores in the NBA, set them up for years to come, and they would still have some money to splash out on free agents to complement the young players, so it’s not a given that they would even miss Bogdanovic and Burks.

I do question whether Detroit has Miller ranked that highly, but other than that, this seems like a no-brainer for the Pistons and one that the Hornets would probably run away from, as they can likely do better if they want to trade the 2nd pick.

Grade: B