213hoops.com
What Would a Clippers Trade for Jrue Holiday Look Like?
The Clippers have already been linked in trade rumors to Jrue Holiday, and it seems very likely Jrue will get moved in the next week or two. But how would a Clippers trade for Jrue Holiday work?
Well, let’s first rule out Kawhi Leonard and Paul George as trade chips, as Portland wouldn’t want them and the Clippers need them to contend. There were PG trade rumors early this summer, but that’s not happening now, and certainly not for Jrue.
Now let’s consider the Blazers perspective. They just traded away their franchise superstar and are actively tanking. They also just went out of their way to get a starting center (DeAndre Ayton), and their three best young players are all guards (Scoot Henderson, Shaedon Sharpe, Anfernee Simons). All the reporting is that having gotten Ayton and with their stable of young guys, they’re mostly looking for draft capital.
Returning to the trade package, Norman Powell seems like a non-starter. He’s a guard, the Blazers traded him to the Clippers in 2022 because they regretted paying him his current deal, and he’s not on their current team’s timeline. This is important because the Clippers need to get very close to Jrue Holiday’s nearly $37M in salary for the deal, and Norm’s is the biggest salary of the non 213 group.
For assets, the Clippers’ young guys mostly don’t have a ton of value, and the second overall most promising of them by broad consensus, Bones Hyland, is positionally redundant with all of the Blazers’ young guys. That makes him an unlikely candidate to be in such a deal.
What we are left with is probably one of two options. The first is the Clippers sending all three of their veteran power forwards – Morris, RoCo, Nico – to make the salaries work, attaching any of the fringier young guys as needed (Moussa, Jordan Miller, Preston, Boston), and then putting in both the 2028 and 2030 first round picks. The Blazers are after picks, and with no blue-chip player/prospect (or anything remotely close for that matter), the Clippers would have to send both. Maybe they could put light protections on one or both, but it seems unlikely.
The second version of the trade would have Terance Mann in instead of one of the power forwards (the Clippers would presumably prefer to keep Nico) and sending over just one first round pick. The Blazers would honestly probably prefer the first scenario unless they really love Terance, as while he’s a good player and would fit next to their young guys, he is already in his prime and it seems like they’re in for a long rebuild.
I do think the Blazers would probably do either of these deals in a vacuum. There are now two follow up questions – can other teams beat this offer, and would the Clippers accept either of the deals.
The answer to the first question is yes. The Heat, Celtics, Knicks, and Sixers are the teams who have been firmly rumored to be interested in Holiday, and all but the Sixers have significantly more picks to offer than the Clippers. Whether any of them would send 3 first round picks is a different story, but the Celtics and Knicks in particular have the assets to do so.
The second question is murkier. Jrue Holiday is a fantastic fit next to Paul George and Kawhi Leonard, and would easily be the 3rd best player on the team as well as their best teammate in the 213 era. On the court, it’s great. There are questions though, as Holiday is 33, has a lot of miles, and has just one year left on his deal. There have been rumors he might retire, and if not, he’d probably want a massive deal. The former would mean sacrificing most remaining future assets for a rental, the latter would require committing the next four years to an aging core of Kawhi, PG, and Jrue.
To me, trading both firsts for Jrue (if both are unprotected or very lightly protected) is a tough pill to swallow. As much as I appreciate Terance Mann, what he does can largely be done by Jrue, making it a bit easier to send him out compared to a Harden deal. Whether that deal is enough for Portland remains to be seen, but if a Jrue Holiday to Clippers trade occurs, my bet would be something along the lines of Terance, Morris, RoCo, the 2028 pick, and maybe a swap or some seconds.
What Would a Clippers Trade for Jrue Holiday Look Like?
Robert Flom