The Bratwurst – Milwaukee Bucks Blog

UPDATE: It’s official

On Monday, when I saw the story being reported by the News-Herald of Northern Ohio that the Cavs, Bucks and Seattle OKC Nobodys were working on a trade centering around Mo Williams going to the Cavs, I almost wrote a post saying that I thought the story was totally bogus.

There were several things in that report that didn’t sound right to me. Why would the Bucks send Mo to a division rival? Since Cleveland just extended the contract of Daniel Gibson, why would they want to add another short point guard (as a newly re-signed player, Gibson cannot be traded immediately). It always bugs me when trade rumors are published but are attributed to nothing but anonymous “NBA sources” and don’t mention any concrete trade scenarios beyond speculation. That’s just lazy reporting.

The more I read that story, there was something in it that made me think it had been given to the reporter by someone either from the Bucks’ or Mo Williams’ camp to encourage a deal. It says that Mo is 6’2″.

Everybody who follows the Bucks knows he is listed at 6’1″ and plays smaller than that. He is listed as 6’1″ on the Bucks website. The only way a reporter gets that wrong is if someone tells him the wrong height and he just runs with it. Why would someone want Williams to be 6’2″ instead of 6’1″? Because they don’t want him to appear smaller — and, by implication, worse defensively — than Daniel Gibson.

Now, though, the Journal-Sentinel is on the story, with Charles Gardner saying that the Bucks are interested in getting back Luke Ridnour in the deal. Now it sounds like someone is doing some real reporting.

One thing about Ridnour — he isn’t nearly the offensive threat that Mo is, but defensively he positively makes Mo look like Gary Payton (the Seattle Payton, not the Milwaukee version). Ridnour is listed at 6’1″, 167 and was the starting point guard on a Seattle team a couple of years ago that was the worst defensive team of all time. However, the biggest problem with Mo and the Bucks is that Mo is basically “too good” offensively to fit in. Ridnour, for better or worse, fits the bill as a distributor who would help the offense flow. Ridnour, after all, was also the starting point guard on the surprising 52-win 04/05 Sonics.

Ridnour also only has two years remaining on his contract, so he would give the Bucks flexibility to see just how good Ramon Sessions really is — Ridnour will be fine off the bench if Sessions is good and adequate as a starter if Sessions isn’t.

So what would each team want from a trade in order to make it work?

Cleveland is gunning for a championship shot this year or next. They are well into luxury tax land this season, but have a little cap room next year and will drop well under the cap should LeBron leave after next season. By adding Mo they would probably build around him should LeBron leave. They also need a general talent upgrade in every other spot besides small forward.

Seattle wants to save money and clear a frontcourt logjam to eventually move Kevin Durant to a forward position.

The Bucks are trying to remake their long-term salary structure on the fly, remake the roster into a more complementary group, and picking up some rebounding would be nice.

Here’s the best trade I could come up with:

Cleveland gets Mo Williams and Chris Wilcox.

Seattle gets Wally Szczerbiak (I just spelled that correctly from memory. Amazing).

Milwaukee gets Luke Ridnour and DJ White.

The OKC Runaways would save about $7 million next season, and would free up room for both Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant. This would also solidify their shot at the #1 pick in next years’ draft, as their team would be awful this season. But it is well known that they are in a long-term rebuilding plan, and with several high picks and about $40 million in cap room in 2010, they are biding their time.

Cleveland would add two ostensibly talented players, one of which (Wilcox) has an expiring contract. I’ve never thought much of Wilcox’ game — he’s the 6’10″ version of Mo Williams. He scores just well enough to be a good looking offensive player but not enough to really carry a team, and he’s lousy defensively to boot. But Cleveland made the finals with a power forward tandem of Drew Gooden and Anderson Varejao, so a Wilcox-Varejao combo might work just fine. Cleveland will be $30 million under the cap after next season (if LeBron leaves) so Mo’s salary wouldn’t be a problem.

The Bucks get rid of Mo’s contract and a point guard who should fit the roster better. DJ White has a chance to be a Carl Landry-type of player — an undersized bench guy who gives 15 energetic, effective minutes a night. In the long run, the Bucks would save about $20 million on this deal.

How would this trade affect the Bucks? I don’t think they will win more with Ridnour than they would with Mo. But they wouldn’t lose more, and they would have much more roster flexibility going forward.