What the Bojan Bogdanovic Trade Means
Please note that this is not a full “Meet Bojan” post. I want to wait a day or so to make sure there isn’t another move coming down right away.
The Trade:
The Detroit Pistons traded Kelly Olynyck and Saben Lee to the Utah Jazz for Bojan Bogdanovic. It is being reported that there are no picks going either way.
On first viewing, this trade seems slightly bizarre but mostly bizarre from the Jazz perspective. Bojan Bogdanovic is good, good enough that I would’ve definitely thought they could’ve gotten some sort of draft asset or a worthwhile young player for him, especially when you consider that the Jazz are only shedding about $4million in salary with this deal.
But this trade does make sense for the Pistons?
Yeah. It’s still a little strange for a team that clearly is set up to more or less tank again to make a trade that is making them better for one season but when the cost is so low there’s not much reason not to.
Is the cost really that low? Saben is young and Olynyck was hurt but he can play.
Getting off of Saben’s salary is a win. Seems like a good guy who dominated the G League to the point that he likely has a long and successful career owning fools in Europe ahead of him and I wish him nothing but the best. At no point has he looked like a viable NBA player, he was only owed $1.7million this season but anything other than eating that is a win.
Olynyck can play but the degree to which he can play is overstated by some. For much of his career he has been played off the court when games matter, he misses some key big-man stuff. The only thing you are worried about losing with him is the fact that he is a large human who can shoot, but Bojan is a better shooter and even if he isn’t as big as Olynyck he is big enough to play the 4 so it works out.
Isn’t Bojan more of a 3?
Yes. He has been the 3 more often than the 4, but he’s spent plenty of time as the bigger wing on the floor in his career and has often acquitted himself quite well. This is actually one of the main reasons this makes sense for Detroit.
Coming into the season the Pistons had two gaping holes that were closely connected.
Lack of high-level shooting. Especially from larger humans.
Lack of proven power forwards, shooting or not.
Bojan should immediately be the best shooter on the team by a wide margin and he can play the 4. My official prediction had Olynyck playing the 4, which is workable but not ideal.
Essentially, even if you want to make the argument that Bojan for Olynyck is a wash in terms of their ability to make your team better (which, to be clear, is not even remotely true) you’d still rather have Bojan because he fills a bigger hole that Olynyck.
Even if capable of being a power forward, Olynyck is really a center and the Pistons didn’t need him to play center, whereas the power forward spot was so dire that there was much talk of trying to have Isaiah Stewart spend time there. No longer is this an issue. Bojan is the starter, some combination of Livers, Diallo, and Knox will eat up the backup minutes. You no longer have to decide between playing bad/unproven players or moving guys out of position.
Does this end the “Stew as a 4” talk?
I certainly hope so. That was a bad idea from the moment it was proposed.
What will this do to the rotation?
Only good things. The only young guy who will be impacted here is Livers who no longer has a shot at winning a starting spot but Livers was a second-round pick with a very limited track record. In addition to that, Bojan is on an expiring contract so if Livers plays well enough to earn starter’s minutes this season then it’s just delayed by 1 year so no worries.
Beyond Livers, the only impact is that no one has to play out of position. The starting lineup is most likely Ivey/Cunningham/Bey/Bodganovic/Stewart. There is no positional or rotational downside here.
What are the odds this is one step towards a bigger deal for Detroit?
Decent? Although I doubt they make this trade with the specific intention of trading Bojan if that makes sense.
Given that Bojan is a good veteran on an expiring deal the Pistons will certainly be open to dealing him if anyone shows interest. But this deal makes perfect sense on its own for Detroit that I don’t think this is just the first domino to fall before like, taking on the Westbrook contract or something.
Are they going to take on the Westbrook contract??
This theoretically makes it easier if they wanted to which is what I mean. Bojan makes more money to use as salary filler and is good enough that any contending team trying to shed salary would be happy to get him back. But once again, I don’t think Detroit made this deal only to turn around and immediately trade Bojan. To be fair though, I don’t think Detroit wants to eat the Westbrook contract. If they wanted to do that they could’ve done it at any point this Summer or even last season, my guess is that ship has sailed which is fine with me.
It seems far more likely that Utah did this with an eye directly on another trade because it certainly seems like they took less value for Bojan than they could’ve gotten, but who knows? Sometimes guys fall through the cracks and no one has real interest anymore. Possibly that’s all that happened here.
The one thing that I will poo poo a bit is that I am doubtful as to the Pistons’ ability to flip Bogdanovic into something valuable, if that was possible then why did the Jazz trade him for so little? Maybe some team gets desperate at the deadline, but it just doesn’t add up there.
Does Bojan meaningfully change the Pistons’ trajectory this season?
Assuming he is on the roster when games start, yes.
On paper, Bogdanovic should be a perfect fit with the roster. He’s an elite shooter who can also score and create for himself. He isn’t going to like, carry the Pistons to the playoffs, but there’s a good chance he is the second-best player on the team behind Cade Cunningham. Over the last four seasons, Bojan averaged 18/4/2 while shooting 40% from deep on good volume, a TS% of 60.1%, and each of those teams made the playoffs so it isn’t total empty calories. He’s also not a bad defender and has some really good moments.
Essentially, Bojan mostly makes the Pistons more watchable and functional. His ability to space the floor while also taking some creation duties for himself will make life much easier for the Pistons’ young players without much fear of him overstepping to the point where he is hampering them at all. The Pistons will still probably suck, but they will suck less with him, and if some things break right his presence does raise the possibility that the Pistons don’t suck.
He is 33, any concern he is washed?
He’s at the age where it has to be at least some concern, but there wasn’t any statistical dropoff last season and the eye test says the same. It’s possible that this offseason is the straw that breaks the camel’s back but age shouldn’t be a huge concern at this point. His game is largely reliant on his size and shooting so it should age gracefully even if he does lose half a step and he’s also been largely healthy in his career so he doesn’t have a laundry list of injuries piling up, the fewest games he’s played in a season was 63 in the COVID shortened 19-20 season where they only played 72 games. He followed that up by playing in all 72 games the next year. He missed a couple of weeks down the stretch of last season but came back for the playoffs where he played heavy minutes and put up solid production.
Combine all that with the fact that the Pistons shouldn’t be overburdening him with responsibilities or minutes this season and there is good reason to figure he will be happy and healthy.
Are we concerned he tries to push his way out to a team trying to win?
That’s a real concern. He knows that even if he’s still physically good this season, he’s old enough that the clock is ticking so it wouldn’t shock me if he makes some sort of attempt to get the Pistons to trade/buy him out so he can contribute to a contender.
On the flip side though, he’s certainly aware that next Summer is probably the last significant contract that he will get in the NBA, so if he’s playing well with solid production he may be happy to ride big numbers into free agency instead of a diminished role on a contender.
Final Verdict:
Not some world-altering trade but a very tidy bit of business that makes sense both in terms of helping the young players develop while also making the team more fun to watch every night. As long as Bojan doesn’t agitate to get to a contender this should work out just fine, there’s even a universe where Bogdanovic works out well enough they keep him around for another year or two.