NBA Trade Grades: Hornets acquire Dwight Howard from Hawks

The Charlotte Hornets have agreed to trade for Dwight Howard, sending Miles Plumlee’s awful contract to the Atlanta Hawks in the process. Here are NBA Trade Grades for both sides.

Trade season leading up to the 2017 NBA Draft has officially gotten weird.

As if the Boston Celtics trading down from the No. 1 pick and the Los Angeles Lakers sending poor D’Angelo Russell and Timofey Mozgov to the Brooklyn Nets for salary cap space weren’t bizarre enough, the Charlotte Hornets and Atlanta Hawks decided to get in on the action with an unexpected move of their own.

As first reported by The Undefeated‘s Marc J. Spears, the Hawks have agreed to send Dwight Howard to the Hornets.

The Vertical‘s Adrian Wojnarowski first reported the details of the deal, which will see D-12 and the No. 31 overall pick in this year’s draft heading to Charlotte in exchange for Marco Belinelli, Miles Plumlee and the No. 41 pick in the draft.

This is a head-scratching deal for the Hawks at first glance, but is there more here than meets the eye? To sort if all out, here’s a look at NBA Trade Grades for both sides.

Atlanta Hawks

For the Atlanta Hawks, this deal really boils down to one objective, pure and simple: Getting Dwight Howard’s contract off the books.

It appears as though new general manager Travis Schlenk didn’t want to waste any time in shipping off a deadweight contract that was spun as a hometown hero’s triumphant return to the ATL less than a year ago.

After signing D-12 to a three-year, $70.5 million deal last summer, Howard had a bit of an up-and-down year in Atlanta, to put it kindly. His numbers dropped to 13.5 points (the lowest scoring output since his rookie year), 12.7 rebounds and 1.2 blocks per game (the lowest output of his career).

His effort waned and in an infamous exit interview, he sounded off on his lack of minutes in the playoffs, leaving many wondering if his time back home would be over after only a year.

A few months and a few comments about adding a three-point shot to his game later, Howard is being unceremoniously shipped off to Charlotte for a truly underwhelming return.

At 31 years old, Howard’s athleticism and ability to help a winning team are clearly on the decline. The Hawks had the fourth-best defense in the NBA with him in the middle, but as the team looks to rebuild, this lackluster package might have to do.

At the very least, Atlanta created a small trade exception with this move.

The Hawks will clear out a little more than $4 million in cap space by getting rid of Howard’s contract, though it’s worth noting he only had two years left on his deal, as opposed to Plumlee’s remaining three years.

As ESPN‘s Zach Lowe points out, the free agencies of Paul Millsap and Tim Hardaway Jr. will all but negate that short-term cap relief if the Hawks look to re-sign them.

It sounds like a definite possibility Millsap receives better offers elsewhere, but with three years and $37.5 million left on Plumlee’s contract, it’s not like the Hawks are getting that much relief here. They still had to take on one of the NBA’s worst contracts to make this happen.

Belinelli will provide three-point shooting (36 percent last year), but even after a bounce-back season in Charlotte, the 31-year-old veteran will only be on the roster for a year before he and his $6.6 million salary hit free agency in 2018.

Combine that with trading down 10 spots in this year’s draft and it’s hard to get excited here, even from a salary/personnel dump standpoint. The Hawks didn’t have to attach any assets to move him, which is a positive, and they have a good chance to land a young center with this year’s No. 19 overall pick, but nothing more than a passing grade seems appropriate.

Grade: C

Charlotte Hornets

Say what you want about Dwight Howard, but this is a pretty great deal for the Charlotte Hornets, who needed to improve after a disappointing 36-46 season but didn’t really have the means to do so in free agency or on the trade market.

Yet somehow, they were able to turn Plumlee’s horrible deal and an aging veteran who shot 42.9 percent from the field last season into (an admittedly declining) Dwight Howard.

That being said, his past experience with Hornets head coach Steve Clifford on both the Orlando Magic and the Los Angeles Lakers could lead to a late-career Renaissance for D-12’s game.

Though Howard still has two years and $47.3 million remaining on his deal, a core of Kemba Walker, Nicolas Batum, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Cody Zeller and Frank Kaminsky needed more help. That wasn’t going to happen in free agency, so turning two unnecessary assets into a defensive anchor is a great move.

As The Vertical‘s Bobby Marks points out, the team will enjoy some cap relief in 2019-20. This team is too good to blow it up and tank, but not good enough to seriously contend.

For a team trapped in the middle that could do with a return to the excitement of playoff basketball, even during the Golden State Warriors’ and Cleveland Cavaliers’ reign, there are worse ways to spend the short-term than trying to revive Howard’s career.

Throw in the fact that the Hornets moved up 10 spots in this year’s draft, where there will be plenty of talented and experienced second round prospects to choose from, and this deal is pretty clearly a win for Charlotte.

The potential downside here is what happens to Cody Zeller’s minutes at the 5, and though this seems insignificant, it’s worth remembering that Charlotte was 33-29 with him on the floor this season…compared to 3-17 without him.

However, internal development wasn’t going to get this team back to the postseason, and Zeller is still growing. If Clifford knows how to use D-12 to anchor what’s been a regular top-10 defense until this past season, the risk of his diminishing game and forcing Zeller to adjust will be more than worth it.

Especially since they got rid of Plumlee’s deal and moved up 10 spots in the draft.

Next: 2017 NBA Draft - 5 possible draft-day trades we want to see

Grade: A