NBA Trade Grades: Timberwolves send Ricky Rubio to Jazz
Utah Jazz
On the one hand, the Utah Jazz got a touch worse with this trade. Rubio and George Hill are both stout defenders, but Hill brought the perimeter touch that Rubio will not.
Hill is coming off a terrific year in Utah, averaging a career-high 16.9 points per game on .477/.403 shooting splits. Compared to Rubio’s 11.1 points per game on .402/.306/.891 shooting splits, it’s pretty clear who the better scorer and shooter was, which is important for a Jazz offense that ranked 12th in offensive rating despite its slow pace.
However, Rubio has three vast advantages over Hill, Teague, Lowry, Jrue Holiday or any other point guard hitting the free agency market this summer: His facilitation, his age and his contract.
Last year, Rubio averaged a career-high 9.1 assists per game, trumping Hill’s 4.2, Lowry’s 7.0 Holiday’s 7.3 or even Teague’s 7.8 per game. Rubio is also only 26 years old, making him younger than Holiday (27), Teague (29), Hill (31) and Lowry (31).
Finally, Rubio is slated to make $29.2 million over the next two seasons (about $14.6 million annually). You can be guaranteed all four of the aforementioned players will make way more than that.
With only a few hours before the Jazz lost about $16 million in cap space — stemming from not signing Hill to an extension at the start of the season, which means his cap hold will put Utah over the salary cap after the moratorium period — they needed to find a replacement for their point guard. This is why the Jazz were able to absorb Rubio’s deal without sending matching salary.
Utah needs to stabilize PG position to have a real shot at keeping Hayward. Would use cap space that expires in 7-plus hours. https://t.co/6Lwm03KvJZ
— Zach Lowe (@ZachLowe_NBA) June 30, 2017
The trade obviously signals Utah is not confident in its ability to re-sign George Hill, or that they don’t want to overpay for the services of a 31-year-old point guard who missed 33 games last year due to a variety of injuries.
Rubio can’t shoot, but if the Jazz are able to keep Hayward — and a little stability at the point guard position should help there, with Hayward’s unrestricted free agency and Joe Ingles‘ restricted free agency leaving things feeling very up in the air — this could be a great addition.
Have talked/written about Rubio/Utah for last week-plus. Made sense. Hill likely out. Utah can at least negotiate from position of strength
— Zach Lowe (@ZachLowe_NBA) June 30, 2017
As ESPN‘s Kevin Pelton points out, the Jazz can get back under the salary cap line by waiving Boris Diaw‘s $7.5 million non-guaranteed salary and finding a way to trade Alec Burks and the remaining two years, $20 million on his contract.
Giving up a pick in the 20s is more than worth the ideal presence Rubio will bring to Quin Snyder’s third-ranked defense. Though his lack of a perimeter shot hurts, the Spanish floor general will get the chance to prove his true worth on a more competitive squad (assuming Hayward re-signs).
Next: 2017 NBA free agency tracker - Grades for every deal so far
Even without Hayward, Rubio is an underrated floor general on a below-market value contract, and represents a superior alternative to re-signing a 31-year-old, injury-prone George Hill to a lengthy deal.
Grade: A-