Phoenix Suns: Complete grades for the 2019 NBA offseason
By Adam Noel
Trading away Josh Jackson
Two years is in no way a long amount of time.
But for Phoenix Suns fans, two years of waiting for Josh Jackson to live up to expectations melted away like an ice cube on a warm summer day.
The former lottery pick from 2016 found himself downgraded to the value of a rotation player at best this offseason.
That culminated into the Suns trading Jackson, De’Anthony Melton and draft picks to the Memphis Grizzlies in exchange for Kyle Korver and Jevon Carter.
The Grizzlies are trading Kyle Korver and Jevon Carter to the Suns for DeAnthony Melton, Josh Jackson 2020 second-round pick and 2021 conditional second-round pick, league sources tell ESPN.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) July 3, 2019
But in retrospect, Memphis will be a great spot for Jackson as he will get to play and develop around a very young core of players.
From the Suns side, this was not what people wanted to see.
Immediately the team decided it would not keep Korver, later buying out his contract. So all in all, Phoenix only received former West Virginia guard Carter. This was a massive swing-and-miss for Suns management.
Yes, it was understandable the team wanted to part ways from the troubled Jackson and dump his $7 million contract for next season. But to attach Melton and multiple picks was again a huge mismanagement of team assets.
While the money Phoenix saved from Jackson’s deal helped other acquisitions, this overall was a terrible trade for the Suns. Giving up on two young players and surrendering picks for a single third-string point guard was not great.