In what may end up being the most irrelevant trade in the NBA this season, the New Orleans Hornets have sent 30 year old PF Hakim Warrick to the Charlotte Bobcats and will receive 32 year old SG Matt Carroll.
Before anyone attempts to over-analyze this trade, I implore you to reconsider, because the deal as a whole is largely meaningless. Given the Hornets’ incredibly deep front court, Hakim Warrick was the team’s 6th big man, behind even Lance Thomas. As a result, he was shipped off to Charlotte, seemingly in exchange for some back court help in Matt Carroll, since the Hornets are much thinner at his position.
Look deeper, though, and this trade looks like more of a cost-cutting maneuver than a basketball-related one. Over the past four seasons, Carroll has posted PERs of 5.5, 7.1, 12.2, and 5.6 (from oldest to most recent), with his 2010-11 year looking like a clear aberration. In fact, the first two words of John Hollinger’s most recent player profile of Carroll are “it’s over”, so it’s probably safe to say that his best years are behind him.
From a financial perspective, he will make $3.5 million dollars this season in the last year of his contract, compared to the $4 million that Warrick is scheduled to earn. Given that neither player has any real value for the Hornets on the court, saving $500K seems like a good enough reason to make this swap. In a pinch (see – 76ers game last Wednesday), Carroll is someone who could potentially be utilized as some extra guard help, but other than that, don’t expect much of anything from him.
One potential downside of this deal that Michael McNamara just mentioned is the trade limitations set forth in the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement for recently acquired players. A newly acquired player’s salary cannot be aggregated with another player for two months following the initial acquisition of that player. While Warrick’s salary could have been aggregated with that of another player (as Brad Miller’s and Dyson’s were in the trade to acquire Lopez and Warrick) at any point with another Hornets player, Carroll can only be moved in deals that do not require aggregation until January 13th. Aggregation allows more flexibility in making deals, but it is not always necessary. It is fair to wonder whether or not the $500,000 of savings is worth forfeiting the ability to aggregate Warrick’s salary as part of a possible larger trade within the next two months.
Additionally, as a Bird player, Carroll can veto any trade since he is in the final year of his current contract.
Reaction from Queen City Hoops: It’s pretty simple from the Bobcats point-of-view. This is a no risk trade and fills a serious need for the team. Rod Higgins dumps Carroll’s expiring contract worth $3.5 million and takes on $500k more for the season with Warrick- Charlotte was just north of $500k under the tax and this is basically how they’ve chosen to use that extra cash.
Warrick should see some significant minutes in Charlotte and may just jump ahead of Tyrus Thomas for the backup PF spot. Warrick will also play some SF behind MKG in the absence of Gerald Henderson.
Overall, a logical, no risk move by the Bobcats front office today.
35 responses to “Hornets Acquire SG Matt Carroll from Bobcats in Exchange for PF Hakim Warrick”
We goin’ all da way.
HAWNETS HERE DEY COME; Ft. Matt CarroLOL
Well said Mason.
Warrick wasn’t getting any burn so we don’t lose anything…
The upside is that this guy can come in a hit a needed 3 in a pinch.
beyond that he is not gonna do much for us.. but that is still more than we were using warrick for..
Trading away the better player and we still become better as a team… even if its better by a miniscule amount…
Well his numbers from 3 for the last season was 8-43, those 3’s in a pinch years are done.
Eek, that sub 19%.
38% on 3s for his career… thats a very respectable number…
he may have had a down year but normally shooting ability is one of the longest lasting skills that doesn’t really fade with age…
Over the last 5yrs he’s shot 12%, 26%, 21%, 37%, & 18%
Thats an average of 22.8% from 3
Warrick is still a versatile, serviceable backup at SF/PF. Carroll is a complete scrub. I don’t see how this trade is beneficial to this team at all, besides the $500,000 that Benson gets to keep in his pocket.
LOL. To quote ESPN’s article “The Bobcats are trying to build their team around defense, and Warrick could help in that process.”
This is why I always come to 247 first.
Hah!
That’s dunlaps quote not Espn writer
I was hoping we’d be able to use Warrick as a trade with Henry later on. Hopefully Carroll comes in and gets some 3’s for us. Welcome to the Hive
We need scoring out of the SG position looking at Ben Gordon with 37 points and 4 points out of our starting SG is not acceptable… And Henry needs to work on his shot… He is beginning to remind you of JuJu…
I think this was a cost cutting maneuver. My guess is Dell didn’t care about the January deadline because his mojo is focused on the trade deadline. He also may want to stand pat until the off season just to let the team gel and the young-unz grow to see where we are at. In the end, I don’t see how a half mil does anything but help. As for Carroll, I don’t think he will add anything on court, per se, but he could be a valuable practice body to help AD get used to blocking 3s in the NBA:).
This might be one of Demps’ trades to set up another trade. If Demps does intend to keep Carroll though, I think we couldve gotten a better 2 guard for Warrick, even if he won’t be playing major minutes (or maybe even minor minutes).
On a side note, Chad Ford just tweeted that Anthony Davis leads the NBA in PER (32.49) for players averaging over 20 mpg… not bad.
We’ve got six players over 15.0. When was the last time that happened? 🙂
But our next player (GV) is at 9.18 and D. Miller at 8.27. 🙁
Can you believe that Steve Reed, the writer for the AP report on this trade, stated that Charlotte’s reason for acquiring Warrick was his defense. His defense is terrible, which is why Monty hasn’t played him. He can’t rotate to save his soul. Hopefully Carroll can play a little D. He could see more playing time than Warrick since we are thin at guard and Rivers turns his ankle all the time.
Perhaps we gave up too much in this trade.
Check out these stats:
FG% FT% Steals PER
50% 100% 1.0 28.14
Adjusted for 48 minutes:
PPG Steals FT/PG
27.4 6.9 13.7
All this on an amazing 2.0 PPS!
And that is for his ENTIRE Hornets career!
Clearly we could have gotten a #1 pick from Detroit for that kind of output.
Please, okithor, tell me you were being facetious!
Lol. I was. I was just amazed that after watching Warrick in action for an absolutely atrocious 7 minutes that his advanced stats were so good.
When read that last night I laughed so hard I fell out my chair. I read it again this morning and I still get a kick out of it. I wonder if my Detroit buddy would take the trade…
All the comments on espn are how the hornets got screwed and how dumb the hornets are and how after Davis and Gordon the team is a joke. If only they knew a thing about the hornets …
Seems good to me. The trade thing mentioned in the article could be an issue later on but as of now, trading an aging Warrick at a position where we’re solid makes sense. Plus, we grab a guard, and judging by the Philly game, our talent there drops off severely after Vasquez and Rivers. Not that Carroll is a stud or anything but at least it’s one other guy you can throw in in a pinch to see if he’s hitting that night.
Some of the fans don’t know anything about the game… I would rather trust in Demps and Coach…. Try looking at Lopez and Anderson and their roles on this team… In this case we needed shooting and a veteran presence in the backcourt… We got that and if this guy can be our Steve Kerr we are fine.. a role player… Carroll may have a spot on this team, if he can shoot… He has great numbers in 3pt shooting and 85% at the free throw line…
Rivers and Vasquez combined for 8 points last game… That’s unacceptable at their positions…. But let’s just trust Demps will make the call…
I guess the move is for depth at a weakened position … but does this confirm the absolute lack of faith the staff has in Xavier Henry? Not like Carroll will see a lot of time out there, but neither has Henry.
Time for Henry to show what he is made of…. or move on…
If he’s a nothing but a scrub/replacement player, what does Carroll “bring to the table” to still be in the pros at age 32 instead of going with someone younger & cheaper with fresher legs?
Could i be that Dell Monty picked up Carroll because AR rolled his ankle again?
Look Rivers might be the future but he is not the present… Again the kid had 4 points at the SG position.. We could have kept Belinelli… and remember Thronton…
I’m not bashing/denigrating Rivers. The fact is, though, that he rolled his ankle for the third time in a month.
That means his minutes need to be limited to let it heal.
I agree but 4 points from any of our starting Guards is a terrible night… College players score more points… Monty and crew certainly see what we see.. And frankly I will bash the kid until he slows down allowing the game to come to him… So he gets a pass because he is Doc Rivers son… Please..
Can he play defense??
Stay in your box, Al-Farouq!!
http://videos.nola.com/times-picayune/2012/11/new_orleans_hornets_coach_mont_126.html
A really insightful answer to John Reid’s intelligent question about AFA.
Who the hell is Matt Carroll???
Matt Carroll was on a crappy team for man years that misused him and never average 6PPG or more maybe with the Hornets all that can change for only this year.
When it comes to this trade, Warrick wasn’t doing anything, and with Carroll, we can buy our shooters about 4 minutes of rest late 1st Quarter, Early 2nd Quarter, and again in the late 3rd Quarter/Early 4th Quarter. As Belinelli has proved on multiple occasions, unless your solo outside shooter is a Ray Allen or a Reggie Miller, you have to have multiple outside shooters in order to have any sort of long-range offense. (Belinelli did well while Peja was here, but then his offense declined when faced with a good defensive player. He’s doing well in Chicago.)
Overall, I see Carroll, besides the 500k saved, as a sort of veteran presence, considering that we have the 2nd youngest team in the league, and Jason Smith at 29 was the veteran presence before. Then there’s the fact that he’ll be able to stretch the floor in late-game situations to open up the floor.
(We’re assuming the other team has an excellent defensive player on Anderson to make it difficult to get to the ball to him.)
In Short, expect Carroll to be kinda like Lindsey Hunter. He’ll stick around, get his 2-4 minutes a game for rest for Rivers and eventually Gordon so we don’t run their batteries out like we did with Chris Paul, or have them play in foul trouble.