Golden State Warriors: Revisiting the Monta Ellis for Andrew Bogut trade
3. Other Ramifications of the Trade
Though the Golden State Warriors would eventually establish a dynasty, it’s important to rewind the clock and see why they made the trade — beyond drooling over the prospect of finally having a capable big man in their lineup.
The 2012 NBA Draft was a historically brilliant one for the Warriors. They would end up selecting Harrison Barnes, Festus Ezeli, and Draymond Green with the number 7, 30, and 35 picks respectively.
But it almost didn’t happen that way.
In July 2008, the Warriors traded their 2012 first-round pick along with a 2011 second-round pick to the New Jersey Nets for Marcus Williams. The thinking was that they wouldn’t still be this bad four years later and that Williams would be good at basketball.
They were wrong about both.
The first-round pick would be flipped to the Utah Jazz in a trade that sent Deron Williams to the Nets.
It would remain top-seven protected for the 2012 and 2013 seasons, meaning that the Warriors would receive it back if they finished with one of the bottom seven records in the league and survived the lottery.
By Warriors standards of the time, Golden State was having a pretty mediocre season in 2011-2012 — they had put together a 19-25 record, which was bad, but not bad enough to land within that protection.
So, they shipped off their top scorer for a center who wouldn’t play a single game for the Warriors that season. Oh, and Curry didn’t play another game that year, either.
Hot. Could the Golden State Warriors still have the NBA’s best backcourt?. light
The tank was on. And impressively — if you want to see it as that — the Warriors went 4-25 to close out the season. By doing so, they got their 2012 pick back, which they would turn around to use on Barnes.
The pick fell out of its protection in 2013 since the Warriors put together a 47-win season. The Utah Jazz received the Warriors’ first-round pick, the 21st overall, instead and selected Gorgui Dieng. Barnes was never a superstar with the Warriors, but he was a massive step up from Dieng.
In four seasons with the Warriors, Barnes averaged 10.1 points, 4.6 rebounds, and 1.5 assists per game, shooting 44.6% from the field and 37.6% from three-point range. He added a fourth defensively-minded player to the original “death lineup.”
Aside from undeniable strategy to implode for the remainder of the 2011-2012 season, the Warriors also benefitted from the flipping of Stephen Jackson to the Spurs as part of the Bogut/Ellis blockbuster.
The 30th overall pick that was used on Festus Ezeli came as a result of the quick trade that sent Jackson from Milwaukee to Golden State and finally to San Antonio in a matter of three days.
Ezeli played three seasons with the Warriors, fitting in as a serviceable backup center to Bogut. He put up 4.2 points, 4.3 rebounds, and 1.1 blocks per game. Similar to Bogut, injuries nagged him throughout his career, sending him to what seems to be an early retirement.
And as a final bit of trivia that came of that quick trade of Jackson, Richard Jefferson, who never really seemed to fit on the championship-caliber Warriors team, would be packaged with Andris Biedrins, Brandon Rush, and a couple of draft picks to land the Warriors Andre Iguodala from the Denver Nuggets.
Not bad.