Trade no. 1
In this trade idea, the Miami Heat send Dion Waiters, Wayne Ellington, and Rodney McGruder in return for the New Orleans Pelicans’ Nikola Mirotic and E’Twaun Moore.
While it has been exciting to watch Waiters’ comeback, and the feelgood story of Ellington back in the starting lineup, the Heat need a change up in this roster and have maybe one too many players. Letting go of Ellington and McGruder, essentially, won’t change the trajectory of this Heat team at all, as they both have had a minimized role in Miami’s success over the past month.
However, with Waiters’, this is where many Heat fans would be disappointed, as he has turned himself into a fan-favorite player.
Alas, the Heat could do more with the efficient shooting of Moore off the bench then they got out of Ellington and McGruder, and they could also get more immediate versatile wing/big-man play in Mirotic that Waiters’ cannot give the Heat, especially now that Derrick Jones Jr. has been reported to be out for the next six weeks, per Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel.
I added the second round pick to New Orleans in this move in order to get them another trade asset they could work with since Waiters and McGruder are really the only rebuilding tools they can possibly get from this deal, as Ellington will probably go elsewhere this summer.
While this deal does seem nice for Miami, Ellington could potentially veto this move, if he feels obliged, even with the obvious increase in minutes.