Kidd Trade Reeks of Panic

Despite Devean George and Jerry Stackhouse's best efforts, the Jason Kidd trade is now official. Like the phoenix, the deal rose from the ashes (with a little help from semi-retired Keith Van Horn). Like the Phoenix Suns, the Dallas Mavericks hit the panic button in response to the Lakers' acquisition of Pau Gasol.

While it's hard to see this trade being as detrimental to Dallas as the Shaq trade could be to Phoenix, it is a lateral move in the short term and a step backward in the long term. The Mavs should get an immediate boost from adding Kidd to their starting five, as the team had sputtered a bit going into the All-Star break, but that is mainly because he'll be replacing Eddie Jones or the now-infamous Devean George. The team's struggles had much more to do with injuries to Devin Harris and Josh Howard than the team's talent and chemistry.

Kidd will help the Mavs get some easier baskets with his passing and perhaps he can bring back some of that run-and-gun style the Mavs had under Don Nelson, but is the shake-up really necessary? Dallas is currently fifth in the NBA in offensive efficiency (and they were even higher before Harris went down), despite placing 20th in assist ratio. This is because Dallas' offense relies mostly on isolation plays, for Dirk Nowitzki and Howard in particular, so the assists aren't really necessary. That's not to say that Kidd's passing won't be appreciated, but the team would have to significantly adjust its playing style to maximize Kidd's impact on the offense.

Defensively there is a little upside to adding Kidd in that his size allows the Mavs to match up better when they play Kidd and Jason Terry together. Harris struggled at times when assigned to bigger guards, so Kidd may be an improvement on that front. Okay, so maybe Kidd can contain Baron Davis, but who's going to slow down Tony Parker, Steve Nash, Allen Iverson, and Chris Paul? Not 35-year old Kidd, that's for sure.

And that brings up another crucial point. At 35, how many productive years does Kidd have left? It's hard to see him completely falling apart in the next year or two simply because he doesn't rely on athleticism to make plays, but he's certainly not getting any better. As it is, Harris has a better Player Efficiency Rating this year, and he is only 24. Common sense would say that he'll continue to improve, while Kidd will decline, thus making this a potentially disastrous deal for the Mavs in the long run.

And don't even talk to me about triple-doubles and Kidd's amazing rebounding ability. Kidd's rebounding is a product of the Nets' system and their incompetent big men. Think about it. The Nets have started Jason Collins, Nenad Krstic, Malik Allen, Josh Boone, and Sean Williams this season. Boone is the only one of these players to average more than six rebounds a game. Meanwhile, the Nets' wing players don't get a lot of defensive rebounds because their role is to start the fastbreak after a missed shot, rather than crash the boards. These factors leave tons of easy defensive rebounds for Kidd and that's why he has 8.1 RPG. While he is having his best defensive rebounding season ever, a better indicator of his rebounding ability is his work on the offensive glass. He is actually having his worst offensive rebounding season to date, pulling down only 1.1 offensive boards a game, and while he is the top total rebounder amongst NBA guards, he is 11th in offensive boards. That sounds pretty impressive until you consider that Kidd plays 37 minutes a game, making him far less efficient than the likes of Kelenna Azubuike (1.3 OREB, 21.7 MPG), Maurice Evans (1.3 OREB, 21.1 MPG), Adrian Griffin (0.9 OREB, 10.1 MPG), and even Devean George (0.8 OREB, 15.0 MPG). I admit this was a bit of a tangent, but rest assured that Jason Kidd will not significantly improve the Mavs' rebounding.

So far I've analyzed the trade as if it was a Kidd-Harris swap, but the Mavs also gave up DeSagana Diop in the deal. What's the logic in trading DeSagana Diop, arguably your best defensive big man, in response to the Lakers and Suns adding big men? Who comes off the bench when Erick Dampier inevitably fouls out or is simply ineffective? Brandon Bass? Malik Allen? Juwan Howard? Obviously Diop was included to make the salaries match up and to make the deal more appealing to the Nets, but in the short term the Mavs may miss Diop more than Harris.

The rest of the players in the deal are fairly insignificant. Trenton Hassell is semi-useful as a defensive specialist and useless when you already have defensive stoppers in Josh Howard and Eddie Jones. He might help the Nets a bit. Maurice Ager has the potential to be a decent player and might get a chance to develop in New Jersey. Keith Van Horn may not even play, let alone help the Nets in the playoff hunt. Meanwhile, the Mavs also receive Antoine Wright and the aforementioned Malik Allen. Wright is a young, athletic defensive specialist and he'll more than make up for the loss of Hassell and Allen gives the Mavs a little size, though he won't quite replace Diop's defense.

It's hard to see this trade paying great dividends for Dallas. Maybe a rejuvenated Kidd can lead the team to the promised land, but wasn't Nowitzki in the Finals just two years ago? Why is it that he's suddenly incapable of leading a playoff team? He doesn't deserve all the blame for the catastrophic Golden State upset. Sure, he struggled, but he wasn't the only one.

On New Jersey's end, this is a great deal. They unload Kidd and receive Harris and some cap room. Harris and Diop could improve the team and help them make the playoffs, but if not, it's no big loss as the team is going to rebuild anyway. Rod Thorn's next step will be trading Vince Carter, though he'll have a much harder time finding takers. Rumor has it the Knicks are interested (and really, who else would be?), so we'll see what Thorn has up his sleeve.

Regardless of how this impacts the standings, it will make for an exciting remainder of the season, and it will likely spark a few more trades as the Western Conference powers continue to bulk up for the stretch run.