At the beginning of last season, Rajon Rondo was deemed to be a superstar with MVP-like potential that was wasting away on a team that was rebuilding. When he was traded to the Dallas Mavericks midseason, he was supposed to be a piece that elevated them to championship status. Instead, he flopped and the Sacramento Kings ended up swooping in to get a bargain in the offseason. It was supposed to be straightforward but one player has changed the course of the future for three teams quite dramatically. Here’s how it went down.
Boston Celtics
An argument can be made that the single move that helped accelerate the Celtics rebuild the most last season was the Rondo trade. In fact, Boston posted a 9-14 record before the Rondo trade but went 31-28 after they traded him to Dallas. They even wound up making the playoffs. Jae Crowder, who was one of the pieces acquired for Rondo, played a significant role in the Celtics making the playoffs last year and while he won’t be back with the team, they still have the Mavericks’ 2016 first-round pick as long as it falls outside of the top seven.
Boston also used Brandan Wright to land Isaiah Thomas from the Phoenix Suns. Factor in that moving Rondo opened the door for Marcus Smart to take over the starting point guard role, who earned All-Rookie Second Team honors last season, and there is absolutely no doubt the Celtics significantly benefited from trading Rondo to Dallas last season.
Dallas Mavericks
Dallas was so desperate for a starting point guard that it might have ignored some obvious red flags in the Rondo trade – including the high asking price for an aging point guard that had clearly lost a step to age and injuries. The Mavericks’ 19-8 record before acquiring Rondo was clearly better than the 31-24 record they posted following the trade and we haven’t even mentioned that head coach Rick Carlisle shut him down midway through the team’s first-round playoff loss to the Houston Rockets after he couldn’t get him to follow instructions on the floor.
Just when it seemed as though the Rondo trade couldn’t get any worse, the team’s leading scorer Monta Ellis, who was a close friend of Rondo and was reportedly very upset about the team’s decision to sideline him, opted out of his deal and signed with the Indiana Pacers in the offseason.
It’s impossible to blame what happened to Dallas with DeAndre Jordan but in many ways, it played a part. If Rondo proved to be a star or had the Mavericks traded for Ty Lawson or Reggie Jackson instead, Jordan might have felt like they were closer to being a championship team. Acquiring Rondo directly cost the Mavericks draft picks and role players, and then indirectly may very well have turned the franchise’s fortunes around for the absolute worse.
[related_post_one]
Sacramento Kings
If Rondo were a free agent last offseason, he would have commanded a contract in the range of $15 million or more. Instead, the Kings get to swoop in and potentially buy in on a superstar on the cheap. If Rondo continues how he played in Dallas, then you can forget about calling this a bargain. However, there’s the very real chance here that he reverts to being the nightly triple-double threat he used to be during the Celtics championship years.
If that’s the case, the Kings are getting great value on a point guard who might fill a crucial void and get them into the playoffs. They have a competent frontcourt with DeMarcus Cousins and Willie Cauley-Stein, they have a quality small forward in Rudy Gay and they have some nice pieces in the backcourt with Ben McLemore, Marco Belinelli and Darren Collison. Sometimes all it takes is a good point guard to bring it all together and Rondo could be that guy. The best part is the Kings only pay him $10 million on a one trial. To put that into perspective, guys like Reggie Jackson and Goran Dragic are making $14 million on long-term deals.
