The Detroit Pistons have acquired Bojan Bogdanovic from the Utah Jazz for Saben Lee and Kelly Olynyk, according to Shams Charania and James Edwards III of the Athletic.
The Pistons were looking a bit light in the shooting department, and Bogdanovic is a 39% career shooter from beyond the arc. He averaged 18.1 points per game as a starter for 69 games with the Jazz last season.
As the Jazz have entered a full-on rebuild by tearing their roster down to the studs, the cost to acquire Bogdanovic is very light. There are no draft picks involved and all the Pistons had to do was trade a couple of players that probably were not going to be seeing tons of playing time this season in Lee and Olynyk.
I think a big reason for this trade is the fact that the Pistons enter training camp with 16 players under contract. This means that they were going to have to release a player at the end of camp to get down to the regular season max of 15 players. By sending out two players for one, they do not have to cut anybody and get an upgrade for their rotation.
Another key to this trade is that Bogdanovic has 1 year left on his contract, so this will not have an effect on the Pistons’ cap space for next season. It actually gives the Pistons a bit more money because Olynyk had a partial guarantee for next season.
On top of all of that, it clears the way for Jalen Duren to get more minutes as a rookie. The only other center on the roster is the veteran Nerlens Noel, who I am sure will also get time behind Isaiah Stewart in the rotation.
For Saben Lee, this is an opportunity for him to get some playing time on a team that is not going to be very good and will probably have some rotation spots opening up when other shoes on their roster teardown drop. For Olynyk, he has a partially guaranteed contract for next season and will probably either be flipped or kept around as a veteran presence for the Jazz next season.
This trade signals that the Pistons are going to play the young guys with some solid veterans and see what happens. If they shock people and fight for the play-in, then they can go into the summer with a lot of optimism and cap space. If they are bad, they have flippable veterans at the deadline and can fight for a top pick again.
There is very little downside to this trade and it adds another shooter to surround Cade Cunningham and Jaden Ivey.