The Most Lopsided Trades in NBA History
The other day in the office, we were talking (and laughing) about some of the awful trades that have gone down in the NBA over the years. We quickly came up with some of the most lopsided trades in NBA history …
The Sixers trade Charles Barkley to the Phoenix Suns for Jeff Hornacek, Tim Perry and Andrew Lang.
- This was the official start to a dark age for the 76ers. They dealt a Hall of Famer (albeit a Hall of Famer who wanted out of town) for a version of Jeff Hornacek that wasn’t quite the Hornacek who knocked down bucket after bucket for those great Jazz teams, a disappointing role player in Perry and Lang, who only played one season in Philly.
The Raptors send Vince Carter to the Nets in exchange for Eric Williams, Aaron Williams, Alonzo Mourning and two first-round draft picks.
- VC was dealt for an entire frontcourt – one that was totally defunct. ‘Zo refused to play above the border, and Eric and Aaron averaged a cumulative 3.95 points in their seasons with the Raptors.
The Sonics trade Scottie Pippen to the Bulls for Olden Polynice.
- Granted, Seattle made this deal before Scottie ever suited up for them, but they should still be reprimanded dealing a Top 50 NBA player for a big who’s claim to fame will forever be that he was charged with impersonating a police officer, not once but twice? Um, yeah.
The Suns trade Steve Nash to the Mavericks for Martin Muursepp, Bubba Wells, the draft rights to Pat Garrity and a first round draft pick.
- This deal isn’t quite as bad as it would seem to be at first glance (which is pretty awful). That first round pick was used to take Shawn Marion and the Suns eventually lured Nash back to Phoenix as a free agent.
The Hornets send the rights for Kobe Bryant to the Lakers for Vlade Divac.
- True, Kobe made it known that he didn’t want to play in Charlotte (as ChrisGO points out in the comments below), but could you imagine if the Hornets had convinced Mamba to stay?
The Bucks acquire Oscar Robertson from the Cincinnati Royals for Flynn Robinson and Charlie Paulk.
- Big O led the Bucks to a chip alongside Lew Alcindor the next year, while the Royals celebrated their success by being booed out of Cincinnati two years later.
The Bucks trade the rights to Robert “Tractor” Traylor to the Mavericks for the rights to Dirk Nowitzki and the rights to Pat Garrity.
- Garrity appears again in this list as part of this lopsided deal. Do we even have to get into how poorly this worked out for Milwaukee?
The Celtics send the rights to Joe Barry Carroll to the Warriors for Robert Parish and the rights to a draft choice that turned out to be Kevin McHale.
- Parish and McHale are two-thirds of what was arguably the best frontcourt in history, while Carroll earned the nickname “Joe Barely Cares” from Peter Vecsey.
The Warriors deal Wilt Chamberlain to the 76ers for Paul Neumann, Connie Dierking, Lee Shaffer (who retired rather than play) and $150,000.
- No breakdown necessary.
Got a favorite “Worst Trade” that’s not listed here? Add it to the comments section below…
September 7th, 2007 at 10:20 am
chrisGO says:
didnt Kobe make it known he didn’t want to play in Charlotte thus prompting the trade for Vlade?
September 7th, 2007 at 10:50 am
Bron42 says:
come on..did we really leave off shaq for odom, butler(who was then traded for kwame) and brian grant? lol last i heard the lakers havn’t won much since.
September 7th, 2007 at 11:38 am
IGP says:
That Shaq trade was terrible…I’m a huge Odom fan too, and when I saw that trade I was like “damn they traded Shaq and didn’t get Wade?!” Odom is pretty nasty, but Kwame and Brian Grant? What the hell…
September 7th, 2007 at 12:20 pm
2Cleva says:
The LA/Charlotte deal of Divac for Kobe was made before draft night. Charlotte never had intentions on taking Kobe. Kobe did make it clear to NJ that he wouldn’t play for them and vowed not to go.
September 7th, 2007 at 1:49 pm
fab says:
that shaq deal actually wasnt that bad. they had to choose between him and kobe and traded the right won and if they hadnt shipped butler they would now have an all-star(butler) and an near-allstar(odom) to play with kobe. that would have been a very nice trade imo, espacially now when you consider the age and the contract of shaq and the ages and the reasanable contracts of odom and butler. so the dumb trade was butler for kwame and not the shaq trade.
September 7th, 2007 at 2:12 pm
Bron42 says:
they chose the right one? the lakers suck now so obviously the trade didnt do jack for them except start a bad turn of events lol
September 7th, 2007 at 3:10 pm
J-Cub says:
I agree with fab… they traded the right one. I don’t think Shaq would be winning more games than Kobe with the same Lakers team. Shaq depends on perimeter players to get him the ball and to knock down shots. The Lakers don’t have that. At least Kobe can single-handedly win some games. I would have kept a young Kobe over an older Shaq.
September 7th, 2007 at 5:42 pm
Bron42 says:
ya but u can find a scoring wing alot easier than u can find a dominant big man.
September 7th, 2007 at 6:41 pm
sans says:
Terrel Brandon to the Bucks; Vin Baker to the Sonics; and Shawn Kemp to the Cavaliers.
Not a bad trade, however, all three were perennial all-stars at the time of the trade, and all threes game went south after the deal.
Terrel was called “the best point in the NBA”, by SI, when he took the Cavs, with no one else on the roster essentially, two the playoffs three years in the row under Mike Fratello. Vinnie was unstoppable on the lowpost and Shawn Kemp was in conversations for the MVP when he wasn’t grabbing his junk after dunking on everybody.
Kemp gets to Cleveland and throws on hundreds of pounds; TB doesnt have to carry his team anymore, so he stops playing as hard (although continuing to be a solid starting point); and Vinnie starts playing worse than Bill Walton’s dead grandma.
Terrible trade for everyone involved
September 7th, 2007 at 8:32 pm
Bone says:
What about the Wizards/Bullets trading Rasheed Wallace to Portland for a washed up Rod Strickland? Or the same Wizards trading a young Chris Webber to Sacramento for a broken down Rock Richmond?
Or how about the Memphis Grizzlies trade a future first round pick to the Detroit Pistons for Otis Thorpe? Granted, Detroit took Darko but can you imagine if Memphis was able to hold onto that pick and took Carmelo (who Jerry West wanted) at #2 and paired him with Pau Gasol?!?!
September 7th, 2007 at 8:39 pm
IGP says:
Hey Fab good point…Kwame for Butler was the bad trade, but really Kwame did have a lot of promise, but he still sucks now. What NBA player can’t even catch a ball in the post?
September 7th, 2007 at 9:43 pm
Chad says:
The VC trade wasn’t about Mourning or the Williams’ players…it was about creating cap room, getting the two first-rounders, and rebuilding. Look at them now…better than they were then! Bad trade? NOPE!
September 7th, 2007 at 11:03 pm
Eric says:
I am shocked these two were not mentioned: 1983 the Boston Celtics trade Rick Roby to the Phoenix Suns for Dennis Johnson. 1980 the Boston Celtics trade their first round pick 1st overall to the Golden State Warriors for Robert Parish and their third overall pick. The Warriors drafted Joe Barry Carrol the Celtics drafted Kevin McHale.
September 7th, 2007 at 11:08 pm
Bron42 says:
actually no. how much farther have the nets gotten since they got carter? kidd,jefferson, kmart went to the finals TWICE. vc and kidd didn’t even make the conference finals. so their not really better.
September 7th, 2007 at 11:41 pm
jamesinva says:
Rod for Rasheed wasnt that bad of a trade for the bullets. Didnt strickland put up some monster numbers for a couple years? lead the league in assists maybe? I dont remember.
A crappy trade was Clyde Drexler to Houston for Otis Thorpe and some European player that never came to portland. Drexler being my favorite player at the time, that trade was horrible.
JR Rider and Jim Jackson to Atlanta for Steve Smith.
Don Ford for Clevelands #1, Lakers took James Worthy with that pick.
Charlie Scott for the Lakers #1 pick, that pick became LARRY FRIKKN BIRD
Moses Malone for Caldwell Jones
Glen Rice for Eddie Jones and Elden Campbell (Lakers could have won the ring just staying put with Jones and Campbell IMO
Mitch Richmond for Billy Owens
Jermaine Oneal for DALE DAVIS
Richard Jefferson Jason Collins and Brandon Armstron to the Nets for Eddie Griffin (RIP)
Ron Harper for Danny Ferry
September 8th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Amar says:
horny was an all-star in the west before the trade, and had something like 21-7-3 in philly for a bit before he was traded for jeff malone.
September 8th, 2007 at 1:54 pm
Amar says:
another bad trade was goodrich to utah for a draft pick that became magic johnson. goodrich retired right after the trade, and never played for the jazz.
September 8th, 2007 at 1:55 pm
Amar says:
lastly —> utah traded the draft rights to dominique wilkins to atlanta for $1 million dollars. sure, that trade saved the franchise from moving out of utah (which isn’t that great), but could you imagine nique, stockton, malone, eaton, griffith and crew all in their primes together?
ridiculous.
September 11th, 2007 at 3:32 am
E-ROC says:
Yeah, that Butler for Kwame trade was horrible. Trading a productive player for unproductive player is never a good idea. And that unproductive player was getting himself into trouble at the time, too. I would have traded Shaq, IMO. A young Kobe entering his prime over an aging center is probably a no-brainer considering Shaq wanted crazy money. He is in a $100 million deal that will last another 3 years or so. Would u have paid him that money, considering his age and injury history?
September 17th, 2007 at 1:32 pm
John Oh says:
Finest Article I have ever seen written. I believe Andrew Katz is the next “big thing” is sports journalism and you heard it first here
September 19th, 2007 at 8:26 pm
Brandon says:
What about the Dirk Nowitzki trade? Which by far was the most craziest trade I ever seen.
Dallas trade Robert Traylor to Milwaukee for Dirk Nowitzki.
LOL, I really lauged because the Bucks got nothing but a washed up has been power forward who was oversized, but the Mavs really benefited. Not in the beginning, but he found his place.
And I was reading a newspaper a while ago that there was going to be a trade between Dirk and Kevin Garnett.
January 3rd, 2008 at 11:36 pm
JimmyT says:
How about Sixers trading the Number One OVERALL pick for Roy Hinson to the Cavs who then draft Brad Daugherty who was an outstanding big man but back problems limited his career. Hinson did what?
May 25th, 2008 at 10:44 am
David says:
worst trade ever. jason kidd (who clearly does not fit in dallas) to the mavericks for just about their entire team, including a young devin harris - one of the quickest players in the league. desegana diop a defender similar to the likes of dikeke mutumbo, defensively oriented. trenton hassel, still a premeire perimeter defender and other role players with veteran experience for a young, but very talented, new jersey team. so who gets the worse end of the deal? why don’t you ask the mavericks, who won 1 game against a .500 or better team after the trade.
May 25th, 2008 at 10:46 am
David says:
oh and butler would have never become anything in LA behind kobe at the same position. so the trade brought out butler and made him somebody in this league.
May 29th, 2008 at 10:19 pm
Cammy Z says:
What about the Baron Davis to Golden State trade? Does anybody remember what the Hornets got?
Or Rasheed Wallace to Detroit (from Atlanta). Again, I don’t even know what Atlanta got.
But in both cases, I’m sure they didn’t get any quality players.