The 5 worst NBA trade deadline deals ever
By Adam McGee
1. Ray Allen, Ronald Murray, Kevin Ollie, 2003 first round pick to the Supersonics; Gary Payton, Desmond Mason to the Bucks
How do you go from being one of the league’s most exciting and promising teams to flat out mediocrity in the space of a couple of years? Reckless trades, bitter in-fighting and a contentious coach certainly contribute, and in the aftermath of Milwaukee’s Eastern Conference Finals near-miss in 2001, the Bucks would have fit in most of the categories above.
Having experienced a rapid rise to the point where they narrowly lost at the last hurdle before the Finals — to the 76ers in a hard-fought (and controversial) series — the Bucks were left looking for answers. Solving problems that aren’t there is never good, but in this case it also likely exacerbated the one that was there.
George Karl, or Furious George as his recently released autobiography titled him, had started to grate on the nerves of many of Milwaukee’s players. After he was traded, Allen revealed just how deep his own negative feelings towards Karl ran, explaining:
"If we were tired, he made us work harder. If we needed a day off, he made us practice. It always seemed like when something went wrong he’d bash us in the papers . . . I started despising him . . . I got tired of that after a while, and my hatred started growing."
After the addition of Anthony Mason in an attempt to push the team to the next level backfired spectacularly, Karl started to point fingers inward. In doing recent publicity for his book, Karl noted how he made mistakes, as did Milwaukee’s then general manager Ernie Grunfeld and owner Herb Kohl.
Those mistakes may have started with trading Glenn Robinson, but they certainly peaked with the deal that saw Allen land in Seattle. At 27-years of age, Allen was hitting his prime and starting to establish himself as comfortably one of the league’s best players. In other words, he was the kind of franchise player that teams give up the farm to get their hands on.
All Seattle parted with, though, was a 34-year-old Gary Payton on an expiring deal and a promising young role player in Desmond Mason. That was enough for Milwaukee to discard one of the brightest piece of their franchise’s future, on top of also sending proven backup guard Kevin Ollie and what would become a 14th overall pick to the Supersonics.
When the deal was made, Bucks GM Grunfeld commented:
"“It’s never easy to give up a player like Ray. But when you can get a premier player, a future Hall of Famer, and probably the best defensive guard in the game, like Gary Payton, and a young, athletic player like Desmond Mason, it’s something you have to do.”"
Predictably, Payton would leave Milwaukee as a free agent only a couple of months later, meaning the Bucks had nothing other than Mason to show for the void left by Allen’s departure.
The Bucks have failed to progress past the first round of the playoffs since the Allen-led 2001 team, and only made the post-season a total of six times in the years since Allen left for Seattle. While for the Sonics, not even Allen’s talent proved enough to break them out of the rut that plagued their final years in the Emerald City.
Next: The 5 greatest NBA trade deadline deals ever
Eventually Allen would move on again with only a single post-season trip and above .500 season to his name as a Sonic. He would win a championship with each of the Celtics and Heat.