If you needed a better example of how second round picks in the NBA Draft are basically fake currency, the trade deadline had you covered. Every other deal contained second round picks, often multiple of them — heck, FIVE second round picks were dealt for Jae Crowder.
This isn’t some galaxy brain level team building tactic and more the NBA’s currency for “I dunno… give us something?” These picks are basically crypto. Teams don’t know what they’re worth, why they have them, or what they’re going to do with them. Sure, you might randomly hit on a player — but more often than not you’re either backfilling your G-League roster with them, or selling them on draft night for cash.
Who doesn’t like cash?
How many second round picks were dealt on Thursday anyway?
A hilarious amount. FORTY FOUR second round picks changed hands between the start of the day and the end of the deadline. There are too many trades that involved second round picks to even count, but here are the biggest deals that exchanges the most picks.
- Jae Crowder traded from Nets to Bucks for FIVE second round picks
- Saddiq Bey traded from Warriors to Hawks for FIVE second round picks
- Gary Payton II traded from Blazers to Warriors for FIVE second round picks
- Josh Richardson traded from Pelicans to Spurs for Devonte Graham and FOUR second round picks
- Thomas Bryant traded from Lakers to Nuggets for THREE second round picks
Those five deals make up just over half the second round picks dealt on Thursday, with others being thrown in as part of larger deals or two-picks being traded for some fairly solid players like Bones Hyland, who joins the Clippers.
More seconds than a buffet dinner…
This is easily the biggest meme of the trade deadline. Dealing players for multiple seconds is a functionally pointless effort and so many changed hands nobody even bothered to track how many years out these are.
What we really need is a coordinated effort to conglomerate all the second rounds picks in one small market city. Everyone can take turns. Say, in 2024 Charlotte gets every pick in the second round … then it’s Indiana’s turn, and so on.
If we’re going to see every big market team get the players they want, the least we can do is let the smaller teams trade their pointless NFT picks wildly on draft night. Give ‘em something to do.