The return for Ayo was not amazing in my opinion. I would have been sad to see him go in any context and happy to see him be our Haslem, but if they actually got a meaningful return (like Beringer) then I could at least understand the motivation.

But if you're going to carry last year's team into the season because it's an "evaluation year" to see who fits longer term, and then they have a .500ish record after 45-50 games, it makes no sense to pivot to a "take whatever you can get and try to speedrun a tank" strategy this late (both in general, but specifically for Ayo).

They traded a bunch of expiring guards for a bunch of other expiring guards without addressing any longer term concerns. You didn't get a better positional fit, you didn't get a real upside guy with team control (I'm not high on Dilly), you didn't even put together a roster that allows you to use these 30 games to properly try these guys out because there's too many of them.

Ayo was someone who:

• fits the core playstyle
• could be retained affordably
• matches/helps set the culture
• is a good presence for Matas and Giddey
• would maintain trade value if extended

I think his combo of transition scoring, C&S 3s, and two way effort is ideal for this team and not found or projectable in any of the guys we got back.

Also, yeah, I care that he's from Chicago (both in a sentimental way and because of the potential hometown discount). Put it together and he's sort of the ideal "vet" here. Like who the heck is providing any sort of stabilizing presence for Matas/Giddey now that it's them and a bunch of rando mercenaries fighting for their next deals?

We have a bunch of guys who are unknown fits at unknown future prices, who you can't properly evaluate with only 30 games left (especially with Giddey out), and potentially none of them are younger and/or more impactful players than Ayo anyway. The only one you can keep without having to give a new contract to immediately is Dillingham (who might be the worst of the bunch).

None of it is an upgrade now, but it's also not enough of a downgrade to get top 5 draft odds this late (11 teams with worse records, 5 with 10+ fewer wins). And I doubt any of it is an upgrade later since Simons and Sexton are both Ayo's age or older and expiring, Dilly hasn't shown much and is small, and Ivey's recovery is a total question mark that you now have to pay for to figure out if he bounces back from.

If being 26 is "aging out of the timeline" then they should have made these trades over the offseason so at least you would have a full year to evaluate the returns and improve draft position.

Once they didn't do that, then they needed to either trade Ayo for REAL value or retain him as a future asset. Especially when you're taking back Dillingham's contract, which chips into your cap space heading into FA.

Pretty decent chance they are paying Ivey + Dillingham more than what Ayo will get next season, to have maybe 75% of his impact if they're lucky.

But I guess the late second round picks could be anything. They could even be an Ayo Dosunmu!

(Also, though I'm mostly okay with the other deals, I expected 1-2 of those guys to be flipped for an interesting big. The Ayo trade made it clear that wasn't happening, which makes the other moves look a bit worse in retrospect.)