The San Antonio Spurs traded for center Kelly Olynyk Tuesday, a deal that gives them another shooting big man and closes the book on a big part of their disastrous trade of Derrick White.
To get Olynyk from the Washington Wizards, the Spurs traded both guards they drafted in the 2022 draft, Malaki Branham and Blake Wesley. Branham’s selection came from a trade where San Antonio took on Goran Dragic in a salary dump from the Toronto Raptors, while the No. 25 pick used on Wesley came from trading White to the Boston Celtics.
Saying the Celtics decisively won that deal is an understatement. Since obtaining White, the Celtics reached the NBA Finals in 2022, went to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2023 and won the title in 2024. White made two All-Defensive teams and starred in the playoffs, shooting 39.5 percent from three-point range and hitting some huge shots, including an improbable game-winner to win Game 6 in 2023.
In exchange for one of the NBA’s best shot-blocking guards who’s also a dead-eye outside shooter, the Spurs received the pick that became Wesley, a first-round pick swap in 2028 and guard Romeo Langford, who was out of the NBA after the season. Wesley has averaged 4.3 points and shot under 30 percent from three-point range in his three-year career, making only 63.4 percent of his free throws. The deal was quite a heist for the Celtics and a disappointing return for the Spurs.
The Spurs don’t mind now, as they got bad enough the next season to win the draft lottery and come away with superstar Victor Wembanyama. But it’s a good lesson for teams like the Washington Wizards, who have been trading veterans and taking on money to amass draft picks for two years but still don’t have a franchise cornerstone.
Washington does have a lot of young players who were first-round picks, but even the majority of first-round picks don’t become usable rotation players. Trading a player like White is understandable when a team is trying to tank, but the odds are very low that there’s a player as good as White available to a team in the draft, even with multiple picks. Or even as good as Kelly Olynyk.
The Celtics got an amazing deal trading for White. Time will tell if one of the teams trading with rebuilding teams like the Wizards, Jazz or Nets this summer got steals of their own.
