The deal
Bucks get: Nikola Mirotic
Pelicans get: Jason Smith, Stanley Johnson, Bucks' second-round picks in 2019 (via Denver), 2020 (one from Milwaukee, one via Washington) and 2021 (via Washington)
Pistons get: Thon Maker
Get more trade grades for every deal here
Milwaukee Bucks: A
Mirotic has never played for Mike Budenholzer, but he should feel right at home in a system that encourages players to let fly from 3-point range. Only in short stretches has Mirotic been an exceptionally accurate 3-point shooter -- for his career, he's at 36 percent from beyond the arc, a hair better than league average -- but he has always been a high-volume one, which is better in terms of spacing. Never in his career has Mirotic attempted fewer than 6.8 3-pointers per 36 minutes in a season, and he's up to a career-high 9.0 per 36 minutes this season -- more than anyone on the Bucks, believe it or not.
I am curious to see how Milwaukee uses Mirotic. A power forward by trade, he has played a little at small forward in New Orleans this season (7 percent of his minutes, per Cleaning the Glass) and the wing is really where the Bucks need help. Even if they plan to bench the slumping Ersan Ilyasova, that doesn't clear up many frontcourt minutes. Ilyasova had been playing fewer than 14 minutes per game in January.
That said, maybe I'm thinking about it all wrong to even consider positions with Milwaukee. If Mirotic and Giannis Antetokounmpo play together at forward, does it really matter which one is labeled the small forward and which the power forward? The defensive matchups for that combo will be determined more by opposing personnel than any traditional position orthodoxy. That being the case, Mirotic will pick up plenty of the minutes currently going to some combination of Sterling Brown, Pat Connaughton and Tony Snell. He's a huge upgrade over those more one-dimensional players.
My favorite part of Mirotic's playoff breakthrough with the Pelicans was showcasing that he's a better defender than the stereotype for a European stretch 4. Mirotic's teams have generally defended a bit better with him on the court, one reason he's typically rated well by ESPN's real plus-minus. This season, Mirotic's plus-1.5 RPM ranks in the top 20 among power forwards.
Having already traded first-round picks to Phoenix and Cleveland that likely prevent them from trading one outright until 2024 at the earliest, the Bucks managed to pull off this deal using only second-round picks. A lot of second-round picks. But that's totally worth it for a move that improves Milwaukee's chances of winning the Eastern Conference this year and also sheds Maker's salary for 2019-20.
I glossed over the latter benefit in the original incarnation of the grades for the Johnson-Maker part of this swap, reported Wednesday but not finalized -- allowing it to expand to become a legal three-team trade. However, given the Bucks will either be bumping up against the luxury tax next season if they re-sign several key free agents or trying to use cap space to replace them, it's a solid bonus to this trade.
Still, the main benefit is helping Milwaukee's chances in this year's playoffs. FiveThirtyEight's projections now consider the Bucks the favorite to win the East, and I'm in agreement.
New Orleans Pelicans: B-
Despite the fact that the Pelicans were unable to recoup the first-round pick sent to Chicago to acquire Mirotic a little over a year ago, this was still a tidy piece of business for them. Remember, that pick meant both getting Mirotic and shedding the bad salary of center Omer Asik, long ago waived by the Bulls. And Mirotic's arrival was crucial to New Orleans' playoff sweep of the Portland Trail Blazers, which stands as the high point of the Anthony Davis era.
With Davis' trade request, Mirotic held little value to the Pelicans in the final season of his contract, so grabbing the best offer they could get for him made sense. New Orleans is counting on the Washington Wizards to continue to struggle to get value from these second-rounders. This year's Denver pick will almost certainly fall near the end of the second round, and most likely the same is true of Milwaukee's 2020 second-rounder. So that leaves a pair from the Wizards, in 2020 and 2021, as the real value from this trade.
The Pelicans, who already got Washington's 2023 second-round pick in Thursday's tax-related trade with them, are now surely hoping the Wizards stay in the lottery for years to come.
Detroit Pistons: C
For the full analysis of Detroit in this deal, see our Pistons-Bucks trade grades from the original Thon Maker-Stanley Johnson swap.