Amid this week's discussion and speculation on possible moves leading up to Thursday's trade deadline, there's one question we should pause and ask: Do deadline deals work?
Recent history can help shed some light on that issue and a related one: Which teams benefit the most from making a midseason trade?
To determine whether deadline deals work, we must first define their goals.
Who makes deadline deals?
I took every team that made a trade during the week leading up to the deadline over the past five years and sorted them into five categories based on the type of trade(s) they made.
"Buyers" and "sellers" are obvious groupings, so that's two. A third category involves teams trying to improve by swapping roughly equivalent players for better fit -- what we call "challenge trades." And a handful of trades -- like the one between Cleveland and Memphis last month -- are made strictly for salary purposes. These involve "cap renters" and "cap clearers." That makes five.
The table shows how each of these groups have performed before and after making a trade.
Breaking Down Dealer Profiles
Are deadline deals worth it?
In general, we can see the five groups make sense. The buyers tend to be above-.500 teams, while sellers are much weaker. The divide is even greater between cap clearers -- usually teams that are near the luxury-tax threshold -- and renters who are below the cap. Teams making challenge trades are essentially average.
What happens after the deadline is more important. The results for cap clearers and cap renters probably aren't worth noting, but the rest are significant: Sellers suffer more than buyers benefit from trading amongst each other. And teams making challenge trades also drop off slightly.
These shaky results might reflect the cost of making an in-season trade. Besides having to integrate new players, teams that make deadline deals also often play at least one game without them, weakening their roster.
So there you have it -- proof midseason trades aren't worth the effort, right?
Not so fast.
Buyers' remorse?
The results change a bit when we focus in on the buyers and divide them based on their record at the time of the trade.
Whether because they don't want to mess with their chemistry or simply have few holes, it's rare to see truly elite teams make moves at the deadline. Just two teams on a 60-win pace have made such a trade in the past five years, and one of those trades (the Cleveland Cavaliers acquiring Antawn Jamison during LeBron James' last season in Cleveland) was a major flop.
Expanding the pool to teams on a pace for 50 wins or more yields nine additional examples from the past five years. In those nine cases, just three teams improved their record the rest of the way.
In part, that's probably because of regression to the mean -- most of those teams might have been due to come back to earth anyway. But in most cases, the trades couldn't offset this effect.
Only one deadline trade in that span really had an effect deep into the playoffs -- the 2008-09 Orlando Magic acquiring veteran Rafer Alston to fill in for injured Jameer Nelson at point guard.
So don't expect the Miami Heat, Oklahoma City Thunder or San Antonio Spurs to make much noise this week.
The exception to the rule might be the Los Angeles Clippers, if they make a trade to improve their chances of upsetting the West's top two teams.
Buyers' rewards?
The results are slightly better for buyers on pace for 45-50 wins, half of whom improved the rest of the season. The Portland Trail Blazers were able to finish strong in both 2010 and 2011 after adding veterans Marcus Camby and Gerald Wallace, respectively, though those moves did not translate into playoff series wins.
But where trades have really made a difference is among buyers on pace for 35-45 wins. Six of the eight teams in this group played better after making a deadline deal, and on average they improved their winning percentage by 7.6 percent the rest of the way -- an average jump of slightly more than two wins over the final 30 or so games. One of these teams, the 2009-10 "Fear the Deer" Milwaukee Bucks, made the biggest post-trade jump of any team in the past five years, going from winning 47.1 percent of their games before adding John Salmons at the deadline to 71.0 percent thereafter -- a run that nearly culminated in a playoff upset against the Atlanta Hawks.
It's easy to see why teams near .500 might benefit so much from a trade at the deadline. Because of their middling record, such teams usually have at least one obvious hole that can be fixed by adding a veteran player. And since they are fighting for one of the last few playoff spots, an extra two or three wins the rest of the season can prove critical when it comes to seeding or even making the playoffs at all.
Several teams fall into that range this season, including the Boston Celtics, the Dallas Mavericks, the Houston Rockets, the L.A. Lakers, the Milwaukee Bucks, the Philadelphia 76ers and the Portland Trail Blazers.
Should the Mavs, Rockets, Blazers, Bucks and Sixers buy?
Several of the seven teams noted above must be very careful to weigh the desire to reach the playoffs and make an impact this season against their long-term goals. That's especially true of young teams like the Rockets and Blazers, which don't want to sacrifice their future for a small upgrade now. So if they make a trade, it will have to be something that also makes sense going forward.
Dallas is probably too far out of the hunt to worry about a playoff run, and if Philadelphia is going to make a run at the eighth spot in the East, Andrew Bynum, if and when he returns from his injuries, will be the Sixers' big addition.
Milwaukee could make a deal, probably a "challenge trade." The Bucks don't have any obvious weaknesses and really need to consolidate their talent with a 2-for-1 or 3-for-1 trade.
Should the Lakers and Celtics buy?
That leaves two marquee teams in position to benefit from buying, should they decide not to sell their own veterans. The Celtics could solidify their spot in the playoffs with a deal, while the Lakers would improve their chances of claiming the eighth seed and avoiding the nightmare scenario of watching the playoffs from home.
If Celtics president Danny Ainge is willing to consider moving Kevin Garnett, Boston is realistic about its slim odds of a long playoff run and probably won't give up young assets like Fab Melo. Still, the Celtics could address a crying need at guard following season-ending injuries to Rajon Rondo and Leandro Barbosa without giving up too much. An impending free agent like Toney Douglas or Sebastian Telfair would fill out their rotation and could probably be had for a second-round pick.
The Lakers' best chance of adding a player to their underperforming bench would seem to be using a disabled player exception worth $1.8 million they landed due to Jordan Hill's injury. That comes with significant restrictions, though -- it can be used only for a player in the final season of his contract. The lone big man on a non-contending team who would fit that criterion is Phoenix's Jermaine O'Neal. But the Suns don't want to help the Lakers because they get L.A.'s first-round pick from the Steve Nash trade only if it were to fall in the lottery (meaning that the Lakers had missed the playoffs). So the Lakers might have to wait for buyout candidates to upgrade after the trade deadline.