Revisiting Magliore for Mason Trade

If this blog stands for anything, its the battle against lazy conventional wisdom. Wherever I detect it, I seek to stamp it out. The latest bit of conventional wisdom that has my spider-sense tingling is the quickly forming consensus that the Bucks got screwed in the 'Magliore for Mason plus a first round pick' trade. I've seen this implied in numerous articles now. Its not true.

I believe Magliore sucks. Yet the trade for him was a good move. Why? Desmond Mason sucks worse, and the player drafted with the Bucks pick, Cedric Simmons, looks for all the world like the second coming of (sound the ominous music)... Marcus Haislip. Indeed, nbadraft.net gave Haislip a much higher grade coming out of college than they are giving Simmons (99 to 90).

Moreover, as the ridiculous scramble for the services of one Joel Pryzbilla illustrates, centers have special value in the NBA, if they can at least show they have some use. And Magliore has shown an ability to rebound. He is therefore a valuable asset for the Bucks.

On the other hand, Desmond Mason was, at his peak, a below average starting forward. He is now past his peak. Last year he posted the worst Eff48 score in the NBA among players who played at least 30 minutes a game: 12.69. I cannot underscore how bad that is. Yes I can: Jiri Welsch had an Eff48 of 14.71.

So, the Bucks traded a severely declining middling forward and a "pick em" draft spot for one of the more valued assets in the NBA, a functional center. How did they lose on the deal?