Fueled by Search for Chemistry, Wild NBA Trade Deadline Shifts Playoff Landscape

Thirty-nine professional basketball players were traded Thursday afternoon, and 17 NBA teams issued a flurry of statements trumpeting the arrivals and offering well wishes to the departures.

It was a head-spinning, record-setting day, with 9 percent of the league's players on the move, testing the limits of amateur capologists and Twitter's bandwidth. Even the folks who track this stuff for a living were exhausted by the end of it all.

As one team executive said, via text: "Holy cow."

Holy cow, indeed.

There was no single reason for the violent hurricane of transactions. There were several.

Some deals were financially driven, others by an urgent need for talent. But the 2015 trade deadline day might ultimately be known as the Day of Discontent.

Goran Dragic, an All-NBA guard last season, is now in Miami, because he had lost faith in the Phoenix Suns.

Reggie Jackson, a promising young sixth man, is now in Detroit, because he felt marginalized and undervalued in Oklahoma City.

Enes Kanter, once a part of Utah's rebuilding plan, is now in Oklahoma City because he had misgivings about the Jazz.

And those deals helped spur several others—the Suns acquiring Brandon Knight from the Milwaukee Bucks (to replace Dragic), prodding the Bucks in turn to acquire Michael Carter-Williams from the Philadelphia 76ers.

Isaiah Thomas—whose presence in Phoenix spurred Dragic to make his trade demand in the first place—also was dealt Thursday, to the Boston Celtics, who sent Marcus Thornton to the Suns.

The end result of all of this ego massaging, payroll paring, roster shuffling and press release-issuing? The playoff race just got a lot more interesting, particularly at the bottom of each playoff bracket.

The Heat and Pistons bolstered their bids for the last two spots in the East.

The Brooklyn Nets and Charlotte Hornets should be worried.

The reloaded Thunder are now the clear favorites to grab the West's final playoff spot.

And the Suns may have traded themselves right out of the postseason.

It's hard to make any sense of the Suns' last eight months. A year ago, they were the darlings of the NBA with a wide-open offense, a share-the-wealth mentality and the high-powered backcourt of Dragic and Eric Bledsoe. The Suns did not have the all-around talent of their Western rivals, but they thrived on ball movement and an unparalleled esprit de corps under coach Jeff Hornacek.

Bledsoe was an emerging star. The well-traveled Dragic was evolving into a top-tier point guard, earning a spot on the All-NBA third team, and carrying the undermanned Suns for weeks when Bledsoe was injured.

If you asked any of the Suns about their uncanny success last season, "chemistry" was always the first explanation.

Christian Petersen/Getty Images

But something was lost last summer. The Suns let Channing Frye, their sweet-shooting big man, and a key locker-room influence, leave in free agency. They then signed the ball-dominating Thomas to a four-year, $27 million contract, throwing him into a backcourt rotation with Bledsoe and Dragic, who, of course, both needed the ball to be effective and happy.

It seemed like a risky play even then. Sure enough, the three-headed point guard experiment blew up. Dragic was never himself this season, regressing both as a scorer and playmaker. He hardly hid his discontent, and privately, his representatives began warning the Suns that Dragic might leave as a free agent this summer.

When news leaked Monday that the Suns were exploring deals for Dragic, team officials promptly tried to shoot down the report, putting out the word that they intended to re-sign him.

Yet as much as the Suns wanted to keep Dragic—who had been touted as the heir to Steve Nash—the damage had been done. "I don't trust them anymore," Dragic told reporters Wednesday.

So on Thursday, the Suns bowed to reality, trading both Dragic and Thomas—in effect, acknowledging the mess they had created.

Dragic landed with the Heat, one of three teams (along with the Lakers and Knicks) he indicated he would re-sign with in July, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports. In return, the Suns received two future first-round picks, plus veteran forward Danny Granger.

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Thomas was shipped to Boston, in exchange for Thornton, a volume shooter, and another first-round pick.

To get Knight, the Suns gave up promising young big man Miles Plumlee, plus rookie point guard Tyler Ennis.

Knight is a talented, 23-year-old point guard who is in his fourth year and still improving. Adding three first-round picks to an already large stash bodes well for the future. But the Suns unquestionably took a step backward Thursday, sending away the player who was most responsible for their success last season.

So now, with 28 games to play, the Suns will be plugging in a new starting point guard, while moving forward with an even thinner frontcourt.

The Thunder, meanwhile, shipped out their own discontented point guard (Jackson) and turned him into three solid rotation players: Kanter, D.J. Augustin and Kyle Singler. Hours later, they routed the Dallas Mavericks to move into a tie with Phoenix for eighth place.

The Thunder were probably going to claim the West's final playoff spot anyway, assuming good health from Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook. But the Suns' self-inflicted wounds should ensure it.

"The lesson that everyone's learning is it's much easier to build a team and get good than it is to keep a team together and sustain it," said one team executive. "When you do well, everybody thinks they're more important than they are. It's so hard to manage some of that."

In Utah, Kanter felt he wasn't receiving enough playing time, so he demanded a trade. In Oklahoma, Jackson felt his role diminished by the acquisition of Dion Waiters. Jackson longed to be a starter, in any case, with a paycheck to match. And in Phoenix, Dragic was simply unhappy.

"When people don't want to be there, they can't produce," the team executive said. "If they didn't trade [Dragic], he wouldn't have played well for them."

Chemistry is a fragile commodity in the NBA. It cannot be forced or manufactured, or even anticipated. Sometimes, the right pieces fall into place and wonderful things happen. The Suns had it, and squandered it, and now will likely pay the price—with another spring spent on the sidelines.

Howard Beck covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter, @HowardBeck.