Making a quick profit
There wasn’t a lot of salary cap space available across the NBA during the 2014 offseason. McDonough was likely aware of this and felt compelled to use his salary cap space to add an asset. Adding Isaiah certainly didn’t make sense from a roster construction standpoint but it may have been the best value purchase on the market. In fact when was the last time a team signed a free agent to a four-year deal on the open market and immediately turned that asset into a first round pick six months later? I’m sure there was no similar offer on the table for Young, McRoberts and Frye. Is an investor who bought Apple at $20 and sold it at $35 a moron because the stock eventually went to $150? What if I told you the other 20 stocks he considered buying didn’t appreciate in value at all? The Isaiah trade needs to be put into its complete context.