National Basketball Association

Milwaukee Bucks: Michael Carter-Williams For Ben McLemore Is A Bad Deal

Published Jun. 30, 2017 6:28 p.m. ET

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If the Milwaukee Bucks trade Michael Carter-Williams for Ben McLemore straight up, they’re making a mistake.

Editor’s note: this is very nearly an analysis article, but we decided to mark it as an editorial just in case. Ti Windisch is not fond of trading MCW for Ben McLemore and that’s an opinion, but plenty of facts go into his argument.

I’m not completely against trading Michael Carter-Williams. As much as I like MCW and think he’s perfectly suited to be an energy guy coming off of the Milwaukee Bucks bench, for the right price pretty much anybody should be available.

Ben McLemore is not the right price, despite Milwaukee allegedly attempting to trade MCW for him and Sacramento apparently saying “or nah.”

McLemore appears to fit better into the massive, Khris Middleton-sized crater currently on the Bucks than Carter-Williams does (more on that later), but he’s simply not as good of a player as MCW is.

McLemore’s one advantage is shooting. He made 36.2 percent of his threes last season, whereas MCW made just 27.3 percent of his. McLemore is also younger–he’s got about two years on Carter-Williams, despite them both having three years of service in the NBA.

Aside from those two factors, there aren’t many other areas where an argument can even be made that McLemore is better than MCW. Their per 36 minutes numbers from last season tell the story:

MCW vs McLemore, per 36 minutes, 2015-16 season
Player	Age	G	MP	FGA	FG%	3PA	3P%	FTA	FT%	TRB	AST	STL	BLK	TOV	PF	PTS
Michael Carter-Williams	24	54	1649	12.1	.452	1.2	.273	3.5	.654	6.0	6.1	1.7	0.9	3.3	3.5	13.6
Ben McLemore	22	68	1443	11.4	.429	4.6	.362	2.6	.718	3.7	2.0	1.3	0.2	2.5	3.5	13.2

Their points per 36 minutes are close, with MCW holding a very slight edge of 0.4 points per 36 minutes. Rebounds, assists, steals and blocks per 36 are not close.

Carter-Williams does so much more than McLemore on both ends of the floor. I ragged on MCW a bit recently for not sporting an assist-turnover ratio of 2.0, but McLemore doesn’t even get up to 1.0–he never has in three NBA seasons.

MCW is also the vastly superior defender out of the two players. McLemore was one of the worst defenders on the Sacramento Kings last season. Only Darren Collison, Marco Belinelli and Seth Curry were worse, according to the three advanced defense stats.

According to defensive rating and defensive box plus-minus, MCW was the best defensive guard on Milwaukee’s roster. Defensive wins added has him at second, behind only Middleton.

Is Michael Carter-Williams a perfect player? No, of course not. He’ll be one of the first to acknowledge that, and he’s apparently been working on that shaky three-point shot this summer.

Even if he cannot become a dangerous outside shooter, Michael Carter-Williams is still a better overall player than Ben McLemore. McLemore is fine and I wouldn’t hate the idea of the Bucks getting him, but trading MCW for him is an overpay.

Saying McLemore is a better approximation of what Middleton gives the Bucks on offense is inaccurate. He brings half of what Middleton does on that end–Carter-Williams brings the other part.

Middleton is certainly a dangerous outside shooter, and that’s vitally important to the Bucks. His distribution is important too though, and that’s something that MCW brings and McLemore doesn’t.

So if we’re looking for a Middleton replacement, MCW and McLemore both are incomplete visions of what Khris brings to the Bucks on the offensive end.

More from Behind the Buck Pass

If the two players are roughly equal on offense–MCW’s passing and rebounding balancing out for McLemore’s shooting–then the steep decline from McLemore to MCW on the defensive end makes Carter-Williams the better player, even if he doesn’t provide the shooting Middleton and McLemore can.

That spacing may be slightly more valuable considering the rest of the Bucks roster, but it’s tough to say giving up MCW for McLemore is a worthwhile deal just for one aspect of offense like that.

Maybe you could talk me into the deal if Sacramento had something else worth pursuing, but the Kings can’t deal picks for years because they’ve already sent too many future first rounders out. Willie Cauley-Stein is a fun young piece, but the Bucks hardly need another center right now.

The deal that makes sense financially is MCW for McLemore, but it doesn’t seem like a smart deal for Milwaukee.

In the long run, this trade would likely end up in the conversation with the Jared Dudley trade, the Zaza Pachulia trade and the Greivis Vasquez trade. It just doesn’t provide good value for the Milwaukee Bucks.

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