Welcome to another edition of The Friday Five! Every Friday I cover a topic related to basketball gaming, either as a list of five items, or a Top 5 countdown. The topics for these lists and countdowns include everything from fun facts and recollections to commentary and critique. This week’s Five is another list of five teammates who were once traded for each other, and the video games that feature those stints.
When I posted my previous Friday Five recalling five teammates who had once been traded for each other, I mentioned that there was an example that I cut after being reminded of a pairing that I definitely couldn’t leave out the first time around. Since I hate to waste any writing and research, I kept that example aside, with the intention of revisiting the topic. It actually didn’t take too long to find four more examples of players who became teammates after being traded for one another, and as such, the time has come to follow up with a new instalment.
As I’ve often said, I love roster trivia like this! It’s fascinating to trawl through NBA history to find interesting trades, unique lineups, and other unusual events, including phantom stints, and familiar faces in strange places and back in familiar places alike. I look at them through the lens of the virtual hardwood, not only because it’s the focus of our content here at the NLSC, but also because as I like to say, basketball video games are interactive almanacs. I had to search beyond the obvious games to find virtual representation of a couple of these pairings, but that’s all part of the fun! And so, let’s tip things off with the pair of players that were cut from the previous article.
Thanks to the reputation of the “Jail Blazers“, Rasheed Wallace’s tenure in Portland is well-known. His run with the Pistons is also remembered thanks to a championship and several Eastern Conference Finals appearances. Even his single game with the Atlanta Hawks in 2004 – coming in between his Blazers and Pistons stints – has some degree of infamy, being such an interesting oddity that even made it into one video game. However, it’s easy to forget that Sheed actually began his career in Washington when the team was still the Bullets. After a solid rookie season filling in for an injured Chris Webber, Wallace was traded to Portland for veteran point guard Rod Strickland.
The deal actually worked out quite well for everyone. Sheed eventually blossomed into an All-Star in Portland, where he wouldn’t be battling Webber or Juwan Howard for minutes. As for the Bullets, it avoided a logjam up front and netted them one of the league’s top playmakers, helping them return to the Playoffs in 1997. When the Wizards were looking to trim their payroll and reshape their roster in 2001, Strickland was cut and ended up returning to the Trail Blazers. It was a very brief comeback and pairing with Sheed years after they were traded for each other, but the stint that made Strickland a familiar face back in a familiar place can be found in NBA Live 2002.
It’s still weird looking back and seeing footage and photos of Shaquille O’Neal in a Boston Celtics uniform. To fans of Shaq and the Los Angeles Lakers, it probably feels very similar to what Michael Jordan in a Washington Wizards jersey does to me! It happened though, making Shaq part of a small group of stars who played for both the Lakers and Celtics. The Diesel’s final NBA stop also produced some other trivia, as he ended up being teammates with a player that he was once traded for. That player is Sasha Pavlovic: a 6’8″ swingman from Montenegro who was part of the famous Draft Class of 2003, and ended up playing most of his career for the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Indeed, Pavlovic’s tenure in Cleveland drew to a close when he was traded alongside Ben Wallace to the Phoenix Suns for Shaq in June 2009. The deal was merely a cost-cutting measure for Phoenix, as neither Pavlovic nor Wallace ended up playing for the team. As for Shaq, after he failed in his quest to “Win a Ring for the King”, he ended up signing with the Celtics in 2010. By the end of the season, he’d be joined by one of the players he’d been traded for almost two years prior, as Pavlovic was picked up by the Celtics in March 2011 following 10-day stints with the Mavericks and Hornets. Roster updates for NBA 2K11 reflect this trivia footnote in Shaq’s illustrious career.
Yes, in the spirit of continuing to mention players after covering them in a previous article, let’s talk about Herb Williams once again! As I noted when I discussed Herb’s interesting history with the New York Knicks, he was traded to Toronto during the 1996 season, resulting in him playing a single game for the Raptors; the only time he played for a team other than the Knicks after 1992. That trade, which also sent Doug Christie to the Raptors, saw Willie Anderson and Victor Alexander land in New York. Alexander would be cut soon afterwards, giving him phantom stints with the Raptors and Knicks, but Anderson stuck around and was part of New York’s Playoff roster.
And, as I recalled in the aforementioned article, Herb Williams was also a member of the Knicks’ Playoff roster in 1996. That’s because a day after his single game in a Raptors uniform, Williams was cut, leading him to rejoin the Knicks less than a week later. As such, Herb Williams and Willie Anderson became teammates ten days after being traded for one another! Given the timing of these deals, it’s close to impossible to find any official representation of Williams and Anderson as Knicks teammates on the virtual hardwood. In fact, the only examples I could find are the default rosters of NBA Full Court Press, and NBA in the Zone 2, where Anderson is a Roster Player!
So, I’ll admit that I’m stretching the definition of “traded for” here, as Patrick Ewing and Horace Grant were never swapped directly for one another, as is the case with the other players that later became teammates. However, they were two of the key players in the same blockbuster trade, so I’m going to count it! That trade was of course the one that sent Patrick Ewing to the Seattle Supersonics in the 2000 offseason. Grant had spent the previous year with the Sonics – a forgotten stint that I would definitely label as a familiar face in an unfamiliar place – but didn’t go to New York to replace Ewing. Instead, Grant was sent to the Lakers in the four-team, eleven-player trade.
Grant undoubtedly got the best end of the deal, as he won his fourth ring as the new starting power forward for the Lakers. Ewing started in all 79 games that he played for the Supersonics, but averaged single digits in scoring for the first time in his NBA career. Both were free agents in the 2001 offseason, and both signed with the Orlando Magic. For Grant, it made him a familiar face back in a familiar place. For Ewing, it proved to be his NBA swansong, as he came off the bench for the first time in his career, backing up Grant in the middle. The 2002 Magic are actually a fun video game team, as you’ll discover if you dust off titles such as NBA Live 2002 and NBA 2K2.
A trio of Hakeem Olajuwon, Charles Barkley, and Scottie Pippen may look good on paper, and indeed, it helped make Team USA a force to be reckoned with at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. By 1999 however, they were older and banged up, so a first round defeat at the hands of a young and upcoming Lakers team was hardly a shock. Nevertheless, Pippen wasn’t happy with the situation, and so he demanded a trade; a request that the Rockers granted. Houston sent Pip to Portland for six players: Stacey Augmon, Kelvin Cato, Ed Gray, Carlos Rogers, Walt Williams, and Brian Shaw. Unsurprisingly, Pip also traded churlish barbs with Chuck on the way out.
Although the Blazers’ 2000 season will always be remembered for the fourth quarter meltdown in Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals against the Lakers, it was still a respectably successful campaign. Pippen had a large hand in that, even though his numbers were in decline as he deferred to his younger teammates. Stacey Augmon, one of the players he’d been traded for, was also part of that Blazers run in 2000. The Rockets waived him shortly after the trade, freeing him up to sign with Portland. NBA in the Zone 2000 is the only 2000 season title that was released late enough to include the deal, but you’ll also find Pippen and Augmon on the Blazers in games set in 2001.
Do you remember these players becoming teammates after being traded for each other? Can you recall any other noteworthy examples of players who ended up playing together after they were swapped in the same trade? Let me know in the comments, and as always, feel free to take the discussion to the NLSC Forum! That’s all for this week, so thanks for checking in, have a great weekend, and please join me again next Friday for another Five.
The post The Friday Five: 5 Teammates Who Were Once Traded For Each Other (Part 2) appeared first on NLSC.
