The Utah Jazz's trading for Jusuf Nurkic has been heavily questionedJazz's from the moment it was announced. The Jazz didn't need another big, and trading Collin Sexton for him felt like an all-around talent downgrade. The only way it could be worse is if they traded Nurkic for basically the same player as Sexton, only more expensive.
CLNS Media's Bobby Manning floated an idea exactly like this when discussing where the Boston Celtics could send Anfernee Simons. He brought up Nurkic as a potential option for the Celtics to save money.
"The Jazz are also worth watching as a destination for Simons if the Celtics want to move off his contract. They have 16 standard contracts and are $2.5 million under the cap line. Boston could take back Jusuf Nurkić and save $8.3 million, or throw in Tillman to slide below the tax line completely," Manning wrote.
Now, the Jazz have already helped the Celtics save money when by agreeing to take Georges Niang off their hands earlier this offseason. However, they also made that trade because they wanted Niang on the team as a veteran influence on their youngsters.
Getting Simons for Nurkic would be getting the better player, but here's the problem: Simons is basically the same player as Sexton. An undersized score-first guard who is just average at best as a playmaker and leaves a lot to be desired defensively. More than that though, he's the more expensive version of Sexton.
Acquiring him would defeat the purpose of trading Sexton in the first place too. The reason why Utah traded him was to give more time to their young guards, which makes all the sense in the world even if they got crummiest return possible for him.
Getting Simons undoes all of that because he'll want minutes just like everyone else as he will play for his next deal this summer. Making a trade like this would make people ask why they traded Sexton in the first place as that would have been easier than swapping him for Nurkic to then only swap him for a similar player as Sexton who gets paid a lot more.
If they could re-route Simons elsewhere & get an asset or two, it would make more sense
Trading Nurkic for Simons doesn't make sense on the Jazz's part, but if they could acquire valuable assets from Boston (like a first-round pick) and re-route Simons elsewhere in the process for an expiring deal, then making such a deal would be easier to swallow.
While Utah could acquire a contract that extends beyond 2026, the problem is that Utah likely wouldn't want players who would interfere with their cap flexibility going forward, as they will soon have to pay Walker Kessle. If they didn't care about that, they likely would have found a home for Jordan Clarkson instead of waiving him.
For everything that's wrong with the Nurkic trade, at least it didn't mess with Utah's salary cap. Trading for someone like Simons would make it worse, and trading for someone who messes with the Jazz's cap flexibility would only lead to more questions.