From Zach Lowe to two Sports Illustrated reporters, the "Heat" are HUGE winners in this three-way trade.
Powell is coming off a career season and now heads to South Beach.
Let's grade how each team made out in the aftermath of the big news.
Miami Heat
Grade: A-
As far as the on-paper transaction goes, this was a great deal for the Heat. Powell averaged a career-high 21.8 points per game for the 50-32 Clippers. His scoring was largely powered by his excellent three-point accuracy, as Powell averaged three makes per game from beyond the arc and shot 41.8% from that area of the floor overall. Entering his age-32 season the scoring guard isn't quite a long-term piece but for his $20 million salary the output is a bargain.
More importantly, the Heat gave up very little to land Powell's talents. Anderson is a useful rotation player but nothing more and the days of Love making an on-court impact are way in the rearview. Miami has to be thrilled to land a 20-ppg scorer for two players who both averaged fewer than 20 minutes on the floor last season.
In context of the Heat's quest to become a contender again, it's a largely lateral move. Powell has a lot of overlapping skills with Tyler Herro and, problematically, overlapping weaknesses too. Bam Adebayo is going to be a busy man cleaning up the back end of the Heat's defense with those two at the point of attack. His addition feels more like the difference between losing in the first round instead of losing in the play-in tournament rather than leading to a playoff series win.
Powell is also due an extension this offseason and coming off his best year ever he may be looking for a bigger payday than the Heat should give out. The acquisition makes the team slightly better but doesn't do much to separate them from the pack of middling teams in the East who are hoping for a lucky run with the conference wide-open.
Still, it's great business from Pat Riley, Powell is a good player and didn't cost very much at all. They're the big winners here.
That is a very fair take. An A- grade, a MAJOR upgrade on offensive, and not a trade that moves the needle for Miami, even in the Least.