Who were the Minnesota Timberwolves competing against when they traded three playoff rotational players and the rights to seven of their first-round draft picks from this decade for 30-year-old center Rudy Gobert?
If you are the head of basketball operations on the other end of the phone, all it takes is one new ownership group or empowered executive desperate to make a splash, or both, to outbid a player's value. A reckless negotiation should never set a market, but the 2019 trade of Anthony Davis to the Los Angeles Lakers, who also were not seriously negotiating against anyone, promoted a trend of unprotected pick-heavy packages.