THURSDAY, 3:37pm: The Bucks have officially announced in a press release that their acquisition of Butler is complete. It looks like it'll just be Smith and Kravtsov for Butler, with no draft picks involved.
WEDNESDAY, 11:37pm: Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic hears the Suns will receive point guard Ish Smith, center Viacheslav Kravtsov, and a draft pick (Twitter link). Even though the Bucks acquired Kravtsov on July 31st as part of the Brandon Jennings sign-and-trade, they're exempt from the two-month moratorium on packaging him in a trade with another player, since they're under the cap.
10:45pm: The Bucks and Suns have reached agreement on a trade that will send Caron Butler to Milwaukee, according to HoopsWorld's Alex Kennedy (Twitter link). Butler has already been told the trade will indeed happen, a source tells Marc Stein of ESPN.com, who adds that the teams are still working on the details of the deal (Twitter link). Butler is a native of Racine, Wisconsin, which is about 30 miles south of Milwaukee, and it appears the Suns are attempting to do a favor for the 33-year-old, who's heavy on community involvement, tweets Ramona Shelburne of ESPNLosAngeles.com.
Since the Suns acquired Butler from the Clippers in a three-way swap that became official July 10th, Phoenix can't package Butler with any other players in a trade until September 10th, under the rules of the collective bargaining agreement. However, the club can trade the veteran by himself at any time. It's conceivable that the teams could wait a couple of weeks to officially announce the trade if Milwaukee wants anyone else on the Suns roster, but given the timing of the deal and the speed with which it seems to have come together, I think Butler will be the only Sun going to Milwaukee.
The rebuilding Suns are looking for draft picks and short-term contracts, Stein noted. That jibes with the notion that the Bucks are unlikely to give up any of their key players in the swap, as Gery Woelfel of the Racine Journal Times wrote when he first reported that the teams were in trade talks. I speculated earlier this evening that a big man would likely be headed to Phoenix, since the Bucks have eight of them on their roster. Milwaukee is about $7.5MM below the cap, but Butler's set to make an even $8MM in the last season of his deal this year, so the Bucks can't absorb him in the trade without sending a player to the Suns.
Butler averaged 10.4 points per game last season, his lowest output in nine years, but the two-time All-Star has added the three-point shot to his arsenal in recent years, nailing 38% of his 3.8 long-range attempts per game the past three seasons. He shot just 31.2% on 1.8 three-point tries per contest over the first eight years of his career. That outside threat will help the Bucks make up for the losses of Brandon Jennings, J.J. Redick and Mike Dunleavy, who went to other teams this summer, and Carlos Delfino, who signed with the Bucks but could miss a part of the regular season recovering from a fractured bone in his foot.
