The 2007-06-28 trade leans slightly toward Miami Heat, though Indiana received useful value led by rights to Stanko Barac.
Indiana acquired the draft rights to Stanko Barać on June 28, 2007 by sending Miami a future 2009 second-round pick. Barać was a draft-and-stash center rather than an immediate NBA rotation player, so the Pacers were betting that one future second could become a useful international prospect without taking a roster spot right away. That upside never turned into NBA games for Indiana.
The future pick conveyed at No. 43 in the 2009 draft, where Miami selected Marcus Thornton. The Heat did not keep Thornton, so his later scoring for New Orleans and Sacramento does not belong in Miami’s grade. Instead, Miami immediately converted his rights into two more second-round picks from New Orleans, turning the original Indiana asset into a second layer of draft capital.
Basketball-Reference records Miami trading Thornton to New Orleans for a 2010 second that later became Jarvis Varnado and a 2012 second tied to the slot where Jae Crowder was later selected. Crowder’s later NBA career cannot simply be assigned to Miami because that pick changed hands again before he entered the league, but the two-pick return still shows that the Heat extracted more transactional value from Indiana’s second than the Pacers realized from Barać’s rights. The pick routing after the initial agreement is what separates this transaction from a routine draft-and-stash exchange. Indiana obtained Barać's rights in 2007 but never received NBA regular-season appearances from him. Miami later used the acquired second at No. 43 in 2009 to select Thornton and then moved his draft rights to New Orleans for two more second-round assets. The eventual selection names Jarvis Varnado and Jae Crowder appear in those later chains, but neither player's whole future career should automatically be credited to Miami. The Heat's trade activity preserved assets that could be moved again, whereas the Pacers' original rights did not become a comparable roster contribution.
Heat Win — Miami B-, Indiana C. Indiana took a reasonable draft-and-stash swing on Stanko Barać, but the rights never produced NBA games for the Pacers. Miami turned the future second into Marcus Thornton’s draft rights and then converted those rights into two additional second-round assets. The grade credits Miami for that repeat asset conversion without backfilling Thornton’s or Jae Crowder’s later careers as if they had played for the Heat.