Coevolution is the change of a biological object triggered by the change of a related object.

Remove aesthetics and philosophy from the question for a moment: The premise of this trade is that in the short term (1-2 years), Love gives the Cavs a better shot to compete for a championship. But how is he a surefire thing more so than Wiggins?

I typed “Kevin Love Beard” in Google and this came up. Go ahead, try it.

Here’s what we know about Kevin Love: His beard is awesome. His uncle was a Beach Boy. He grabs a lot of rebounds and can shoot the ball well. Other than that, we’re not really sure what we’re getting. Let’s see if he can play ONE playoff game first before we start calling him a top 3 power forward in the game. Not only has he never made the playoffs, but he’s never even gotten CLOSE to them. His win totals: 24, 15, 17, 26 (lockout 66-game season), 31, and 40. In Love’s career arc, finishing one game under .500 last season actually feels like an accomplishment. Forget playoff experience, Love hasn’t even played a truly meaningful NBA game after the all-star break.

I’m not one to put every egg in the “What have you done in the playoffs?” basket, but it’s still relevant. We’ve seen players struggle in the one-and-done rut year after year. Garnett, T-Mac, Melo. This is another level.

Can you think of another player in NBA history that was considered a top 10-15 guy in the league after 5+ seasons but never made the playoffs? There isn’t one.

What does it say that Love occupies this unique place in modern NBA history approached by none over the last 20-30 years? It might mean that Love’s career is simply a cosmically unmatchable event of the rarest kind: the first great player in modern NBA history to wallow in uniquely terrible circumstances for 6 straight years. Or it might mean that he actually isn’t a top 10-15 player.

Love’s supporters make the case that 25 and 15 a night is still the same whether you win or not. Obviously, this is ridiculous. The entire point of the game is to win, and frequently we see players making the decision to play a style that may not rack up stats the same in order to put their team in a better position to win (see Bosh, Duncan, Noah, LeBron). Changes are made for the greater good. This is how teams and stars coevolve in the NBA. And while Love’s Win Shares are great, and that calculates a player’s individual contribution to a win, it fails to quantify a player’s ability to enable his teammates to contribute towards wins. This is the scale all great players are judged on.

The popular narrative is that Kevin Love simply had terrible teammates. This is true, though when we think of top NBA players we usually expect them to have some positive impact on their teammates. Why is it that so many of his teammates wind up worse than they were projected to be? Take Ramon Sessions, who’s Player Efficiency Rating (PER) pre-Minnesota was 17.6, followed by a paltry 12.9 as Love’s teammate. What happened the very next season after a trade to the Bobcats? Back up to a 19.0.

This is not an anomaly. Minnesota’s last six years are littered with players whose efficiency took a dive when playing along Love, most notably but not confined to Chase Budinger (14.9, 9.7), Michael Beasley (16.1, 13.0)and Al Jefferson (23.1, 19.0). There’s an even longer list of players who saw an increase in production upon leaving the Wolves, guys like Wayne Ellington (9.4, 12.2), Kousta Koufos (10.4, 20.3), Cory Brewer (10.3 to 17.6), Martell Webster (10.0, 13.9), Wesley Johnson (8.0, 10.3 and 11.0 after he left) and Derrick Williams (7.6, 11.9).

Is there a reason that Barrea hasn’t really been the impact in Minnesota that many thought he could be after playing a key role in Dallas’ 2011 Championship? Is it a coincidence that ultra-talented Ricky Rubio plateaued so early on in his NBA career (PER of 14.6, 16.2, 15.4). Why did Alexey Shved look so much more promising when Love was sitting on the bench with an injury? Why did Kevin Martin just have one of his worst shooting seasons on his career? Why was Shabazz Muhammad nowhere near as effective an offensive player has scouts pegged him to be? Yes I’m picking nits, but in six years you won’t find ONE perimeter oriented player who either improved as Love’s teammate or diminished upon leaving the team. Not one.

I’m not saying Love isn’t a very talented player, but maybe if he was a top ten guy then sometime in the last 6 years SOMEONE would have benefited to play on his team and he might have won half of his games at least once.

Love’s inability to coevolve around the team is further exposed at the end of close games. Last year the Wolves went 7-14 in games decided by 5 points or less and OT because it’s not a secret around the league: Love is relatively easy to manage at the end of games. Because he doesn’t have a quick first step, defenders can play him tight at the 3 point line. His post game is easy to muddle up with two defenders and he hasn’t evolved into a threat from 16–23 feet like most closers in the league.

None of this is to say Love isn’t a VERY good player, a perennial all-star. But to treat his impact on winning basketball as a quantifiable fact is a stretch. We know Kevin Love has put up great scoring and rebounding numbers on a bad team for exactly three seasons when he was healthy and a starter. That’s it.