Wait, the Mavs approached the Lakers with this offer? 28 NBA teams probably found out Luka was available when the trade news broke.

Lakers arent contenders this year but this gives them a chance to build one over the next several years. They were on the verge of needing a tear down. Ill take it.

I still don't get it. If you are willing to trade Doncic (which seems crazy in the first place), why wouldn't you try to get more than that? I honestly don't know what because I'm having a hard time imagining the motivation. He is a guy you build around, and he is only 25. Unless he was threatening to go back to Europe, why would you ever trade him?

I will say I'm getting a good laugh out of Hawks fans celebrating that "we won the 2018 trade".

I read an recent article about Woj retiring and there was a part where he said he was still being offered tips on deals. I wonder if he actually would have gotten this before Shams if he wanted it. Maybe it wouldn't have been such a shock if he was still doing his thing.

I don't know how serious the LeBron trade stuff was, and I guess they can at least see how 2 ball hog players work together before making an off-season deal for the rest of this year. But I still think he ends up with Curry for a last gasp shot at a title, and the Lakers move on to the next superstar era.

As a Laker fan this may have me tune into a game or two. Having said that, I've pretty much quit watching NBA games over the last few years. Between the 100 threes per game and not knowing the young players coming in because they don't play college ball long enough to be seen, my interest has gone to almost zero. If NIL money improves this "never see them play" problem I could see myself coming back. It's pretty bad when I know more of the women in the WNBA draft than I do men in the NBA draft.

Great deal for LA, good deal for Dallas as I think a healthy AD (can he stay healthy?) gives them a better chance to win a title now. Take that with a grain of salt. As I said I've barely watched the league in the last few years so may be speaking out of my ass. :lol:

I read that Dallas was tired of Luka’s conditioning issues and believe it’s playing a part in his injuries. They said at one point this season his weight ballooned to 260 and delayed a return from injury. I’ll be honest I don’t follow Dallas much and always thought he just had a body type that made him look heavier than he is. Is his weight and conditioning a legit concern?

Back to real basketball, the Indiana Fever just signed DeWanna Bonner to go with recently acquired Sophie Cunningham and Natasha Howard. They are putting together a team for a run.

Funny enough, the Athletic just did a feature on athletes with "dad bods." Doncic was up there with Mahomes as the example of elite athletes without the DK Metcalf physique.

Can't wait for the season to start. Good lord did I just say that about the WNBA? Yes, yes I did. :cool:

Weight and conditioning has been a public issue for him since the Tokyo Olympics, he's been 260-270 since 2021. He's been to the WCF in 2022 and the finals in 2024. He can singlehandedly win playoff games on his own, who cares if he's fat?

All of the hit pieces coming out is damage control for the awful trade.

Mavs got better defensively but their offense is gonna suck now. Their best players except for Kyrie are all non-ball handlers/playmakers. They're gonna play like a mid-2000s team.

You are not alone, and it is crazy how much I'm looking forward to it. Since I can't get the Braves on television with any regularity, the WNBA has basically taken second place behind football in my sports interest. If you would have told me that ten years ago I would have thought you were nuts.

The thing that gets me most about the trade is how out of the blue it was. No one leaked it, we didn't have days of them waffling.. I'm shocked that a trade of this magnitude happened without someone telling Luka or LeBron (or AD) ahead of time with them attempting to push it through or stopping it.

For all the talk of LeBron GMing, the fact that this came out of the blue to him has to put paid to that, right?

edit: The Mavs GM apparently thanked the Lakers in the press conference for not letting other NBA teams know that Luka was available for trade.
edit 2: This move cost Luka nearly $100 million in guaranteed money.

https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/l...ally-get-400m/

Quite the flex to thank the other team for ensuring you didn't get the most value you could. I guess they were really worried if it broke he'd shut it down and demand to pick his destination... but just bizarre to take one of the most valuable assets in the entire league and bid in secret against yourself.

Also the endorsements he'll get in LA and as a Laker will dwarf that Supermax money, I would think.

A number of people did not believe even after he reposted the trade saying "This is real". I guess it is fine when it is about a silly NBA trade.


This feels like Dallas wanting to get the best player possible without all the speculation that waiting until Thursday would bring. Davis was 2nd team All NBA. They could have gotten a lesser player and more draft capital but I think that goes over worse with the fanbase.


I do think conditioning is a legitimate grip for the Mavs to have. Who does not want their star player to be in the best possible shape? I would say the same thing about Jokic as well. However, Jokic has a few MVPs, a NBA title and still does not have a teammate who has been an All Star while playing with Jokic.

Is it a guarantee that Luka would play at a higher level than he already is if he got in better shape? No but I doubt it makes him worse.

Is it a guarantee that Luka would get injured less often if he were in better shape? No but I doubt getting in better shape makes it more likely.

It is also quite possible that Luka is never going to look like Karl Malone or LeBron and still goes on to have a HOF career. filled with NBA titles. To be clear, I would have had no problem giving Luca the supermax and hoping that eventually a 26,27,28 year old Luka eventually gets himself in better shape. Especially, if the alternative is counting on the health records of Anthony Davis and Kyrie Irving.

Per Shams,

De'Aaron Fox to the Spurs to team up Victor Wembanyama.

Zach LaVine to the Kings to team up with DeMar DeRozan (again)

And the Bulls might be getting their top 10 protected pick from the Spurs.

EDIT: Full Trade.

Full trade:

Spurs: De'Aaron Fox, Jordan McLaughlin

Kings: Zach LaVine, Sidy Cissoko, three first round picks (2025 CHA, 2027 SAS, 2031 MIN), three second round picks (2025 CHI, 2028 DEN, 2028 own back)

Bulls: Zach Collins, Tre Jones, Kevin Huerter, their own 2025 pick via SAS

Solid trade for the Kings and Spurs. I'm still not entirely sure what the Bulls are doing.

This one's not a surprise at all. Fox to Spurs was the expectation.

The thing that stands out so far are teams who have decided that they are not signing their star to a max extension and are moving on from them early. I disagree with what the Mavs did but if you don't want to sign Luka to a supermax extension, I think moving him early makes sense. Same for the Kings and Fox.

There is still time but I also have no clue what the Bulls are doing. This tidbit from Elias Schuster who cover the Bulls is stunning. Even the most average
NBA front offices get a 1st round pick for one of the the floor sweat mop.

My theory is that Trump's a Lakers fan, and he threatened tariffs against the Mavs.

How do you contact just one team about trading for Doncic - and publicly admit it! - as if you don't have one of the most valuable trade chips in NBA history? When people talk about sports being rigged, this is the exact kind of story you think about. The Lakers need a transcendant star to take LeBron's place. And as good as Davis is, he's really not that guy. And all of a sudden, a team offers you a 25 year old superstar with no escalated bidding required. How does that not smack of "keep the Lakers relevant"?

I don't care how much you like Davis, and apparently there's some connection there that goes back years. You make the best deal for your team. And that necessarily involves multiple interested teams, which there would have been. Just bizarre.

Right?

Even if your internal thinking was "We really want Davis," you still create a bidding war and at least probably squeeze another first rounder out of the Lakers.

Mavs have an inside line to Trump and he's going to deport Doncic since he can't stay healthy and work his green card is getting torn up.

How does Karnišovas still have a job? Oh, I know. It's because the team owner doesn't give a shit. Reinsdorf loves to keep incompetent GMs/Operations guys waaay too long (see Paxson, Foreman, and probably Krause; also see the White Sox :banghead: ). This kind of incompetence from bad owners makes you wonder how they were successful enough in other ventures to afford a professional sports team.

Which should tell all of us that the Mavs believe that what was best for the team was getting Luka out of that organization NOW and with as little complications as possible.

If this were some other media markets, we would have already gotten the hit pieces about how terrible a teammate/human being Luka was in order to justify the move.

With football just about over, I'm already looking forward to the WNBA. Strange times!

The Athletic article today basically confirms that first paragraph. Essentially they reached out to the Lakers and one other team to try to gauge interest and over a few weeks, the Lakers said they were only going to give the one first rounder and AD and the Mavs were so worried they would walk away and it would leak leading to a disgruntled Luka that they announced it as fast as they could.

And they will end up paying (an injury prone) AD a Supermax through the age of 37 rather than paying Luka a Supermax through the age of 30.

Unless it turns into a championship for them or Luka blows multiple achilles in the next few years, going to go down in the history books as one of the worst and most one sided trades in any sport surely.

This is a league where Marcus Morris got like 5 draft picks in a trade. A 25-year old who is arguably a top-3 player entering his prime should command a generation of 1sts plus players. Like would the Lakers have really said no if they had to include the 2031 pick?

I just don't know how you move on from Doncic and don't get like 5 first rounders in any deal.

Allegedly they didn't want to include the 2031 pick because they weren't sure they could sign Luka to an extension, but the reality is they were handed all the cards and the power and knew they were dealing with a weak GM and organization.

Leonard Hamilton announced he is resigning at the end of the season. As much as I appreciate everything he did to elevate the FSU basketball program, this is for the best. Things seemed to fall off a cliff following the abrupt end of the 2020 season. That was an Elite Eight/Final Four team. Could never really capture that again, and with NIL and now being sued for allegedly promising some sort of payments (NIL?), it's clear the off-the-court game has passed him by.

Maybe have top 3 protection on it or something. I just don't see any scenario where the Lakers balk at that trade if you have to include a 2031 pick too. They're getting a top-3 player entering his prime! Those guys just don't come around much. Heck, Dallas should have taken all their 2nd round picks till the end of time too.

Would the Lakers have really said no if they had to include the 2031 pick? Maybe

As I listen and read more analysis of the trade, the max extensions especially the supermax extension that came into play under the previous CBA are filling NBA front offices with fear. I don't think it is automatic for teams to just sign their players to a max extension anymore.

I know the salaries rise every year and how much you are paid depends on when you sign your deal. Still, as great as Luka is, is he six million a year better on the court than Jason Tatum who also signed his supermax extension with Boston at age 26? Is Luka ten and a half million per year better than SGA who is also supermax eligible this year at yes 26 yes old? Hell, is Luka worth twenty three million dollars per year more on the court than he is on the court with the Lakers with the extension he can sign with the Lakers? Under the new CBA and all the restrictive aprons? That is before I get into whatever the behind scenes situation was with the Mavs.

I'm still not sure I move him but I am beginning to understand why the Mavs would if things were really shitty behind the scenes. As far as opening it up to other teams, it is still the NBA. How much are you trading for two years of Luka before being at his mercy. This article explains what the scenarios for signing Luka will be moving forward.

403 Forbidden

My guess is the Lakers felt like they were taking a chance on Doncic not re-signing with them since he was not being told about the trade and they couldn't talk to him beforehand. So, that likely limited the value they were willing to offer - with no competition, no less. Why bet against yourself?

Kyrie has a player option for next season which he will probably decline. PJ Washington will also be a free agent. And then the proceeding offseasons there is Gafford and Lively. A preemptive move to avoid the second apron in a few years and not pay a 9 digit tax penalty.

The other conspiracy of course is the Adelson family wants to move the team to Vegas since casinos aren't allowed in Texas. Moving Luka is the first step to disengage the fans from the franchise. Dallas and Seattle would then be the expansion teams.

The new CBA and the hard aprons shouldn't have had any effect on a Luka level decision, 1st team All-NBA guys like him or Tatum making 35% of the cap is a huge bargain not an issue. It's when you have to pay the Bradley Beal's and Damian Lillard's that amount that you're screwed. I can also see the sticker shock of giving someone $70 million a year or $350 million total when he may or may not play 350 games in that timeframe will always be there, but guys like Scottie Barnes are getting locked in for $45 million a year/$225m total and Joel Embiid is already locked in to $70 million in 2028/29. Strange as it is I really believe this was a basketball decision by a GM who doesn't seem like he plans to be there or care where they are in 10 years, but also one that now has a team that I don't think anyone thinks can come out of the West and win a title in the next 3 years. The Celtics have shown we can shoot horribly enough at times to lose to anyone, but a team like us or OKC will get a parade of wide open 3's vs them, AD's individual brilliance can't cover for PJ at the 3, Klay at the 2, Kyrie at the 1.

Overall CBA wise I like most of what it's doing. Like it's a little annoying 2nd apron teams can't aggregate salaries... but teams were abusing that and it should be really hard for a defending champ to maintain depth. The main issue I see is that the pay structure got tilted too much in favor of late career vets, now that it's close to a hard cap teams are starting to play hot potato with those guys, even ones who are All-Star but not All-NBA level. It's increasing star player movement but not sure the players in that age bracket are liking that, walking away from guys is becoming normalized so you can't just get your max money and your pick of destination anymore. But end of the day those are aging players and 2nd/3rd tier guys who used to all get maxes, this is Luka and an idiotic decision by an idiotic GM. They're not just betting on Luka (who has always been a little fat and out of shape as he finishes 1st team All-NBA and carries them deep into the playoffs) falling apart before he is 30, they are betting on Anthony Davis and Kyrie Irving being significantly healthier the next 5 seasons.

Like did anyone here look at that Mavs team making the finals run and think Luka was the problem? No, he carried a flawed team to the finals and a loss to a juggernaut and all-time offense. But apparently his own GM thought Kyrie who is 32 and shot like 32% that series and got equally abused on defense is the one to build around. True galaxy brain thinking. :lol:

Dallas losing to Embiid who got a triple double is peak irony.

Butler to the Warriors. They were going to make a deal to shake things up one way or another.

Jimmy to the Warriors for Andrew Wiggins, Dennis Schroder, Kyle Anderson, and a protected 1st. Jimmy signs an two year $121M extension.

The Warriors now have Jimmy's loyalty.

EDIT: The Pistons also get Lindy Waters from the Warriors and Josh Richardson from the Heat.

Report is that Mike Woodson has agreed to retire at the end of the season. Hoosiers fans rejoice! As always, Brad Stevens is the guy most people want. Maybe the third time is the charm...


Like Fox Mulder, I want to believe.

I'd still be pretty surprised if he left now, but his son is a FR at ND and I think his daughter is a JR or SR in HS. I know he didn't want to make his kids move schools again, but if they're both in college and especially if the Celtics win a 2nd maybe he would be up for a new challenge.

Does Stevens miss being on the sidelines? Not saying he had declined as a coach skillwise or anything like that. I have always thought that he had reached his limit as a coach as far as the day to day grind goes and preferred the more strategic view of the front office.

Who knows. I'm hopeful but well aware that we've been through this twice before with poor results. I do know that he is perhaps the only guy who could make the whole fanbase happy.

I'm curious about this, and you're not the only one here who has posted about the WNBA. I've never seen a game.

But when I was in high school, I got into it when the sports info department at Michigan was looking for volunteers and I ran the 24-second clock, among other things. Then I ended up with that beat at The Ann Arbor News for a few years. Newspapers were how I paid for college.

So I appreciated the women's game, maybe more than the men's game. Basketball seems to work better when it's not played above the rim.

It has never caught on, though, until maybe now. Is it Clark? Do people either root for her or root against her, but they won't watch a game unless she's playing? TV ratings seem to suggest that's half the audience, at least. Or it something else?

Not when the shooting and ball handling is as poor as the WNBA it doesn't.

The women's college game is more often unwatchable than not at this point, and the WNBA seems to reflect that, a general decline in basic basketball skills overall.

For me, it is definitely Clark. She adds a lot of excitement with her passing and shooting skills. It feels a lot like watching Jordan in the day.

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Regardless of gender it seems like at a basic level the more you prioritize athleticism and size over skill the worse the product is to watch. Not just because they're less skilled on offense but also because weaker and smaller defenders allow more time and space for others to be creative. But it's really easy to identify the biggest and best athletes and most coaches prefer to think they can coach up anyone with the athletic tools and oftentimes that defensive floor is enough to win/be competitive so coaches will always do it. And then my theory on top of that is that you still don't have as many girls play as boys so there aren't as many players with size and skill weeding out the ones who are almost all length and quickness. The refs also seem to allow much more physical defense in the WNBA or D1 women's games, ticky tack fouls aren't fun but neither are star players going 1/19 and teams shooting 22/72 when they win a title game.

Hubie Brown has been associated with the NBA/ABA as long as I have been associated with Earth.

Have you watched full wnba games? How many? The highlight reels shown of bad wnba plays remind me of Skip Bayless daily running of Russel "Westbrick" bad plays. Westbrook with the Lakers made more bad plays in one game than any wnba player I saw in any game last year.

Watching a men's division 1 college basketball game the other day a 6'10" center shot an air ball from 3 feet. Nobody bodying him and no hand to disturb the shot. I bet if I look close enough I could put together a reel of men's fuckups. These would be cherry picked plays, that same as the wnba fuck up plays have been cherry picked.

The thing that surprised me most about watching wnba last year for the first time, due to Clark, was how fundamentally sound they are. They can't play above the rim but they do play good basketball.

I spent quite a few years following the league very closely, as the college game slowly declined (and as the members of the league became one of the most unlikable collections of athletes ever assembled) that interest faded.

I've seen the contemporary version more sporadically, but if I want to watch women's basketball that struggles with shooting, struggles with coaching, with erratic officiating, I can do that with local high schools.

For me, it started last season. The IU men's team was simply no fun to watch. Their style of play was shitty, and a lot of games they were not competitive. I'd been hearing about Caitlin Clark a lot, so I was like I'll check out the IU women's team. The way they played was much more fun to watch, and they were actually a good, high-effort team. They could actually hit their threes, which nobody on the men's team has been able to do in a lonnnnnnnng time. I especially enjoyed watching McKenzie Holmes, our star center. Since I was enjoying the IU games, I started to watch Iowa games too. Clark was a joy to watch. She just makes these amazing passes, and can hit from everywhere. She has a Jordan-like determination to win. After the season, Dad and I started watching the Indiana Fever games. Eventually, we both paid for the WNBA season pass. After football, women's basketball has become my second favorite sport. It was great to have something to watch through the summer where previously the summer was just a void as far as sports were concerned.