Holy shit. I would say with this last move the Lakers won the Luka trade. My goodness.
What a trade deadline in the West! Not so much in the East.
Jimmy Butler is now a Warrior. De’Aaron Fox is now Wemby’s running mate in San Antonio, and all of the sudden the Lakers sitting in the 5th seed look like ‘maybe’ they could have the second best starting five in the West if Luka can get his fat ass into shape.
I hope I have this right with all the Laker departures still swirling in my head. The Lakers’ starting five would now go LeBron, Luka, my favorite lunchpail player in the league–Austin Reaves, Rui Hachimura, and Mark Williams at the center position. You people out there…take notice–Austin Reaves was not traded among the Laker departures. MJ has been right about Austin since Day 1.
This is why I wrote what I wrote yesterday. That being, “I want to see who the Lakers land as their incoming center before we judge the trade in its totality.”
The Jimmy Butler trade, I’m not so sure how that will work. Pray for Steve Kerr is my first thought. Coach Kerr now has to manage Draymond Green, Jimmy Butler, and Gary Payton Jr. Maybe it’ll work. The Warriors didn’t give up all that much in Aaron Wiggins, Kyle Anderson, and Dennis Schroeder. We’ll see is all I’m saying. Draymond and Jimmy Butler together just seems like an ‘ask’ of sorts.
The sleeper trade I like though is De’Aaron Fox going to San Antonio to be Wemby’s point guard. The battles for the play-in slots are going to be fascinating in the West.
And the Thunder picked up some center ‘insurance’ with the addition of Theis. I don’t see Theis being a factor at all unless either Chet can’t stay healthy or Isaiah gets hurt again. This is like a personal center umbrella liability policy for Sam Presti—if you you know what those are. For you Oklahoma-Trump readers on here…well, never mind. Let’s move on. You’ve got to rebuild Gaza and figure out where you’re moving 2 million Palestinians.
Of course… the deadline isn’t over till midnight.
The West needed this.
Mike J