by Paul Teetor
The Lakers did it again.
Sooner or later, all the stars that are big-time box office – Wilt Chamberlin, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant, Shaq, LeBron, Pau Gasol and Luka Doncic – find their way to Los Angeles.
Now the Luka era in Lakers history has officially begun – thanks to an unbelievable, inexplicable unforced error by the Dallas Mavericks.
But let’s tamp down the great expectations for now. Even with Doncic on their team, don’t expect the Lakers to win a championship or be in the NBA Finals this year.
This trade was all about the future. About securing the Lakers future.
The Lakers now have their successor to LeBron James for the next decade or more. Just as LeBron followed Kobe Bryant as the Lakers’ Alpha Dog, so now Luka Legend – or Laker Luka, as he now will be known – follows LeBron.
LeBron is now the Lakers past, whether he stays or goes – and it says here that he will stay for now.
Luka is their present and more important, their future.
The words block-buster and bombshell are two of the most over-used words thrown around in the news business. But in this case, they understate the magnitude of the Lakers trading soon-to-be-32-year-old star center Anthony Davis for 25-year-old superstar point guard Luka Doncic.
Luka is the kid from Slovenia who conquered the hoops world. So this was an earthquake felt around the world, a shifting of the NBA’s tectonic plates with all kinds of ripples across the league.
Doncic is one of the three best players in the world. Teams never trade generational talents like him unless they are forced to – but that is apparently not what happened here. Dallas just made the dumbest trade in NBA history – and the Lakers are the beneficiaries.
In tennis, it would be called an unforced error. Luka had two more years left on his contract and had not issued – publicly or privately – a demand to get him out of Dallas.
That’s why the explanations floating out of the Mavericks front office – his fitness and conditioning were a chronic problem, his off-court attitude was too lax, even hints he drank too much – were so absurd as to be laughable.
His fitness and conditioning have been a problem every year – and yet he has been first-team All NBA for the last five years and last year he led the NBA in scoring at more than 33 points a game. Oh, and he led the Mavericks to the NBA Finals where they lost to the Boston Celtics because Luka didn’t have any scoring support beyond notorious head case Kyrie Irving.
Nobody saw this trade coming, including LeBron James, who up till this point was consulted on every single roster move by the Lakers GM Rob Pelinka. That by itself carries a lot of significance – for LeBron and also for his agent Rich Paul, LeBron’s childhood friend who thought he was running the Lakers behind the scenes until he learned Saturday night that he wasn’t in charge after all.
This was the greatest roundball robbery since the Lakers stole Kobe Bryant from the Charlotte Hornets for Vlade Divac and spare parts on Draft Day 1996. Just like now, the Lakers traded away a very good player for a great player, a transcendent player. The difference is that back then only Lakers General Manager Jerry West knew how good Kobe was going to be. In this case everyone knows how good Luka is and the Mavericks still made the lop-sided trade.
It cost Luka $117 million – the difference between the $350 million super max extension he could have signed with Dallas and the regular extension he can sign with the Lakers this summer. And that money is at the heart of the seemingly inexplicable trade. You have to know the history behind the Mavericks ownership to understand this trade. Brash billionaire Mark Cuban was the Mavs owner until last year, and there is no way in hell that he would have approved this trade.
But Cuban, who used to hang out at the Shellback Tavern in Manhattan Beach whenever his team was in town to play the Lakers or the Clippers, sold the team last year to the family of Miriam Anderson, who run the Las Vegas Sands casino company. Cuban, you can bet, now regrets the sale every day.
The new owners simply made the calculated bet that Luka was not worth $350 million over five years. They felt he was not fully committed, was not maximizing his talents, and would never get in world-class shape like LeBron and other superstars who are fully committed to their unique talent.
Some media are giving Lakers GM Rob Pelinka props for pulling off such a great trade in total secrecy. But the facts do not support that conclusion.
According to ESPN, which broke the story late Saturday night, the Mavericks targeted Davis – a great defensive player – as the missing piece in their defense and set out to get him. Dallas GM Nico Harrison said the Lakers were the only team they called about trading Luka.
That is not the normal way NBA teams do business. When you have a player for sale, a player that virtually every team covets, you put him on the open market, announce you’re open for business, and wait for the lucrative offers to roll in.
And they will roll in, especially if teams get into a bidding war. The minimum price for a player like Luka would be four or five first round draft picks, an All-Star caliber player like Davis, and a couple of lesser players.
Instead, the Lakers only had to give up one of their two available first round picks and Max Christie, a non-entity. Star rookie Dalton Knecht was kept out of the trade.
A team mired in mediocrity just found hope again. A team that was being run into the ground by a superstar and his agent just regained control of its identity again.
There is much talk about Luka’s lack of fitness, but what about Davis? Last year the great Charles Barkley tagged Davis with the derogatory nickname “Street Clothes” because that was how he was most often seen: sitting on the bench watching the game in his street clothes while rehabbing his latest injury. It was a cruel but accurate bit of locker room humor by Barkley.
So the Lakers dealt a brittle, aging defensive whiz for a 25-year-old scoring machine. They dealt a guy who could never carry a team for a guy who last year nearly hauled the mediocre Mavericks to an NBA title.
They dealt their murky present for a hope-filled future, and now you have to wonder, with the NBA trade deadline fast approaching, are they done?
LeBron says he is staying with the Lakers past the trade deadline, which is Thursday February 6. All Ball believes him. But a lot can happen in the off-season, and if Luka and LeBron can’t share the ball LeBron will be the one to leave LA, not Luka.
Luka averaged 29 points, nine rebounds and six assists in last season’s NBA Finals loss to the Boston Celtics. He averaged 32 points and almost a triple-double in the Western Conference finals against the Minnesota Timberwolves.
He made the All-NBA first team in each of the last five seasons and capped his run with a scoring title.
The one thing the 6-foot-6 star doesn’t do is play center. The Lakers now need a center.
While Lakers fans were elated by the trade, Mavericks fans were furious and there was talk of a fan boycott in Big D. By Tuesday the push-back was so intense that Dallas “team sources” were hinting that the real problem was that they couldn’t control Luka’s drinking habits to the point that they didn’t think he would have a long career.
So according to the Mavs, the Lakers are getting a fat, lazy drunk who doesn’t care about the game of basketball except when he is actually on the court.
But the Lakers – and their fans – think they are getting one of the three best players in the world, a guy who is three years away from entering his prime, generally considered ages 28-32 – unless your name is LeBron.
It’s the kind of difference of opinion that won’t be settled for a minimum of five years.
But All Ball has a spoiler alert: once he recovers from the shock of being dumped by the team he thought would be his home for his entire career, Luka will rip off several MVP seasons in a row and emerge as the next face of the league as LeBron fades away.
The Lakers did it again.
Mustangs Upset Sea Hawks in a thriller
The Mira Costa boys basketball team upset the Redondo Sea Hawks 69-68 Tuesday night to grab a share of the Bay League title.
Mira Costa fell behind by double digits Tuesday in the regular-season finale between the teams, but that was a wake-up call for the Mustangs.
They outscored Redondo 24-15 in the final period and survived a last-second shot attempt by Brayden Miner for a thrilling win that gave the Mustangs a share of the Bay League title with the Sea Hawks (23-4, 7-1).
Mira Costa (25-3, 7-1) outscored Redondo 45-33 in the second half.
In the fourth quarter, Mira Costa’s Eneasi Piuleini took over. The 6-foot-6 senior swingman scored 12 of his 22 points in the final quarter, including seven consecutive points to turn a 67-61 deficit into a 68-67 lead.
Later in the quarter, Redondo’s Chace Holley was fouled and he hit one of two free throws, tying the game at 68-68.
On their final possession the Mustangs got the ball to Jacob DeArmas, who was fouled and made one of two free throws for a 69-68 lead.
It was the climax to a thrilling comeback. Redondo led 35-24 at halftime and reached its largest lead, 38-24, on a 3-point play by Hudson Mayes.
Mira Costa was able to hang around, eventually cutting the deficit to five on a basket by Bryson Bryker, 42-37, with 4:29 left in the third quarter.
Redondo answered quickly and pushed the lead back to double digits at 51-40 on a 3-pointer by Miner.
Bryker finished with 14 points and Luke Hammerschmidt had 12 for the Mustangs.
Mayes led Redondo with 19 points. Holley had 15 and Miner and SJ Madison finished with 14 apiece.
Both teams will find out Saturday where they are placed in the CIF playoffs. Redondo will most likely make the Open Division while Costa will probably be placed in Division 1.
In the early game the Redondo girls basketball team beat Costa 45-34, avenging an earlier loss at Costa. Both teams will now wait for their playoff placement.
Contact: teetor.paul@gmail.com
