Why the Los Angeles Lakers couldn’t say no to Luka Doncic trade – and why the Dallas Mavericks are taking a huge risk

NEW YORK – As we absorb the news of the Luka Doncic trade to the Los Angeles Lakers from the Dallas Mavericks, a three-team deal that also involved the Utah Jazz, we can make some key takeaways.

This is perhaps

the most shocking trade in NBA

(National Basketball Association) history. Out of the blue, a 25-year-old superstar with time left to run on his contract has changed teams. On the face of it, it looks like an enormous risk for the Mavericks and an incredible stroke of fortune for the Lakers.

Doncic, Markieff Morris and Maxi Kleber are going to the Lakers, and Anthony Davis and Max Christie are going to Dallas. Jalen Hood-Schifino goes to Utah along with a 2025 second-round pick from each team (the Los Angeles Clippers’ 2025 pick is being sent from the Lakers; a complicated swop is being sent from Dallas).

Utah are sending back couch change – the minimum consideration of US$110,000 (S$149,000) – split among Dallas and Los Angeles, to complete the deal.

Let’s start with the lowest-hanging fruit. The easiest side to analyse is that of Los Angeles. This was absolutely a no-brainer for the Lakers.

Regardless of what you think about Doncic’s injuries or conditioning or attitude or complaining to officials or whatever, the full-strength version of Doncic is easily a top-five player in the NBA.

In the post-season, in particular, he is perhaps the best offensive player on the planet because of his ability to manipulate matchups in a half-court setting. He is also just 25, allowing the Lakers to reset the clock on a roster that was simultaneously getting long in the tooth and suffering a diminishing ceiling.

I cannot emphasise this enough – generational 25-year-olds do not get traded. Usually such top players are not moved until their third contract, if they move at all. And when they are moved, the receiving team usually has to give up everything to get him.

Not so much for the Lakers. To do this and only give up their 2029 first-round pick – keeping their first-round choice in 2031 – means the Lakers basically set themselves up for a five-year window in which Doncic can carry the Lakers into the post-LeBron James era, while also serving as the draw card to perhaps lure in another star free agent.

Secondarily, can we talk about Davis’ position? His stated preference is to play power forward, but the problem is that, offensively, he is not very good at it; he is much more effective playing the centre spot.

But that position is already the Mavericks’ second-biggest strength after the Doncic-Kyrie Irving core; Daniel Gafford is having a monstrous season and Dereck Lively II is one of the best young big men in the league.

One can fairly wonder if the Mavericks thought Davis and the 2029 unprotected first from the Lakers formed the best return available at the moment, but that combination also serves as a store of value from which to make future deals.

Dallas have three years and some change with Davis as a result of his recent extension, but the Mavericks could also pivot into another trade at some point. Similarly, that Lakers pick could combine with other money to acquire more help for Dallas’ two ageing stars.

The same can be said of the Mavericks’ other bigs; perhaps this deal positions them to sell high on Gafford and ride with Davis and Lively. That would let them satisfy Davis by starting him as the four but playing him at centre in crunch time.

The only downside, perhaps, is that a Doncic-James tandem is a less clean fit than a James-Davis tandem. But that only matters if you think these Lakers were title contenders as constructed. They were not, but they can reach that point again quicker with Doncic.

The construction of this trade is pretty technical because both teams were in the luxury tax at the time of the deal. The Mavericks set it up to get out of the tax, but the Lakers were constrained by being over the collective bargaining agreement’s first apron and capped at the second apron.

Those constraints all but forced Los Angeles to include Christie – whom I had been told had been re-signed for four years for US$32 million last summer as much to be a trade piece as to be a keeper on the Lakers’ roster – with a salary dump of Hood-Schifino to Utah completing the circle. Dallas then had to send out Morris because the Lakers could take him into a minimum exception.

As I mentioned, the deal was set up to get Dallas out of the luxury tax while still being cap legal from Los Angeles’ end, and it just barely cleared both hurdles. That makes the Mavericks the second of the 14 tax teams to wriggle out in a 24-hour span and drops Kleber’s US$11 million obligation onto the Lakers next season.

Kleber has been a total zero on offence, but his presence helps even out the money in 2025-26, when Davis’ recent extension kicks in and gives him a bump to US$54.7 million, which is more than US$8 million over what Doncic will make.

All that said, I’m worried I’ve buried the lead here. The Mavericks have made a lot of smart moves over the past two seasons since general manager Nico Harrison arrived, culminating in last spring’s march to the NBA Finals. Perhaps they are getting out in front of a potential problem and everything will make a lot more sense a year or two from now.

But the disaster potential on this one seems really high.

The Mavericks are now both old and expensive, and they do not control their first-round pick between the years 2027 and 2030, when their current roster is likely to bottom out. Irving turns 33 next month, and Davis turns 32; neither has been an Ironman even in the best of times.

One has to wonder what is the realistic shelf life for an Irving-Davis partnership to threaten the upper ranks of the cut-throat Western Conference. NYTIMES