Who Won The Luka Doncic And Anthony Davis Trade?

Ben Degani

Luka Doncic and Anthony Davis in action during the game between the Dallas Mavericks and the Los Angeles Lakers on December 12, 2023.

There aren’t too many ways that you can shock the entire NBA community these days, but we were all proven wrong last week as news broke that the Mavericks traded Luka Doncic for Anthony Davis. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The Dallas Mavericks traded their franchise player and the face of the team. This is the most shocking trade in NBA history.

This is a trade so insane that fans are now theorizing that the league did it to boost ratings. According to multiple sources, none of the players involved had any idea the trade was coming. Not Luka, not Davis, and not even Lakers GM Lebron James. Luka is reported to have never requested a trade in his career. The Mavericks were just in the finals last year. We’ve seen many players sign with other teams after a good finals run. But there's never been a team that gives up their star player after being three games shy of a championship. Our conclusion? You don't trade Luka Doncic.

Tim MacMahon reports that Dallas had two major concerns when it came to Luka’s future with the franchise. The first was his 345 million dollar five-year extension, which he would've been eligible for this summer, and the second was his conditioning and health. Luka was out of shape, and reported to have bulked up to 270 pounds. The franchise fails to understand that it can be another 20 years before a player of that caliber wears a Mavericks jersey. Three finals trips in 45 years and he was responsible for one of them only six seasons into his career.

The Mavericks considered this a “win now trade,” which almost sounds like an oxymoron considering where they got in the playoffs last year. On the other end, there can be some reasoning found deep within the workings of this trade. The Mavericks GM said that “defense wins championships,” and all-star Anthony Davis will give them just that as one of the top five defensive big men in the league at the moment.

One theory is that the Lakers are playing the long game with this trade. Trade sources report that the Mavericks are the ones that approached LA with this trade, and despite the Lakers playing fairly well lately, they likely knew their chances of winning another title with the LeBron/AD duo were getting slim. So, with the option of trading away key pieces and tripling down on a 40-year-old LeBron to carry them to the promised land, they couldn't book AD's flight to Dallas fast enough. The Lakers needed a new face for their franchise – and they just got it.

All in all, it seems like the Mavericks won this trade if you zoom way in and look at this in an 18-month window. But what if you start to zoom out? The Lakers are looking around, asking themselves how they just pulled off a heist. With AD, the Mavericks lineup looks good and is possibly a winning formula, but the Lakers have something truly special in Luka Doncic. In 20 years, fans will look back and wonder how one of the greatest players of all time was traded away in his prime one random Saturday night.