I was like "who the fook is this guy,?, and then I look at his height, and I was like f*** me. Like the seconds, though. Probably won't keep them for long, but if they're used wisely, that's cool. Nice move. IMO.
From what I'm reading, there are bad defenders, terrible defenders, then there is Jaden Hardy. This guy is like 0.1% percentile bad. He'll be packaged for a trade before wearing a Lakers jersey.
He's getting moved. Lakers wanted the 2nd round picks to package him and Vando in a trade. Lakers know they need a backup big and perimeter defenders. Ayton gifting the Lakers two 2nd rounders was huge.
Walker was a restricted free agent. Lakers couldn't just get him if they wanted. They had to pay Utah Jazz off to back off. It's really not that complicated. Do you want to hold onto those two first rounders and risk losing Luka next season when he figures out you weren't willing to deal the first rounders for the player he wanted?
yeah, i said i'd give both firsts if they ate some salary, but i was figuring it was going to take a max offer to make anything happen anyway. that we got him at what has become low 3rd/high 4th guy money which left us space to nab grimes/mamu was probably worth the extra 1st, too. btw, every time this thread moves to the top i'm afraid that this trade has been formally executed without expansion, which troubles me.
i think we have the path, but atlanta is waiting to see if someone can beat it. they probably want a cost-controlled prospect for kuminga (to me, knecht should qualify, but i'm biased). they're not going to get a 1st, imo.
how was he acquired with cap space? did we two it as two separate trades? ayton into a TE and hardy/2nds into our space? does the league allow such shenanigans?
Listening to his pod from last night it's a bit clearer. We acquired him while we had cap space and that's why he can be aggregated, I guess in the new cba if you're under the cap then you're still allowed to include them in deals with additional players. Not sure how long that window is good for though.