EMERGENCY POD: Reaction to SHOCKING Luka Doncic, Anthony Davis trade between Mavs & Lakers

incredibly long dinner and a lot of wine. So that was a three hour dinner my dad, my wife, and I and then afterwards my dad heads back to my sisters and my wife says, you know, we haven't gone out like gone out, gone out like we used to in quite some time. I was a bottle of wine in I'm not driving. I'm like, okay, let's do it. So we end up going going downtown in New York

a couple different spots. And while we are in a way too loud, far too many people, so much younger than me, as I am the old guy in the club, I look at my phone and I read this breaking The Dallas Mavericks are trading Luka Doncic, Maxi, Kliba, and Markkeith Morris to the Los Angeles Lakers for Anthony Davis, Max Christi and a twenty twenty nine first round pick. Sources tell ESPN from Sham Sharania, and I have the reaction that I think, literally everyone has, Oh dude, got hacked.

Definitely not real, impossible that it could be real. He then follows it up with yes, this is real and has the full trade. But again that means nothing to me because if if you got hacked, if you got hacked, the same person has control of your account. You then tweeting, yes, this is real. I send the tweet to people who would be directly involved in such a thing, and before I even get a response, the main ESPN account tweets it. And my reaction at that moment is like everyone else's

holy shit, what just happened? Is this the biggest trade in NBA history? Maybe, but maybe not. You don't want to be too prisoner of the moment. He I mean, Kareem Abdul Jabbar was traded in the peak of his prime, in a decade when he was winning six league MVPs, So that's a pretty big one. That Shaquille O'Neill obviously changed teams. We've had, We've had Apex, predator stars changed teams. So I don't know if it's the biggest trading in NBA history. It is the most shocking there is nothing.

And when I say shocking, not just to the audience, to the league. Other teams didn't know, other agents didn't know, other players didn't know. There is no context for what we just saw, Luca entering not even yet officially really technically in his prime, even though it sure feels like he's been in his prime since his second year in

the league. But age wise, you're prime in the league supposed to be twenty seven to thirty one, Luca at twenty five being traded without a trade demand, a preemptive strike by Dallas, and Dallas's return being a great player in Anthony Davis. But again, if prime is twenty seven to thirty one, a thirty one year old Anthony Davis, and it is just mind blown. So I then tweeted about it. I went on IG Live from the club that might have been a that could have been a

terrible mistake, and end up going quite well. And then something happened on my phone where it's not even it's not even saved, it's not even posted. You had to be one of those few thousand people watching me live, and I don't even know if you could hear me or else. That's lost to the ether. So here's what we're gonna do. It's not gonna be the normal hour long pod. Never done. I think I've maybe done one other emergency pod. I don't know. Lakers perspective, Luca's perspective,

Lebron's perspective, the MAVs perspective, and Anthony Davis's perspective. Those are the five angles. We're gonna attack each one individually. We are going to start with the Lakers. I do not know. So what does it mean for the Lakers right now this moment. I'm not sure the Lakers actually for this year got demonstrably better, and I know that sounds insane. They're going to have one of, if not the best offense in basketball. That's going to happen. Now.

You now have two of the best generators of offense in NBA history in Lebron James who's still and he showed it to you last night against a good Knicks team on the road without ad old Man still got it thirty three, twelve and eleven, just because Yeah, I'm in the garden, so I'm gonna rev up to still being able to get to whatever my apex is right now, I can get there in the biggest spot. You then add to him a guy who is, with no disrespect to SGA, a top three player. So offensively, the Lakers

are going to be extraordinary. Defensively, they were already bad and they lost their only room protection and so for this year, I don't you know, I know their championship ods went from like fifty to one to twenty to one. Everything I know about the history of the NBA says you can't be as bad as they're going to be defensively and have a real shot at the championship. But honestly, it doesn't matter. That's not the point of this trade.

The point of this trade if you're the Los Angeles Lakers is you now are set for the next half decade, and that's being conservative. If Luca likes it there, you're set for the next decade. You have there Again, there are three guys that are just better than every player in the league. Jokic, Jannis and Luca and now you

have one of them. And now when we zoom out for the last half decade for the Lakers, they flipped Josh Hart, Lonzo Ball, Brandon Ingram and what ends up being four first round picks for a championship in twenty twenty and Luke ad Ancic the Anthony Davis trade got you a championship, and then Anthony Davis plus one more first round pick got you Luk Adncic and the Lakers probably aren't done. The Lakers have to go get a

big They just have to. Jack Hayes is not like if they're actually going to try to compete this year, but even if they don't, it's simply one of the biggest coups in the history of basketball. And there are so many ways to try to build a perennial contender in the NBA. You can do what Okahoma City did, which is draft exceptionally, take your shot, cast your chips out at the right time, rebuild picks, picks picks, draft exceptionally again, and then have your contender make a savvy trade.

See something in SGA the rest of the league doesn't quite see. That's one method. Another method is what the Spurs you're trying to do literally, hit the draft lottery, get a generational talent, hope he wants to be there. Another method is the Knicks what they've tried to do. See something in a player in Jalen Brunson the rest of the league doesn't quite see. Go get him, see him ascend, be judicious with your draft picks, and then go all in. There's all these smart, long term ways

to build a contender. The other way is just be the fucking Lakers and seemingly be mismanaged for a half decade, and then Lebron James is like, I want to play for you and get him, and then he helps you get Anthony Davis, and then a half decade later, the Dallas Mavericks call you and say they call you and say, can I interest you in Luka Ancic, to which you say, uh, yeah,

you can. Now the MAVs side of this is far uglier, and the MAVs are going to try to spin evidently that they were worried about how in shape Luca was and they were worried about giving him the Supermax. If Luca's not worth the Supermax, then then no one is. Whenever we talk about the best players in the league.

The other thing you got to remember is, even if you want to include Shae in that top three and call it a top four in something that is true, but no one ever believes when you tell them Shae older than Luca. Luca's twenty five, Shay's twenty six. Obviously, yokichinyanis considerably older than both of them. So if you're the MAVs, you didn't hold an auction, you didn't get a bounty, you got one first round pick, no swaps, you didn't get Dalton connect, you didn't get Austin Rivers.

Now again, I'm not downplaying who Anthony Davis is. Anthony Davis is a great player, but he is six years older and he is not Luka Nacik. And you're doing it on the heels of Luca. Take the last three years in Dallas. Luca carries you to the conference finals, then you have a disaster year, and then he carries you to the NBA Finals. You pull off a risky Kyrie Irving trade and it works, and to now have

f And here's the other thing for Dallas. They in the Kyrie trade and the other trades they've made, they've traded a lot of their future draft so not to get two in the weeds. But I'm looking at it right now. Think on real GM twenty twenty seven, their first round pick to Charlotte. Twenty twenty eight, their first round pick can be swapped with Oklahoma City. Oklahoma City's gonna be really good, so I would imagine that's a swap that'll take place twenty twenty nine, their first round

pick to either Houston or Brooklyn. That's a complicated one, but they don't have it. Twenty thirty, they swap picks with san Antonio. So twenty when did it start? Twenty twenty seven to twenty thirty, you don't have your own draft pick. You either don't have a first or you're swapping with san Antonio, who by twenty thirty should be awesome, or Oklahoma City, who in twenty twenty eight will be awesome.

And now you're leaning on is Kyrie thirty two now a thirty two turning thirty three next month, Kyrie Irving and a thirty one year old Anthony Davis, who again is a great player, and he turns thirty two next month as well. And what you don't have is a bunch of these other future picks to replenish all the picks you traded away trying to win now with Luca. I don't understand this from the MAVs perspective at all.

I don't understand how you don't hold an auction. All the reporting surrounding this is that Luca did not demand this, that they were And again, I'm sure people are gonna talk about the fact that he mainlined sweet tea or that he's out of shape. Who gives a shit? He was just in the NBA finals. He's one of the greatest offensive players in modern NBA history. And how does this land for Kyrie? How does this land for Anthony Davis? Has to be I mean not just shocked, but devastated.

And I do not believe anyone arguing will actually for this year the MAVs got better, No, they didn't. Luca in the playoffs is one of the most prolific players in the last thirty years offensively, and you'd be like, what about the defense. I don't know, man, they were in the finals last year. Luca's career in the playoffs again, I'm twenty twenty thirty one, ten to nine. The entirety of that series was with Koir Paul George Gardingham. He's twenty years old or I guess the let me make sure,

would he have turned Okay, No, he's twenty one. He turned twenty one before those playoffs, So twenty twenty one again with Koir Paul George guarding him the whole time in the playoffs thirty six, eight and ten, he's twenty two years old. Then he carries them to the conference finals, going through a Phoenix team that everyone loved. He's thirty two, ten and six. And then last year he carries them to the NBA Finals forty one minutes per game, twenty nine,

not ten and eight. And you traded him. You traded him for a player six years older than him who's not quite as good, Max Christi, and won first round pick. And by the way, the Lakers first round pick in twenty twenty nine not going to be that valuable. You know why, because Luca is on the team. All right, what does this mean for Lebron again? There will be

It's inevitable. It hasn't yet happened. I tweeted that it was gonna last night, that it would happen by Monday, and I imagine it will by Monday, there will be folks on your television screens explaining how Lebron orchestrated this, or Lebron ran a d out of town or that is I can tell you with I don't know if it's first hand sourcing, but it's close. That's nonsense. And again I'm not certain I this makes the Lakers such

a different team this year. I don't know how much it helps Lebron this season from a odds to win the championship standpoint. What does allow for is Lucas Lebron's favorite player in the league. There is a great clip Lebron on the Pod with the road Trip and Pod Richard Jefferson in Channing Fry and I think it's Ali Clifton years ago where he says Luca was the first and only player he's ever tried to sign to be

a Lebron athlete on his shoe line. But Jordan got it, and he talked about how much he loves Luca's game, and Lucas talked forever about how he's modeled his kind of game after Lebron's. Those two guys playing together on the back the very back end of Lebron's career is going to be absolutely remarkable to see. Now, is it possible this year that they realize, well, their skills are kind of redundant and we need to figure out how we're going to card wings and this pairing, while fun

from a winning four playoff series perspective, not great. And therefore, next offseason, for what everyone assumes next year will be Lebron's final year, that the Lakers and Lebron talk and figure out do you want to finish here? Should you finish here? Or is there that Steph Lebron pairing that everyone's been hinting about for years? Is there a way to make that happen? Sure, that might be on the board.

But seeing these two basketball savants, true geniuses play together in what is probably at least the second to last year of Lebron's career and maybe the last year of his career just from a pure basketball fan standpoint, is going to be unbelievable. What does it mean for Luca? And here is I think the most important piece of this. Maybe I should have led with it, it's the most important piece. I think this is the single greatest thing that could

ever happen to luka Anci's the basketball player. He is going to see first hand the level of professionalism taking care of your body that it takes to reach his full potential. And what Luca's full potential is. His full potential is one of the ten greatest players of all time. That's what it is. And even without reaching his full potential, he's going to be one of the twenty five greatest players of all time. He's going to be a multiple

time MVP. But if he can glean a bit from lebron On, because the off the court stuff, the way to really stay in shape, and again, Luca played in the Olympics, Luca plays. I'm sure Luca's argument is, guys, I play as much basketball as as humanly possible. Leave me alone if I you know, enjoy hookah and you know, some fatty acids. But he's dealt with a few injuries. He obviously can wear down a bit, and so learning from lebron On that changes the trajectory of his career.

And I can't listen this for me. I mean, this is my all time favorite player ever in Lebron now playing on the same team with my second favorite player in the league in Luca it's it's the greatest player of all time and my larger old Slovenian son together. I can't believe it. I still can't believe it. I

also like, again, what does it mean basketball wise? Because at the end of games, both Luca and still even forty years old, there aren't three guys in the world who you'd rather have ball in their hand, final five minutes of a playoff game dictating everything, Three guys you'd rather have more than Lebron. But if there are, one of them's Luca and so I don't know how they're gonna sort that out, but that's one of them good problems. And again defensively, the Lakers, I have to imagine they're

going to make another move. And they're also now have no size. It's a weird team. But Luca's on the Lakers. And then then we go to Anthony Davis quickly. I I think this sucks for AD. I think that Anthony Davis has done everything right. He did do everything he could to take care of his body. We saw it paid dividends last year. I think he thought I'm going to be a Laker forever and now get shipped to

Dallas with that weird new ownership situation. I think it's fair to say, based on this trade, a front office that seems to be out of their minds, and I I now that people don't understand what kind of a special player it takes to get all the great basketball stuff out of Kyrie and not have to worry about the other stuff. It's to Kyrie's credit, it has really gone away since he went to Dallas. I wonder how

this lands. Man. Kyrie is a thoughtful guy and the shock wave of man, this team just knifed Luca, and knife is the wrong word because Lucas probably happy, but preemptively traded Luca. I don't know how that impacts Kyrie. So I say all that to say this, I would be shocked if the MAVs win a playoff series this year. Shocked, And that's not listen. I love Ad I think he's an excellent player, but right now they're sitting there at the eighth seed, ads injured. I I just cannot believe

the Mavericks did this. And I cannot believe you traded Luka Doncic under the you know, cover of night. You didn't come away with young players one hundred draft picks and a full franchise reboot. Instead, you got an awesome future Hall of Famer that's about to be thirty two and one first round pick. It is like, what would now? Maybe the answer is not as much as you think, because he wasn't gonna re sign, But what would the Spurs have given you to be able to pair Wimby

and Luca? Also? Was it not? Was this trade not gonna be there in six months after? You get one more playoff run again out of a guy who just took you to the NBA Finals. I I am beyond stunt, and I guess I don't know that I want to give Rob Bolinka credit because I don't think that guy's been very good at this job at all. But you just got Luke ad Ancic. You still have picks to trade, you still have swaps you can make, you still have Austin Reeves, you still have Dalton connect there's you can

make moves. And the Lakers are sitting there coming off a great win when Lebron looked awesome. That like, here's the thing about it, and again it's one game, I understand. But the Lakers played Saturday night in Madison Square Garden against the Knicks without Anthony Davis and one. So that Lakers team that when Lebron gets to that level, is

really good offensively, really good. Just added Luke a Ancic, And I'm just staring right now at the standings, like thinking what other teams would have just said take everything. So Oklahoma City obviously has all the picks in the world, but they're happy with where they're at, and you know

they so that probably wouldn't make sense. Houston's got a lot of Pickslake, would Houston have given you Jalen Green a million picks, others like Dylan Brooks or whatever other salaries to make it work and then all of a sudden you have Shngoon and Luca and Thompson. I cannot believe this is all Dallas got, and I don't think anyone in the league can and the Lakers now, it's really unbelievable. If you're a Laker fan, if you're a

MAVs fan, I don't even if you're a man. Kids that are MAVs fans, If I don't know what the parents do this morning, explain to them that this happened. Just devastation. But if you're a Lakers fan. I don't care how old you are, you have been able. You have had on your team one of the ten greatest players of all time without interruption from the mid seventies until Kobe's retirement. I guess the early well there was two.

You know what, let me do a different way. There have been with basically from the start of the league to now, whether it was West and Wilt, Kareem, Magic, Shaq, Kobe Lebron and now Luca. We can go sixty five years and there were if I added up all the seasons, maybe ten total the early seventies, the mid nineties and post Kobe pri Lebron ten twelve years total. You did not have one of the historic again ten greatest players of all time at or near the peak of his

powers on your team. And now Lucas not that yet, but I think he's going to be and he's gonna do it in the Lakers Jersey. Good for them, man. And if you're the MAVs, I mean a year ago you have twenty four year old Luka, doncic An owner and Mark Cuban. That's awesome, getting ready to go to the finals. Cuban's gone, Luca's gone, you're now fighting to, you know, get out of the play in which you're

not going to do. And your team's built around round a soon to be thirty two year old and as soon to be thirty three year old who have both dealt with injury issues, and you don't have your picks in twenty seven to twenty eight, twenty nine, or thirty and you have one extra pick, the Lakers twenty twenty nine pick, which again is not going to be that valuable because they now have Luke Anncic. What is the Lakers' next game at the Clippers February fourth, Luke is obviously

injured home for Golden State Thursday. This is I mean, I cannot wait to see that first Luke in Lebron game, their first national TV game, assuming Luke is not playing this week Saturday February twenty second, Saturday Night on ABC against the Nuggets, and then Tuesday circle this one Today, February twenty fifth, on TNT, the Lakers host the Dallas Mavericks. Unbelievable. So there it is. I'm I don't know if you guys can tell, I'm still a little stunned, but I

cannot wait to watch Luke and Lebron play together. And again I joke on the TV show I have a fake news hat. The hat is fake, the news is real. Lebron was almost as shocked by this as you guys were. And again, I don't know that if the only goal, like from Lebron's perspective, is like win a title this year, I don't know how much closer this makes the Lakers this year. But for the Lakers as a team, it's one of the greatest cups in NBA history. See you

guys on Tuesday for a regular schedule show. It was what trick