FlatearthZorro wrote:meatball sub wrote:how did the kings get more for fox than dallas got for luka. this is insane.
that's a good question, for some reason the Mavs FO were hell-bent on sending him to LAL. Otherwise, they would've gotten enough to fully rebuild their roster. Again, not that crazy that they traded the guy, with everything being said, he's probably a big time prick and he's not a hard worker(just very talented on offense). With that said, it's a shocker that they didn't get 3-4 FRPs and a pick swap + a young guy along with an all-star type player.
They clearly wanted the best single player they could get back in return for Luka so that they could still be relatively competitive and prioritized that over getting the best overall package. They also wanted to get it done without all the drama that would come from truly shopping him, so they engaged an incredibly limited number of teams, which really limited their negotiating power.
It's still surprising that they weren't able to completely squeeze the Lakers for everything that they had in the cupboard given LA's current situation and somewhat dire forward look. You'd think Nico could say "do you want the 25 year old generational talent for your post LeBron era or not?" but at the same time I kind of get it because once Dallas start down this road there really was no coming back. All hell breaks loose as soon as it leaks that they genuinely shopped Luka, so Pelinka probably knew he had some leverage and the only top 10 player definitely available for Luka.
If Nico said give me everything or I'm walking away and Pelinka call's his bluff, they are in for a **** storm of epic proportions. So he likely sacrificed squeezing extra value out for the sake of getting it done and dusted, which is a massive mistake obviously, but so was the idea to trade Luka in the first place anyway.