Lakers fans went to bed last night happy following the team’s 123-120 overtime win against the Los Angeles Clippers led by a near triple double by LeBron James in his first game back since battling a groin injury. It seems like they have woken up to some great news, as well. The Athletic’s Shams Charania reported this morning that Anthony Davis doesn’t have interest to play for the Boston Celtics long-term and would view a trade there as a one-year stop on his way to join the Lakers in 2020 via free agency.
The news is big as Los Angeles has been aggressive in their pursuit to acquire Davis prior to the Feb. 7 deadline. Initial reports as well as their own statements suggested that the New Orleans Pelicans were in no rush to make a deal happen before then and it seemed likely they would wait until the offseason to fully gauge the trade market for AD.
The attraction of waiting it out rather than acting now was to see how the draft lottery faired for the Knicks and their ability to put together a package around Porzingis and their presumed top 3 draft pick, as well as give Boston time to make their best offer of what was expected to be headlined by Jayson Tatum. The Knicks appear out of the running for Davis now, having traded Porzingis on Thursday, and this news could suppress the Celtics’ willingness to give up Tatum in favor of building a trade package around Jaylen Brown.
Just because Davis has said he is West Coast bound doesn’t mean that Boston won’t still take a risk to trade for him and hope they can spend a year recruiting him alongside teammates like Kyrie Irving and Al Horford. If you’re the Lakers, though, it seems like the chips keeping falling into place to make a trade sending Davis to the purple and gold much more probable.
Follow Us
Subscribe