D'Angelo Russell made a no-brainer choice to come to the Golden State Warriors in free agency, but the permutations surrounding it weren't as easy as his choice. While the Los Angeles Lakers were lurking in the background, the Minnesota Timberwolves badly wanted Russell and were ready to wine and dine him, not to mention being armed with a four-year offer worth $107 million.
Of course, the Warriors could give Russell a four-year, $117 million contract as part of a complicated sign-and-trade involving Kevin Durant. Russell knew that was the spot for him:
“Then what are we even talking about here?” Russell remembered thinking, according to Anthony Slater of The Athletic. “I get to be around Steph Curry?” Russell said. “I get to be around Draymond Green? I get to be around Steve Kerr?”
Russell still went ahead with his meeting with the Timberwolves, which involved owner Glen Taylor along with Karl-Anthony Towns flying him in a helicopter over Los Angeles as part of an extravagant pitch for him to join the franchise. Russell was hesitant to get too much into the details of how things went down:
“Ohh, shiiiiit,” Russell said, an interview record scratch at the mention of the helicopter. “How do you know about that? Nah, I ain’t going to talk about it. I don’t want it to come out like it was a joke when that sh*t was serious. It was crazy and I can’t act like it wasn’t.”
Word is Russell had verbally agreed to join the Warriors before meeting with Minnesota. While in the air, news broke of his agreement with the Warriors being nearly finalized, making the flight back home quite uncomfortable. It's clear Russell feels bad about how it all went down.
Slater's source described Russell's flight back to Los Angeles as “an awkward goodbye on the tarmac.” Yeah, that would do it.
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