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The annual complaint of Los Angeles Lakers stars had been filed.
On January 22, in the midst of a period of mediocrity of a month in which their disappointing team went 7-6, a story was published on ESPN in which the concerns of LeBron James and Anthony Davis were shared for the whole world. It was not a new revelation, this notion that the co-stars of the Lakers feared that the president of the team’s basketball operations, Rob Pelinka, is unable to upgrade the list before the commercial deadline of February 6 which could return them to the status of competitor of the title. As if that were not enough, Davis even published a public request for a new center shortly after while doing an interview on the massive world scene of the network.
Team sources say that public complaints have caused a serious frustration to the top of the Lakers franchise. In addition, there was little confidence that the kind of movements that James and Davis wanted were possible on the free market.
To tell the truth, I wrote a version of this same story in previous years. Once, in fact, he included comments from James in which he said something that – in a way in which the stars of the Lakers saw their situation – could be said each year at that time.
“You all know what F – should happen,” James told me on January 7, 2023.
But when the movements they wanted would not come, or when the exchanges that were carried out would not lead to the status of championship that they all wanted so badly, the tension would increase on both sides of the big book of Lakers. And all this time later, with the owner of the Lakers, Jeanie Buss, clearly boring this disgruntled dance and the chances of a basketball life presented by a team of Dallas Mavericks who was quietly desperate to pass from Luka Dončić , this decision was made as monumental as monumental as everything we have seen for decades.
As a source directly involved in the agreement said: “It could be the most surprising trade in the history of the NBA.”

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Dončić is a laker. Davis is in Dallas. And James, whose marriage of convenience with the Lakers has suddenly become more uncomfortable, must now decide what all of this means for the twilight years that he had planned to spend in the city of garlands. And all three, it should be noted, did not know that it was falling.
Anyone who spent time around the Lakers could say that James and Davis were incredibly close. However, now, with his brother Klutch Sports translated to Dallas and Dončić arriving to provide a younger version of what James does the best for these Lakers, it is just to wonder where this relationship is heading.
James has a player option for next season worth 52.6 million dollars, but the internal wait before this business was that he would ask for another extension when summer takes place. Even before this agreement, it was not clear if his desires would be respected. And the question now, with the dynamics so radically changed and that Dončić arrives as an undeniable alpha-malale to Land Land, is it: it could be James last season with the Lakers?
Let’s go back to this keyword for a moment: Alpha. Although Davis was not missing fans in the walls of the Lakers, there was also a strong feeling that it was not “1-A” material. The league sources say there were concerns about its sustainability and availability and the conviction on which it could never really be considered a leading option in the future. And although his approval rating was raised, he had not been forgotten how – in the days before the decision was made to fire Darvin Ham in early May 2024 – the known threat of A possible Davis trade request is so large when it came to their internal calculation. The pressure on this forehead has increased for some time.
This organizational conclusion about Davis had a lot, of course, because James – possible the status of goat and everything – is a 40 -year -old star whose anxiety with the franchise had made sure that the main stakeholders were suspicious of Which was going to happen. The role that James played in public frustration had most certainly been noticed. In addition, Lakers officials were suspicious of repeating anything from a distance near the trade in Russell Westbrook, focused on James, in the summer of 2021 who left the franchise in such troubles. In short, as they saw, there was no real centerpiece of franchise to find.

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So when the Mavericks came to call, it was a solution to the problem of the Lakers that has been percolated for some time. For all of his faults, Dončić, 25, is the type of player who could put the Lakers back on the proverbial card for the next decade. And the irony here, say the sources of the league, is that the two teams involved had similar concerns concerning the stars they exchanged.
The Mavericks were very concerned about the sustainability of Dončić – or his absence – and convinced that his approach to the game would continue to be a problem in the years to come. However, although there was no shortage of shocked teams that the Mavericks were not broadcast their desire to move Dončić, league sources say that there was at least one team in addition to the Lakers who were approached by Dallas almost two weeks ago on the prospect of exchanging Dončić for another star.
This offer was refused, but the message sent to the process had been clear: there were brewing problems in Dallas. And the Lakers, in the end, were those who harvested the advantages.
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(Photo of Luka Dončić: Katelyn Mulcahy / Getty Images)