Even weeks after the news dropped, the Luka Doncic trade is still absolutely stunning, even after watching the Slovenian superstar suit up for the Los Angeles Lakers a few times. Day by day, more information trickles out about what led the Mavericks to this bombshell decision.
Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison spearheaded the trade talks, and Doncic’s conditioning and the unwillingness of the Mavericks to pay him a supermax contract were two big obstacles that led to the trade being made during this season.
Of course, refusing to offer a player of Doncic’s caliber a supermax deal is a major shock, but Harrison was dead set in his ways with those negotiations. Doncic would have been eligible to earn a total of $345 million on his next deal in Dallas, but that was never going to happen according to Christian Clark, Fred Katz and Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic.
“The Mavericks were never going to offer Dončić that mega deal, league sources said,” the trio wrote. “And a general manager identifying one star to trade, negotiating with only one GM he knows and trusts and targeting only one player who he’s worked with before and whose character he can vouch for — just as Harrison did with Dončić, Pelinka and Davis — was no accident.”
Doncic is not eligible for that massive extension anymore. Instead, he will be forced to settle for more than $100 million less if he does choose to sign for four years with Los Angeles. Doncic could also sign a shorter extension this offseason to try and earn a supermax deal sooner.
The Anthony Davis experiment in Dallas didn’t get off to a great start, as the former Lakers star was injured in his first game with Dallas and has not played since. Davis is expected to miss an extended period of time, so the Mavericks will have to sneak into the playoffs shorthanded. However, Max Christie looks like a great addition and has already shown off some of his two-way chops with some shot creation mixed in.
Even if Davis and Christie pan out in Dallas, it still feels highly unlikely that the two of them reach the same level of production that Doncic has the chance to achieve in Los Angeles. If the Mavericks don’t come out of the next few years with a championship, this will be a failed move by Harrison and the rest of the front office.
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