The Luka Doncic trade to the Los Angeles Lakers will forever go down as the most shocking trade in the history of the NBA. It was so massive, in fact, that Jimmy Butler being traded to the Golden State Warriors just days later felt almost insignificant despite it also being a huge deal.
The big difference between the two trade was the fact that nobody saw the Doncic one coming. It wasn’t even known that he was available at all considering he is one of the best players in the league while just entering his prime years. Butler, on the other hand, was known to be unhappy in Miami and was looking to be traded as he and the Heat had been unable to agree to a new contract extension.
When news came out that Doncic was being dealt to the Lakers, the reaction from nearly everyone was to brush it off as a fake story and assume Shams Charania’s social media had been hacked. And in an interview with The National, Butler revealed that he thought the exact same thing:
“I thought it was fake like everybody else. So did you, I don’t even have to ask, you know what I mean? It’s like this guy got hacked or something. I just always thought like, when you use the word untradable, untouchable, you’d think Luka Doncic is one of those guys honestly. I don’t know, it don’t got too much to do with me, I still just, I was baffled by it, I’m still baffled by it. It just doesn’t look right. It’s just, it’s crazy.”
Butler would continue on, believing there was more to the deal, and most other trades throughout the NBA as there is only so much fans and everyone on the outside looking in is privy to:
There’s always more to it. Because everybody else is always on the outside looking in, so you only know what you read. You only know what you see from socials. You don’t know what was really going on behind closed doors. And everybody’s gonna latch on to whatever narrative that they want to believe and whatever clickbait is put out there. But there’s always more to these stories. I don’t know, but I can guarantee you that there is more and there’s always reason behind everything. Do I know the reason? No.
It would come out that the Mavericks brass was unsure about Luka’s ability to lead their franchise into the future having questions about his conditioning and work ethic. The Lakers, meanwhile, have full belief in the superstar guard and are already committed to building their roster around him in both the short and long-term.
Butler is right in that there are always things behind these deals that never come out into the public eye, but regardless of what that may be in this instance, the Lakers were the beneficiaries and now have their face of the franchise for years to come.
Lakers’ Luka Doncic leads Slovenia to EuroBasket quarterfinals
This summer Luka Doncic has been arguably the best player at FIBA EuroBasket 2025 and the Lakers superstar has led Slovenia to the quarterfinals after dropping 42 points and 10 rebounds in their round of 16 victory over Italy.
Next up for Doncic, however, is a quarterfinal meeting with Germany, who are the favorites to win the tournament. However with the other two tournament favorites, Serbia and France, being upset in the round of 16, anything is possible.
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