Arguably the craziest part of the blockbuster trade between the Los Angeles Lakers and Dallas Mavericks was the fact that they were able to keep the talks a secret. In an era in which basically everything gets leaked, Rob Pelinka and Nico Harrison were able to prevent any of that as they completed the swap of Luka Doncic and Anthony Davis.
In speaking about the move, Pelinka noted that the level of trust between himself and Harrison allowed for them to slowly work through all potential issues as they popped up.
“Yeah this all started with a coffee in Dallas, where Nico approached us with the concept,” Pelinka said. “And because there was a partnership and a history of traveling the world between Nico and myself, working around Kobe Bryant, there was a fabric of trust in the discussions. And these type of deals are incredibly intricate and complicated. And along the way, we knew there would be 248 insurmountable snags to get to the end. And there were.
“And so over the course of three weeks, call it, an issue would come up, and we’d think there was no way to climb the mountain, and we’d figure out a way. Then the next issue would come up. And you just keep going, and you keep going and you stay committed to the work. You stay committed to trying to get the deal done in a partnership sense. I think a lot of people talk about negotiations in terms of who won and who lost. I try to approach important negotiations in the sense of how do we build a partnership where we can get to the end? And I think that was the lens that we worked and the premise we worked under.
The relationship between Pelinka and Harrison has been spoken about plenty and that undoubtedly made the trade talks a bit easier. But in any move of this magnitude, the team owner has to be involved in the decision, and Pelinka involved Lakers owner Jeanie Buss immediately once the discussions began.
“And when the concept was initially introduced to us, it was, hey, the only way we can even have these discussions was if it’s between owner and GMs. And there was a commitment to that,” Pelinka added. “And if we broke that commitment by talking to anyone else, this day would never happen. I think trust was at the center of all those discussions. And I called Jeanie after the coffee in Dallas and brought her in immediately, as I do with everything. Her and I have a really strong working relationship, and the fabric of that is that we share things in real time. And she was extraordinarily excited and hopeful that we could get to the end, which we were able to do.”
The best franchises in all of sports always have great synergy starting from the very top and Buss and Pelinka have that excellent relationship without a doubt. Because the two were able to work together the Lakers landed their newest superstar and potential face of the franchise for years to come.
Lakers’ Rob Pelinka praises Jeanie Buss and Nico Harrison for getting this deal done
As Rob Pelinka said, trades like this involve a lot of complications and potential pitfalls, but the Lakers and Mavericks were able to get past all of them and the Lakers general manager thanked both owner Jeanie Buss and Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison for helping to make this happen.
“So, to get to this place, there are a couple of people I want to thank. First and foremost is Jeanie Buss. She’s so supportive,” Pelinka said. “I think her vision, which falls in line with the great and late Dr. Buss, to always make sure the brightest and best basketball superstars play for the Los Angeles Lakers. She’s clearly carried that vision on from her dad, and I just want to thank her for her tremendous support and vision in helping this day become a reality.
“The second person I want to thank is, any time there’s a trade or a transaction, there has to be a partner, and I want to thank the Dallas Mavericks, led by their GM, Nico Harrison, who was also very instrumental in bringing this opportunity to us, and then staying true to the negotiations throughout where it could be culminated with the trade being finalized, and Luka Doncic, Maxi Kleber and Markieff Morris becoming members of our team. Wanted to thank those two people.”
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