On this day in Los Angeles Lakers history, the NBA community thought that then-New Orleans Hornets star Chris Paul was headed to Los Angeles in a blockbuster trade that never happened.
Coming out of the 2011 lockout, a story about a three-way deal between the Lakers, Hornets and Houston Rockets stunned the Association. L.A. agreed to part ways with Pau Gasol and Lamar Odom in exchange for the then-26-year-old point guard, who would eventually become one of the best playmakers in NBA history.
However, the late David Stern — who served as the NBA’s commissioner — vetoed the deal. Lakers governor Jeanie Buss would later reveal the trade collapsed due to miscommunication between Stern and Dell Demps, New Orleans’ general manager at the time.
The league-owned the Hornets when, Buss said, Demps sanctioned Paul’s trade without the seal of approval from Stern. The situation enraged other NBA teams, leading to the commissioner calling off the deal.
Former Orlando Magic star Gilbert Arenas has offered a different perspective on the failed trade.
Arenas claimed that NBA owners realized how much cap space the Lakers had at the time and argued the Purple and Gold would unfairly dominate in the league if the NBA allowed the trade to take place — especially knowing that Dwight Howard would soon end up in Los Angeles in a deal with the Magic.
All in all, Paul moved to California that year but to play for the L.A. Clippers, staying with the franchise until 2017. Meanwhile, the Lakers endured arguably the worst spell in the organization’s history, which ended with the arrival of LeBron James in 2018.
Lakers legend Pau Gasol opened up about vetoed Chris Paul trade
One major aspect of the vetoed trade was that the players that were told they were being dealt ended up back with the Lakers, most notably Pau Gasol who played a few more seasons with the team.
A number of years later, Gasol opened up about how he felt about that trade.
“From my perspective, I went in and had a meeting with Mitch [Kupchak] and Mike Brown who was the coach and I said to myself: I love this city, I love this team, I understand why you guys might’ve decided to go that route. Would I agree with it or not obviously I’m not gonna get into that, but I’m gonna control what I can control and I’m gonna still be grateful and thankful to be here and I’m gonna do my best to help this team as I have done in the past.
“But it was difficult, because you can’t shake that off that easily as much as I tried in many ways. Because now its like this can happen. This can happen yesterday, this can happen tomorrow.”
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