Luka Dealt to Lakers: Nico Harrison is a Basketball Terrorist

[KillerLeft]

Sounds like they are claiming they were under the gun to sign Luka to the supermax this summer or lose him to the highest bidder next summer.

Somehow the team lost faith in Luka leading them to the promised land. This has to go beyond the GM. Coaching staff and management had to weigh in as well.

That’s exactly right. They had decided not to give him the supermax extension, not because they’re cheap, but for all the cap penalty/team building reasons we’ve been on and on about this year. Straight up, they decided giving him that contract was going to cripple the franchise. 

They knew that BECAUSE they weren’t going to offer him that, he would be gone soon after. 

Whether or not any of us can find the bandwidth to agree with that logic…I cannot find the angle on HOW they did it. There had to be a better trade out there than this one, if they had just looked for it. I just keep coming back to the idea that THEY think THIS makes their CURRENT team and near future BETTER. Imagine that. I can’t get there. I couldn’t defend that if I was paid to do so. Not today, anyway.