Kyrie Irving hit the Nets with a conundrum last week. Initially, Kyrie had made it clear that he wanted to return to the Nets. Overall, he was looking for a long-term deal with guaranteed money. However, his inability to remain active for long periods of time swayed the Nets to add stipulations to a potential contract. Kyrie was not feeling these provisions and ultimately decided to request a trade. As you can imagine, this was a very hard pill to swallow for the Nets.
Consequently, they decided to make a trade as quickly as possible. They fielded calls all weekend long, and eventually, they traded Kyrie to the Dallas Mavericks. For some, this was a very surprising landing spot for the point guard. After all, Mark Cuban has been reluctant to make big moves. However, they knew that this was the best way to give Luka Doncic a fighting chance in the West. As you can imagine, the Mavs were not the only ones vying for Kyrie. In fact, most people had Kyrie going to the Lakers for a reunion with LeBron James.
Nets Diss The Purple & Gold
According to Marc Stein, it seems like Nets owner Joe Tsai was never going to negotiate with the Lakers in good faith. Stein wrote that the Nets' objective was to avoid the Lakers. Kyrie preferred the purple and gold, although Tsai felt that it would be a bad idea to acquiesce like that. Moreover, the Lakers were offering a first-round pick and Russell Westbrook. For Tsai, that simply was not enough to justify giving up Kyrie.
LeBron certainly was not happy about this outcome as he took to Twitter with a solemn message. At this point, it is quite clear that the Lakers cannot catch any breaks. Meanwhile, the Nets are going to have a rough go of things until Kevin Durant comes back a few weeks from now. Let us know what you thought of the trade, in the comments below. Additionally, stay tuned to HNHH for more updates from around the sports world.
[Via]
