Los Angeles Lakers: How Dell Demps firing impacts Anthony Davis trade
By Ronald Agers
With the New Orleans Pelicans firing general manager Dell Demps, have the Los Angeles Lakers chances of acquiring Anthony Davis gone down?
The Los Angeles Lakers attempt to acquire Anthony Davis from the New Orleans Pelicans has had more fallout over a week since the trade deadline passed. Dell Demps becomes the first casualty in the well-reported Anthony Davis debacle.
According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, the New Orleans Pelicans fired Dell Demps, who was basically the face of the New Orleans Pelicans negotiating team in the Anthony Davis trade saga.
He took a ton of heat from all sides from social media GM’s, the media and more exclusively Anthony Davis and Rich Paul, the head of Klutch Sports. The leaked reports, the offers and the alleged “phone call” will be what Dell Demps will be remembered for.
Sadly for Demps, the final straw was this video of Anthony Davis and Rich Paul leaving the arena after Davis injured his shoulder.
Couple that with the phrase from Alvin Gentry that was heard around the world, “Dumpster fire”.
Alvin Gentry mentioned Anthony Davis left the building after injuring his shoulder. Asked if that bothered him, he said: “I’m going to talk about the guys who played the game. They did a great job. We found a way to win the game. That’s what’s important.” pic.twitter.com/pvvQCOq6QW
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) February 15, 2019
Due to the tone of Gentry’s voice over the ongoing situation of Anthony Davis, it seems that he wasn’t the only one that was angry. Ownership had some issues as well.
Ownership was livid with an injured Anthony Davis leaving arena during Thursday night’s game, sources say. Gayle Benson is telling associates she wants an overhaul of Pelicans and a search for a GM to take command of Davis trade talks and the reshaping of team’s future.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) February 15, 2019
League sources also inform ESPN that the Anthony Davis situation was not executed to Gayle Benson’s liking either.
"Benson has been angry over the Davis trade demand and her belief that “outside forces” are trying to push the franchise into decisions that don’t make sense, league sources said. Her mandate has been to “take back control from outside forces,” one league source told ESPN. Benson has been adamant with the organization about finding a pathway to sustainable winning in one of the league’s smallest markets and plans to be aggressive in pursuing the best available candidates to oversee basketball operations, league sources said."
Those “outside forces” that the Pelicans is trying to take back control from might be Klutch Sports headed by Rich Paul (in the best interest of LeBron James!) and the Los Angeles Lakers.
Lake Show Life was the only blog website to take Lakers fans to the other side of the AD negotiations in New Orleans talking to a Pelicans’ insider.
Now we bring back David Grubb, to help figure out Alvin Gentry’s term of the Pelicans dumpster fire and how the Lakers figure in all of this in the offseason with all of the changes.
In 2013, he joined the team at SportsNOLA.com as a contributor before working his way up to cover the New Orleans Pelicans.
David is currently a featured columnist for CrescentCitySports.com as well as The Bird Writes for SB Nation. He is a regular contributor to “The Bird Calls,” a weekly podcast covering the Pelicans.
Along with being a regular on Sports 1280 AM in New Orleans, he has also been a fill-in host for “The D-League” (Sports 1280 AM) and “Sport-a-facts” (WBOK) and is a regular guest on a number of sports talk shows in the New Orleans area.
Hopefully, this will Lakers fans gain a possible insight because this may be the most toxic trade scenario in NBA history!