Spencer Dinwiddie
The Los Angeles Lakers receive: Spencer Dinwiddie
The Brooklyn Nets receive: Kentavious Caldwell-Pope Kyle Kuzma and 2020 1st round pick.
It would be unfair to say that the Los Angeles Lakers are point guard deficient, they do have Rajon Rondo, Quinn Cook, Avery Bradley and Alex Caruso all capable of playing the point guard spot. To say they are playmaker deficient would be a must more apt description of the Lakers’ current situation.
Apart from LeBron James (who is leading the league in assists), the Lakers have virtually no player on the roster who is capable of being the Lakers secondary play-maker.
They are force-feeding Rajon Rondo minutes throughout games in order to try and solve that problem, but with Rajon Rondo, he causes more problems than he solves.
In Spencer Dinwiddie, all of the purple and golds problems are answered.
With Dinwiddie averaging nearly 7 assists a game this season (6.8), he would automatically be the ideal secondary play-maker for the purple and gold capable of being the assist man when LeBron James is off the floor.
While Dinwiddie is a poor 3-point shooter, he is still capable of getting buckets each and every night. He is currently averaging 20.6ppg this year. His scoring ability would offer the Lakers a perfect 3rd scoring option each night and would give the Lakers a point guard they can have for years to come.
So why would the Brooklyn Nets part with a 20ppg scorer?
Simple, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant will be fully healthy next season and you can expect that Dinwiddie as an asset will devalue as soon as ball-dominant Kyrie and KD are taking away his touches each and every game.
The Nets would be landing a player in KCP capable of playing starting or bench minutes at both the shooting guard and small forward position. This would allow for a player like Caris LeVert to grab the starting shooting guard position beside Irving and have sufficient depth behind him.
They would also land Kyle Kuzma.
While Kuzma has underperformed this season, there is still a 20ppg player in him. Kuz is in dire need of a fresh start. He is never going to start games at power forward or small forward with Anthony Davis and LeBron James there.
With the Brooklyn Nets, Kuzma has a chance to be the Nets starting power forward. Kuz also has one of the leagues most team-friendly contracts meaning that the Nets would have players like Jarrett Allen and Kyle Kuzma under contract for less than 5 million next season.
KCP does have a player option, but might be willing to accept it to go to Brooklyn, who is another contending team.
It seems like a match made in heaven for both teams.