Lakers can blame Rudy Gobert for a Kyrie Irving trade not happening
By Jason Reed
The big fish for the Los Angeles Lakers this offseason was Kyrie Irving. As the only team interested in trading for Irving, the Lakers could have fixed their biggest problem in Russell Westbrook while adding a star guard in return.
It was a dream situation for the Lakers that ultimately never came to reality. After weeks of speculation and the team waiting, Brooklyn officially put a stake in it and ended the speculation. Kevin Durant is staying in Brooklyn, as is Kyrie Irving.
The Lakers now have to pivot and there are other options for the team to consider. However, at the end of the day, it does still sting that Los Angeles wasn’t able to get this done, as now they have to trade the same amount of assets to move Westbrook for a return that is not as good as Irving.
As crazy as it sounds, the Lakers being unable to trade for Irving may have directly been caused by another trade that happened earlier this offseason. According to Michael Scotto of Hoops Hype, league executives believe that the Rudy Gobert trade between the Utah Jazz and Minnesota Timberwolves ultimately made a deal for Durant much harder to pull off.
"“The draft pick compensation Utah received from Minnesota was considered such a lopsided haul for Utah around the league that if the Nets got anything less than that for Durant, Brooklyn’s front office would’ve looked foolish, according to numerous rival executives.”"
The Los Angeles Lakers can officially blame Rudy Gobert for not getting Kyrie Irving.
To be fair, the blame doesn’t really go on Rudy Gobert himself as he is not the one that is working out trade details for himself. However, it is painful to think that the reason why Kyrie isn’t in LA next season might be because Minnesota overpaid for a defensive center who always gets exposed in the playoffs.
That trade was such an overpay by Minnesota and such a great return for the Jazz. Utah received four first-round picks, a pick swap and the 22nd pick in the 2022 NBA Draft, Walker Kessler. Utah essentially received six draft picks for Gobert and got the picks from a great team as well.
Minnesota is not the best-run franchise and there is a good chance that even with a young star like Anthony Edwards, the Timberwolves mess it up and those picks are great in the future. This is a great haul for the Jazz for a guy who doesn’t make Minnesota a true contender in the Western Conference still.
So in reality, most of the blame can instead be thrown on the Minnesota Timberwolves for overpaying and jumping on the first big name that became available to them. If they didn’t do that then a Durant trade would have been easier to make, and Irving may have been a Laker.
Heck, who knows, if Minnesota just showed some patience maybe they could have sent this exact package for Kevin Durant. They’ll never admit it, but they probably would have waited in hindsight to make that happen instead.