Think back to a long time ago, when Josh Hart was with the Los Angeles Lakers after they acquired him on draft night in 2017. Okay, that wasn't that long ago, but so much has happened since then that it feels like an eternity, like LA winning the championship in 2020, and Hart helping lead New York to the Eastern Conference Finals for the second straight year.
Speaking of winning it all, the Lakers did so because they sent Hart to the Pelicans in 2019 in the package for Anthony Davis. As if that wasn't good enough, a little less than six years later, they used AD to acquire Luka Dončić, so, technically, trading Hart played a role in that.
It doesn't sting for Los Angeles to watch Hart excel in the perfect role for him with the Knicks, as it does for New Orleans and Portland.
Lakers are the only team that doesn't regret trading Josh Hart
The Pelicans sent Hart to the Trail Blazers before the 2022 deadline in the deal for CJ McCollum. Not only do they regret losing him in a move they thought would help make them a contender (and it didn't, to no fault of CJ's), but they also sent Nickeil Alexander-Walker to Portland in the same trade.
New York practically stole Hart a year later, sending Cam Reddish, Ryan Arcidiacono, Svi Mykhailiuk (the only one still in the league), and a protected first-round pick to Portland. The pick turned into Kris Murray, who has had a shaky first three seasons in the league.
The Knicks would make that trade a million times over to get Hart, who is fresh off a playoff career-high performance of 26 points in New York's Game 2 ECF 109-93 win over Cleveland on Thursday. He is still finding new ways to make New Orleans and Portland look bad. Heck, even Utah, where LA got the No. 30 pick from nine years ago.
Josh Hart could help Knicks do what Lakers did by trading him
And no, that's not meant to be a knock against Hart, who was apparently meant to be a Knickerbocker all along. How ironic that he started his career in LA?
New York is two wins away from its first NBA Finals appearance since 1999, 27 years ago. It's been 53 years since they last won a championship. Hart is 31, so he wasn't around for that one, and he was just four years old when they last played for a title.
He's already etched his name into Knicks history books, but he will get a few chapters dedicated to everything he contributed if he helps New York win it all.
And if that happens, the Lakers will be the only team watching without their head in their hands, wondering what could've been. They already got one title out of the Hart trade, and with Luka, they could get one or two more.
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