It’s been exactly one month since the Lakers completed their most shocking transaction of the offseason, sending D’Angelo Russell and Timofey Mozgov’s contract to the Brooklyn Nets.
At the time of the deal, there wasn’t much love for the front office for dumping a promising third-year player. However, with a few weeks of hindsight, and most of the 2017 offseason behind us, it’s fair to reconsider if the Los Angeles brass actually made a good trade.
The point of this isn’t to suggest that the Lakers were somehow vindicated by Lonzo Ball and Kyle Kuzma’s spectacular play in Las Vegas, which theoretically made Russell expendable and added more value to the package the team received.