今天是2018年12月15日。在常规赛开始的60天里，三个戏剧性的和反复出现的故事线浮出水面:安东尼·戴维斯(Anthony Davis)早早地扭伤了脚踝，尼科·米洛蒂克(Niko Mirotic)整个夏天都留起了胡子。新奥尔良队似乎已经失去了季后赛的竞争优势，他们的胜率低于50%，排在第11位。这一挫折，再加上失去隆多和布吉，让布朗感到沮丧，因为他看到了西西弗斯带领佩尔斯进入季后赛的不可能的任务。广告礼貌地去管理层要求交易。佩尔斯需要一名得分后卫和霍利迪配合，并且需要一名合适的大个子(如果有的话)来替换AD，因为他们已经失去了布吉，而且他们的锋线将会非常单薄。2.吉米-巴特勒和卡特在赛季开始时表现不错，狼队的胜率徘徊在五成左右。12月，在主场输给国王队后，这两位球星又一次公开争吵。 The two have to be separated by coaches on the team bus after the two sub-tweet each other on the ride to the airport. Jimmy not-so-politely goes to management and requests a trade or he threatens to walk next summer. The Wolves are looking for a PG of the future and other young talent to put around Wiggins and KAT for cheap. They like the Blazers two rookie picks a lot. 3. The Kawhi Leonard experiment in Toronto has gone all bad. He's failed to give 100% and the Raptors are below-par in a weak Eastern Conference, sitting in 5th place in mid-December. His teammates including Lowry are not big fans, and behind the scenes the Klaw has cont'd to let his LA intentions known. He asks management to trade him to LA...again. At this point Toronto is screwed and Ujiri is fired while an interim GM scrambles to get any value for Kawhi that he can find. In short, Olshey pounces on a huge opportunity facilitated by the following: 1. The values for the Klaw and Jimmy Buckets has never been lower. Both teams are known flight risks throughout the league, and notoriously surly teammates not likely worth the rental or big bucks longterm unless you really 100% believe that either would help bring a championship. 2. There are teams that can offer each team mo' better trade packages than the Blazers. However, ALL of those teams (Boston, Philly, GSW, etc) will be highly competitive at this point in the season and not inclined to make dramatic trades for high-risk stars. 3. AD specifically asks for a trade to Portland to play with Dame. Portland offers the absolute best package they can for AD and good-enough offers to procure Jimmy and Kawhi in subsequent trades, given again their high risk to current and other potential trade partners. The Blazers, having just acquired AD, believe the Klaw and Jimmy will want to stay in Rip City to form a super 4 in Portland with AD and Dame. 4. The Blazers have started off the season better-than-expected and again sit in 3rd place thanks to the elevated play over last season of CJ, Moe, Zach, and ET. Here are therefore the respective trades: Portland > NO: CJ McCollum & Zach Collins for Anthony Davis & Alex Ajinca Portland > Minny: ET, Anfernee Simons & Trent JR for Jimmy Butler Portland > 6ix: Moe, Biggie & Meyers! for The Klaw http://www.espn.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=yb8s8uca Resulting Lineup/Depth Chart: PG: Dame SG: Butler SF: Leonard PF: Davis C: Nurkic Bench: Aminu, Se. Curry, Stauskas, Baldwin, Layman Need to rent to some cheap free agents from Ice Cube to fill-out the roster. Especially some big men as we are pretty thin up front after this trade but definitely boast a star-studded starting 5 as well as a versatile 6th man in Aminu. Kendrick Perkins anyone? Lol. It has been foreseen and cannot be unforeseen :) #ripcity