Los Angeles Lakers Receive: G/F Tim Hardaway Jr., G Spencer Dinwiddie

Dallas Mavericks Receive: G Russell Westbrook

Many observers would agree that the Dallas Mavericks need to upgrade their secondary ball-handler alongside Luka Doncic. With that said, Westbrook is probably not the player many of them had in mind.

That’s fair enough. There’s a real concern here that the Mavericks would run into the same issues the Los Angeles Lakers did with Westbrook. When Luka Doncic is controlling the offense, Westbrook doesn’t really provide much off-ball value.

On the other hand, he’s still a more dynamic on-ball creator than Spencer Dinwiddie. Furthermore, the Dallas Mavericks may be well-built to withstand Westbrook’s presence. After all, they just acquired Christian Wood from the Houston Rockets. He’s exactly the type of stretch big that ought to maximize his presence.

Furthermore, the Dallas Mavericks may be happy to get off of Hardaway’s expensive, long-term deal. If the Westbrook experiment works out, that’s great.

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If it doesn’t, they’ll clear significant cap space following 2022-23. If they’re lucky, they can use it to acquire a new secondary ball-handler for Doncic.