Kristaps Porzingis was wary of potentially having to share the spotlight with Kevin Durant if Durant were to have signed with the New York Knicks this summer, according to Zach Lowe.

"I’m confident after talking to a lot of people, I don't think he was psyched about playing with Durant. I don't know how directly that was verbalized to the Knicks, but I'm confident that it wasn't something that was like his Plan A," said Lowe on a recent podcast.

Lowe added that Porzingis "wanted to be the face of the franchise" in New York before eventually getting traded to the Mavericks. 

Travis Schlenk said that the Atlanta Hawks were going to draft Luka Doncic had they kept the 3rd pick in last year's draft. 

"Not a lot of people know this...if we stayed at 3, we would have taken Luka. We had worked with his agent, he did a physical with us that morning in New York...but then Dallas came in an hour or so before the draft. I told them all along that it would take another lottery pick for us to slide back, and that's when the conversations got started," Schlenk stated on Adrian Wojnarowski's podcast.

The deal to move back two spots and receive a top-5 protected pick from the Mavs this season was influenced by analytics.   

"Our analytics staff was predicting Dallas to finish 8th this year," added Schlenk.

Elton Brand stated that he realized that the championship window for the Philadelphia 76ers was open after seeing how much Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons improved over the summer. 

LeBron James highlighted the hypocrisy between a team trading a player and a player asking for a trade in an Instagram post about Harrison Barnes getting traded to the Sacramento Kings. 

The trade was announced as Barnes sat on the bench in the fourth quarter of the Mavs' win over the Hornets. Barnes had 10 points in the game.

"So let me guess this is cool cause they had to do what was best for the franchise right??? Traded this man while he was literally playing in the game and had ZERO idea. I'm not knocking who traded him because it's a business and you have to do what you feel what's best but I just want this narrative to start to get REAL/CHANGE and not when a player wants to be traded or leaves a Franchise that he's a selfish/ungrateful player but when they trade you, release , waive, cut etc etc it's best for them! I'm ok with both honestly, truly am. Just call a ♠️ a ♠️!!", wrote James on Instagram.

James' post was liked by Anthony Davis.

Barnes knew before the game that a trade to the Kings was imminent but still wanted to play.

The Washington Wizards traded Markieff Morris and a 2nd-round pick in 2023 to the New Orleans Pelicans for Wesley Johnson.

Trading Morris and Otto Porter earlier in the day puts the Wizards under the luxury tax threshold. 

The Wizards have no plans to move Bradley Beal before the deadline. 

The Los Angeles Clippers have agreed to trade Tobias Harris, Boban Marjanovic, and Mike Scott to the Philadelphia 76ers.

The Sixers are sending back Landry Shamet, Wilson Chandler, Mike Muscala, a 2020 1st-round pick, an unprotected 1st-round pick in 2021 via Miami, and 2nd-round picks in 2021 and 2023.

The Sixers are also planning to re-sign both Harris and Jimmy Butler this summer to create a long-term Big 4 with Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid. 

The Chicago Bulls have waived Carmelo Anthony to open up a roster spot to acquire Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot from the Oklahoma City Thunder.

Anthony was never asked to report to the Bulls after they acquired him from the Rockets on January 22nd.

The Thunder will save $7.3 million off their luxury tax bill by trading Luwawu-Cabarrot.