NBA Trade Deadline Winners and Losers: Lakers Score Big While The Bulls Remain Rudderless

An insane trade deadline shook up the landscape of the league and the implications are far-ranging. Some teams made out better than others, some to comical degrees. Let’s discuss three of the biggest winners and three of the most prominent losers of this wild NBA trade deadline.

Winner: The Los Angeles Lakers

I can’t say much that hasn’t been said about the Luka Doncic trade. An act of fate secured the Lakers’ future, despite Davis’s brilliance this season. Davis, as well as a valuable player in Max Christie, is worth landing one of the sport’s all-time offensive players at 25 years old. 

Doncic and LeBron James may take some time to gel, but there’s no reason two basketball savants shouldn’t find a way to mesh. James will slide seamlessly into an off-ball role on offense at this stage of his career. Los Angeles’ defense will need time to harmonize and might lack the talent to compete for a title this season, but this trade is not about 2025.

General manager Rob Pelinka, who didn’t even have to ask for Doncic, reversed the outlook of the post-LeBron era. Doncic, for his genuine faults, is the kind of player worth working around. He’s one of the few players in the NBA who can drag a team to the Finals, as he did last season, and that’s not a player who should ever be traded.

Loser: The Dallas Mavericks

The sky is collapsing in Dallas, littered with coffins outside of the stadium. An organization refunding season-ticket holders who canceled their packages as a result of the trade doesn’t exude confidence. Making a move as unfathomable as trading your franchise star who has no desire to leave isn’t one a team should make without unwavering confidence.

General manager Nico Harrison tells us that confidence is real, believing in the power of his idyllic culture, opposite everything he believed Luka Doncic exemplified. It’s a bold bet to make, even if Doncic struggled to maintain a healthy weight and has a noted injury history. Players like him pave the surest paths to perennial contention, as we saw last season.

Anthony Davis is a phenomenal basketball player and one of the league’s 10 or 15 best. Very few players anchor a defense and create on offense like Davis can, but he’s not a Doncic-level player. He’s currently healthier than Doncic but has a notable injury history of his own, as does Kyrie Irving.

The eighth-seeded Dallas Mavericks have ground to cover if they’re to prove Harrison’s bold gamble correct. Even if Dallas made an improbable championship run, they still mortgaged their future for it. All signs point towards this being a losing bet for the Mavericks.

Winner: The San Antonio Spurs, Once Again With A Star-Sized Gravitational Pull

San Antonio, Texas, is officially a destination. For the first time in Victor Wembanyama’s career, a disgruntled star asked for his team to trade him to the Spurs. Wembanyama is a transformational star who was bound to draw other stars in but we now have an undoubted proof of concept.

Fox, while not a true offensive engine, will thrive as a pick-and-roll partner for Wembanyama. San Antonio’s offense badly needs more reliable creation in the backcourt and Fox will make life easier for other offensive players. With limitations as a shooter and defender, he’s not a perfect player, but will make the Spurs a legitimate playoff contender.

They acquired Fox without dealing any of their valued prospects or first-round picks this season. They’re capitalizing on the beauty of Wembanyama’s early dominance on his rookie scale contract and have plenty of ammo to add another star in the offseason. I’d bet the Spurs are far from finished constructing this first variation of their new era.

Loser: The Phoenix Suns’ Championship Dreams

Phoenix avoided any notable movement amid the most active deadline in years, despite being perpetually discussed in trade rumors. They couldn’t land Jimmy Butler, or trade Bradley Beal or Kevin Durant, despite their efforts. After adding Nick Richards before the deadline, the Suns couldn’t decide which direction they wanted to head.

This paralysis leaves them in a tricky spot, on the far fringes of contention but not bad enough (or in control of their picks) to tank. The Doncic trade certainly complicated their process but their lack of conviction won’t help in the short or long term. They missed out on as volatile a deadline as they get, likely cementing their fate this season.

Winner: The Washington Wizards And Making Tanking Cool Again

Let’s take stock of Washington’s deadline, as IT made what felt like countless moves. The Wizards sent out Kyle Kuzma, Jonas Valanciunas, Marvin Bagley Jr., Patrick Baldwin Jr., Johnny Davis and Jared Butler alongside six second-round picks. In return, they added Khris Middleton, Marcus Smart, AJ Johnson, Alex Len and Colby Jones, as well as two first-round picks, a swap and two seconds.

Washington executed the tanking playbook perfectly, offloading vets and taking on unwanted salaries in exchange for cap relief and draft picks. This isn’t new or surprising, as the Wizards embraced the tank from the start of this season. Head coach Brian Keefe came into the job promising to prioritize development and has done that — Washington’s three 2024 first-round picks are all top five in rookie minutes per game.

The 2025 Wizards are a dumpster fire but an intentional one with a clear direction. A coherent vision carries so much value and many franchises, even those with better teams than the Wizards, lack one. Washington’s trade deadline decisions reinforce this focus on the future.

Despite its abysmal record and net rating, some of Washington’s prospects look promising. All three of the Wizards’ 2024 rookies, especially Alex Sarr and Bub Carrington, look like future high-level players. Bilal Coulibaly, especially with Kyle Kuzma now out of his way, is in the early stages of his star evolution.

It will be odd to see Khris Middleton and Marcus Smart in Wizards kits, but they shouldn’t inhibit the development of their critical young prospects. The Wizards will continue racking up losses and upping their odds for the Cooper Flagg sweepstakes. AJ Johnson and Colby Jones are worthwhile prospect fliers to test out, as well. The Wizards are committing to the tank like no other team in the NBA, and they’re doing it proudly.

Loser: The Chicago Bulls, Still In Search Of “Very Good Players”

The Bulls’ trade deadline followed a consistent, familiar trend of theirs, losing good players for nearly nothing of value. Zach LaVine is playing excellent basketball this season and trading him signaled a desire to take their medicine. Vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas didn’t trade any of his other coveted players, not Nikola Vucevic, Lonzo Ball or Coby White. He’s thinking about sneaking into the playoffs, as he will until the end of time.

Karnisovas revealed some of his team-building philosophy after the deadline, claiming he’d rather build with “nine to 10 very good players” instead of “two to three stars.” Chicago has neither and lost one of the few players who fit Karnisovas’s desired level of play. The Bulls didn’t acquire any valuable draft capital (aside from their own 2024 first-round pick back from San Antonio) to add great players and didn’t take on useful players.     

Losing LaVine, DeMar DeRozan and Alex Caruso without returning a new first-round pick speaks volumes to their priorities. Lonzo Ball, Ayo Dosunmu and Coby White are all worthwhile players to roster and develop, but none move the needle toward contention on a team without stars.

The Bulls have little to no direction, constantly shooting for the middle without much variation. They could have embraced the tank and a youthful direction during this deadline but chose to remain in the playoff fringe. That’s an unfortunate reality for their long-term success.