The Lakers Made Another Big Trade Sending Dalton Knecht And Picks To Charlotte For Mark Williams

When the Lakers shocked the NBA world on Saturday night by acquiring Luka Doncic from the Mavs for Anthony Davis, Max Christie, and their 2029 first round pick, one of the first basketball questions people had after the initial shock wore off was what would the Lakers do to fill a major hole at center after trading away Davis.

In Doncic’s introductory presser, Rob Pelinka said he didn’t expect to make an all-in move with the rest of the Lakers draft assets, and most anticipated a stop-gap veteran center to end up in L.A. Steven Adams and others were connected to Lakers interest, but late Wednesday night the Lakers pulled off another surprising trade to bring Mark Williams in as their center of the future from the Hornets for most all of their remaining tradable assets, per Shams Charania.

Lakers get: Mark Williams
Hornets get: Dalton Knecht, Cam Reddish, LAL 2031 unprotected first round pick, LAL 2030 first round pick swap rights

It is pretty wild that, even factoring how good Anthony Davis is, the Lakers gave up more in the way of draft assets in a deal for Mark Williams than they did for Luka Doncic. The Lakers desperation for a center likely played a role in them getting squeezed a bit, but it was surprising to see how much they gave up for Williams. To be clear, Williams could be a phenomenal fit with Doncic and LeBron James, as he is a terrific defender at the rim and a very good pick-and-roll lob threat. I imagine the Lakers envision him serving in a similar role to Dereck Lively II in Dallas, who immediately became one of Doncic’s favorite teammates upon being drafted.

The problem with Williams is not what he can do when he’s on the court, it’s how little he’s been able to stay on it. He has played in just 84 games in his 2.5 seasons in the league. This season he has only appeared in 22 games for the Hornets due to a foot injury, but when he’s been on the court of late he has been very impactful. On the season he is averaging 16.0 points and 9.8 rebounds per game, and if he can stay on the floor, it’s easy to see how this could work well. The Lakers are banking a lot on his health, trading most of their best assets to Charlotte in this deal.

For the Hornets, this is good asset management as they certainly liked and believed in Williams, but the aforementioned injury concerns meant they had to be willing to listen to an offer of this magnitude. Getting an unprotected pick, even if highly unlikely to be a high one, is good work (same with the pick swap) but they also get a young wing in Knecht who will give them a pretty potent offensive trio alongside Brandon Miller and LaMelo Ball next season. With Miller out for the year, Knecht should get plenty of reps as a leading option to end this season in Charlotte which should be good for his development.