Four post-trade-deadline questions

Jimmy Butler, Anthony Davis, Max Christie, the Lakers' D, and more

1. Can Jimmy Butler juice the Warriors’ attack?

Butler’s debut was quite the statement game, although the road to happiness was rockier than it might look on the surface. A seemingly comfortable 21-point win for Golden State featured a Chicago Bulls 24-point lead in the third quarter that the Warriors wiped away with a monster run.

His second match wasn’t quite that dramatic, but it was a close game against a Giannis-less Bucks squad until Golden State blew it open in the fourth.

A Warriors team that desperately needed layups and free throws has gotten plenty of both from Butler. He has been aggressive and physical, invading the opposing paint like a sentient battering ram:

There have been plenty of moments where the team’s unfamiliarity with Butler (and vice-versa) stood out, but there were far more where the Butler fit felt laser-cut. Steph Curry has certainly enjoyed the coffee connoisseur’s presence, netting 72 points on just 43 field goal attempts in those two games. “I think he’s like the exact opposite player of me,” noted Curry in a postgame interview. So far, the two have completed each other. The Warriors have scored 132 and 125 points with Butler on the roster.

Questions remain. The floor will get small when Jonathan Kuminga returns; we still don’t know how a Kuminga/Butler/Green lineup will work with or without a center, although the Warriors definitely seem invested in making stretch seven-footer Quinten Post a thing — the rookie big went 7-for-11 from deep in his 35 minutes. And the Warriors haven’t seen a good defensive team yet.

If nothing else, Golden State’s players and coaches seem to be having fun again. Curry was taking — and making — ridiculous heat checks, Draymond Green was laughing, and Steve Kerr even cracked a smile. No regrets here.

2. How long can the Mavs survive without Anthony Davis (and Daniel Gafford, and Dereck Lively, and Dwight Powell, and PJ Washington, and Caleb Martin…)

It’s such a cruel joke.

Still in shock after the stunning Luka Doncic trade, Mavs fans at least enjoyed watching Anthony Davis come out and put on an absolute clinic in his Dallas debut — until he got hurt.

The famously brittle Davis had been largely healthy for the last 1.5 seasons. Naturally, he strained an adductor muscle and will miss at least several weeks, with season-ending surgery a potential option.

If Davis does miss the season or even extended time, it’s very difficult to see the Mavericks remaining relevant in the playoff picture. As it stands, the Mavericks are eighth in the West at 28-26. They are two games behind the Clippers for the coveted sixth seed (which avoids the play-in) but also just one game ahead of the Phoenix Suns, who sit 11th. Things could get dicey.

The Mavericks are a deep team, but nobody can expect to maintain a winning pace for the final 30 games of the season while missing all of their big men.

Dallas’ injury list is simply their power forward and center depth charts. Promising second-year center Dereck Lively is out at least a few more weeks and possibly more with a significant ankle injury, and backup center Daniel Gafford just suffered a knee sprain last night. Starting forward PJ Washington has his own ankle issue. The recently traded-for Caleb Martin has a hip thing serious enough that the 76ers had to throw in an extra second-round pick to incentivize the Mavericks to certify the trade. Even depth big man Dwight Powell is hurt!

Some of those guys will miss more time than others, but right now, expect to see a whole lot of Olivier-Maxence Prosper (last year’s first-round selection) and new addition Max Christie in the frontcourt.

Thankfully, Christie has answered the call, averaging 17 points in his first four matches with the Mavericks. He’s been aggressive attacking the hoop, and the Mavs are even letting him command the offense in crunch time:

Christie is a cost-controlled, young, improving 3-and-D wing who has shown potential to grow into something more than that. He won’t replace Luka Doncic, of course, but he was more than just a throw-in for the Davis deal.

More encouraging news: Tankathon believes the Mavericks have a relatively easy remaining schedule. If Davis only misses a few weeks, well, the Mavericks have stayed afloat with Kyrie and their depth so far this season — they were 13-14 without Doncic before he was traded.

If things go pear-shaped, the Mavericks have their first-round pick this year and next, although most of their draft capital after that is compromised. Dallas fans won’t want to hear this, but aiming for a decent draft spot in a deep draft may end up being the best long-term play — think Dereck Lively two years ago.

3. Who will defend for the Lakers?

Luka Doncic made his debut in Lakers gold Monday night, and it was a sight to behold as the Lakers predictably smacked the Jazz. But regardless of the final outcome, the obvious question remains: who will play defense for Los Angeles?

Not Mark Williams! The promising but raw Hornets center, whom the Lakers aggressively tried to trade for on Thursday, failed his physical, causing LA to rescind the trade — a rare occurrence. That may end up a blessing in disguise for Los Angeles, but it does leave them with a gaping hole defensively. (The Hornet have filed a grievance, but I can’t imagine they have much hope of winning a reversal.)

Current center Jaxson Hayes can block shots, but that’s about all he does. Max Christie was the team’s best perimeter defender, and he was an underrated part of the Doncic deal, as we noted above. Jarred Vanderbilt and Gabe Vincent are both solid defenders, but Vincent is too small to guard wings, and both have serious shooting deficiencies that will limit their playing time.

You make the Doncic trade 100 times out of 100, but it does expose just how little two-way depth is available on this team outside of Dorian Finney-Smith (who has had a very positive impact on the team even without sparkling box-score numbers; the team has a net rating of +15.5 when DFS plays, a Herculean number).

That said, the Lakers are 10-1 in their last 11 games, including several high-quality wins (one without Doncic or James or Davis, in which Austin Reaves briefly forgot he wasn’t the greatest player on Earth). LeBron James has been playing like a madman. They’ve had the fourth-ranked offense and top defense during that stretch, even without Davis for the last few games. It’s not crazy to think that James and Doncic are so transcendent offensively that the team’s defense merely needs to tread water to survive, as they’ve more than done of late.

(Something I want to see: if Hayes and depth center Trey Jemison can’t hold up in the middle, the Lakers could run out some jumbo Finney-Smith/James/Doncic/Rui Hachimura lineups to try to make up for a lack of a center with ridiculous size everywhere else! They already tried it during the Jazz game, and I hope it sticks.)

I’ll be looking at the Lakers’ defense very closely over the next few weeks, so stay tuned.

4. Did anyone in the East make themselves better (besides Cleveland?)

Although I don’t love De’Andre Hunter as a player, I do love him for Cleveland. I went over this in-depth in my trade grades, but the two things Hunter is worst at (off-ball defensive awareness and passing) don’t matter as much on a Cleveland team with mistake-erasers like Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen and ballhandlers like Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell. They were clear winners of the trade deadline for that move alone.

However, their efforts were bolstered by an Eastern Conference that was only concerned with two things: lowering luxury-tax bills (which the Cavs, miraculously, also did!) and retooling for the future (i.e., selling parts).

Boston didn’t have much capability to make a move, and they feel good enough about their chances not to require one. I thought New York might try to get another center, but they actually swapped a disappointing big (Jericho Sims) for a smaller guard in Delon Wright.

The Indiana Pacers’ sole move was dumping James Wiseman with cash for luxury tax relief. The Heat packed Jimmy Butler into a Tag Heuer carry-on bag and shipped him to San Francisco, a necessary move that nonetheless lowered their threat level. The Pistons used their salary room to add a few draft picks and Dennis Schroder; Schroder will help them, but he’s coming off a disastrous stint in Golden State and is not the kind of needle-mover who will strike fear into the top of the conference.

The Bucks were the lone team to make a move they can at least pretend was designed to significantly improve their on-court product: swapping the broken-down Khris Middleton for Kyle Kuzma. But the younger, healthier Kuzma is also a poorer fit for the team than Middleton; it’s not clear he will make the team better at all. There was a significant financial motive in this one, too, as Kuzma is cheaper than Middleton this season and next (although he is on the books for one more year after that).

The Hawks and Bulls shed important pieces, the 76ers merely tinkered on the margins (I liked the Grimes pick-up, but he’s a Titanic lounger if Embiid needs another surgery), and the Orlando Magic bizarrely made no move at all.

Cleveland is 5.5 games above Boston for the first seed and was the only Eastern team to make a move that should pay immediate dividends. Will Kuzma round into form, giving the Bucks some desperately needed two-way wing play? The Knicks can say that their big move is waiting for oft-injured center Mitchell Robinson to debut; can Robinson stay healthy enough to make an impact?

While there are other good teams in the conference, none of those teams are better than they were yesterday, and that’s another W for a Cleveland team racking them up left and right. A nasty playoff matchup with the Boston Celtics still looms, but the rest of the way looks clearer than I expected a week ago.