The Luka Doncic trade sent the basketball world into a frenzy, and we now have an inside look at how the Dallas Mavericks players reacted to it. Quentin Grimes was with the Mavericks when the trade went down, and he revealed how he and his teammates took the news on The Young Man and The Three podcast.
“I was in my hotel room in Cleveland,” Grimes said. “I had just ordered room service, had just got chicken wings, I’m chilling. It was funny, you know how you got your friends that if one of them is calling, you’re like, ‘Why they calling me? I should probably pick this up.'”
The news of the trade broke late at night, and Grimes figured it had to be something important if his friend was calling him at that hour. He couldn’t have imagined in his wildest dreams what he was about to be told.
“It was a FaceTime,” Grimes stated. “All I could hear, his audio wasn’t working, and he like, ‘You traded Luka? I’m like, ‘What?’ He like, ‘Lu got traded!’ I’m like, ‘Stop playing with me, what you mean Luka got traded?’ And I go to Shams [Charania], and it’s like, ‘Luka for AD.’
“I heard like ten seconds later, all I hear in the hallway is, ‘Ayo, what the f***,'” Grimes added. “I looked out my door and it’s Naji [Marshall], [Dereck Lively II], I think P.J. [Washington], and we just looking at each other like, ‘What the f*** just happened?'”
Grimes revealed the players had gotten a message at around 9:30 PM that there was going to be a mandatory meeting with the staff. They figured someone might be getting traded, but never thought it would be Doncic.
Grimes couldn’t sleep until about 3:00 AM that night. His friends and even their parents were contacting him, which is another indicator of just how stunning this move was.
The Mavericks had sent Doncic to the Los Angeles Lakers for Anthony Davis, Max Christie, and an unprotected 2029 first-round pick. There was understandably disbelief among Lakers players, too, when the news broke.
Austin Reaves told ESPN that he was certain that insider Shams Charania had been hacked when he reported about the trade. Soon after, though, Davis shared in their group that he had been traded, but Reaves still refused to believe it was true. It was only when Lakers assistant coach Beau Levesque told him it might be real that he finally accepted it.
Not long after Doncic was traded on Feb. 2, Grimes was shipped to the Philadelphia 76ers on Feb. 4. That wasn’t quite as unpopular a decision as moving the Slovenian, but it has ended up being another mistake.
Grimes averaged 21.9 points, 5.2 rebounds, 4.5 assists, 1.5 steals, and 0.4 blocks per game for the 76ers in 2024-25. As for the man he was traded for, Caleb Martin put up 5.4 points, 2.9 rebounds, 1.9 assists, 0.9 steals, and 0.2 blocks per game for the Mavericks. To make matters worse, they had sent a second-round pick to the 76ers in the deal, too.
Mavericks GM Nico Harrison was always going to get ripped for the Doncic trade, but he probably didn’t expect to come under fire for shipping Grimes out of town. To say Harrison’s stock has plummeted in recent months might be an understatement.
