re: It's absolutely amazing that LeLakers truly wanted to upstage the Pelicans

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There will be time to unpack the fallout of this season, the roster decisions that led the Lakers here, the toll of injuries to James and Anthony Davis, who returned on Friday after an 18-game absence.

But on Friday, it was just the aging Lakers suffering the indignity of being flattened by the team that less than three years ago traded its best player to Los Angeles and in that short time has surpassed the Lakers in the Western Conference hierarchy.

“For me, it’s another game,” Davis said.

But the spoils of that trade keep getting richer for the Pelicans. By effectively knocking the Lakers out of the Play-In, the Pelicans all but ensured themselves another top-10 pick from the Davis trade. If the Lakers pick – currently slotted eighth – lands in the top 10, it will stay with the Pelicans, whereas if it lands at No. 11 or later, New Orleans will have to send it to Memphis.

And though no one is trying to relitigate the trade for Davis, which led to the Lakers 2020 championship, it’s hard not to recognize the symbolism that was the Pelicans delivering the fatal blow to the Lakers season, if not the championship window of the Davis-James era.

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