Suns get All-Star Durant; Lakers trade Westbrook to Utah

Hours after Mat Ishbia took over as owner of the Phoenix Suns, the team made a stunning acquisition, getting star forward Kevin Durant from the Brooklyn Nets late Wednesday night, according to The Athletic and ESPN.

Durant and TJ Warren are headed to Phoenix in exchange for Mikal Bridges, Cameron Johnson, Jae Crowder and four first-round draft picks, per the reports. ESPN added that the Nets will get a 2028 draft-pick exchange, too.

The Suns add Durant to an underachieving squad that sits at 30-26, tied for fourth place in the Western Conference. Phoenix reached the NBA Finals in 2020-21, then posted the best regular-season record in 2021-22 before falling to the Dallas Mavericks in the conference semifinals.

The NBA trade deadline is Thursday.

Durant's exit from the Nets ends the sorry history of a ballyhooed "Big Three" that was expected to bring glory to Brooklyn.

Kyrie Irving signed a free-agent deal with the Nets in July 2021, and Durant joined up as a free agent the next month. When James Harden was acquired in a trade in February 2022, the Nets were viewed as a top contender, but injuries and Irving's various off-court issues scuttled those hopes.

The Nets were swept in the first round of the playoffs last season. Harden exited as a free agent in July. Irving demanded a trade last week, then was dealt to the Mavericks on Monday, and now Durant is gone, too.

Durant, 34, won two NBA championships with the Golden State Warriors, won the NBA Most Valuable Player honor in 2013-14 and is a 13-time All-Star. He has been sidelined since Jan 8 due to a sprained medial collateral ligament in his right knee.

In 39 games this season, Durant is averaging 29.7 points, 6.7 rebounds and 5.3 assists. In his NBA career with the Seattle Super-Sonics, Oklahoma City Thunder, Golden State and Brooklyn, he has averages of 27.3 points, 7.1 rebounds and 4.3 assists.

Warren, 29, played in just 20 games for the Nets after recovering from a foot injury that sidelined him all of last season. He averaged 9.5 points and 2.8 rebounds for Brooklyn, well below his career norms of 15.1 points and four rebounds.

Bridges, 26, made the NBA All-Defensive team last season. This season he was averaging a career-best 17.2 points plus 4.3 rebounds in 56 games for Phoenix, better than his career marks of 12.2 points and four rebounds.

Westbrook goes to Utah

The Los Angeles Lakers are trading Russell Westbrook to Utah and reacquiring guard D'Angelo Russell from Minnesota in a three-team, eight-player deal, a person with knowledge of the trade told The AP on Wednesday night.

Los Angeles is also getting guard Malik Beasley and forward Jarred Vanderbilt from the Jazz, bolstering its core around LeBron James in a bid to jump-start its sputtering season. The Lakers fell to 25-30 on Tuesday while James set the NBA's career scoring record, and they sit in 13th place in the 15-team Western Conference.

The Lakers are sending Juan Toscano-Anderson, Damian Jones and their first-round pick in 2027 to Utah with Westbrook.

ESPN and The Athletic first reported the trade. Those outlets also said Minnesota is getting Mike Conley and Nickeil Alexander-Walker from Utah, along with three second-round picks.

Westbrook's tenure with his hometown team lasted just 130 tumultuous games. The 2017 NBA MVP never thrived with James and injury-plagued Anthony Davis for any significant stretch of time, struggling to mold his possession-heavy game into a more complementary role.

A move to the bench last fall led to minor improvements over a dismal 2021-22 season, but Westbrook still appeared profoundly uncomfortable with the Lakers, who are in danger of missing the playoffs for the second straight year. Westbrook averaged 17.4 points, 7.2 assists, 6.9 rebounds and 3.7 turnovers per game during his time in Los Angeles, where fans grumbled regularly about his poor shooting and turnovers.

The 34-year-old Westbrook is making about $47 million in the final year of his contract. Several months after the Lakers infuriated a large portion of their worldwide fan base by not trading Westbrook in the summer, they swapped him for Russell, who played his first two NBA seasons with the Lakers after they chose him with the second overall pick in the 2015 draft.

Russell was a rookie during Kobe Bryant's final season, and the point guard was the most consistently entertaining part of two poor Lakers teams before Magic Johnson traded him to Brooklyn in 2017. Russell is now being traded for the fourth time in his eight NBA seasons.

Agencies