NBA Rumors: Clippers Could Get Kemba Walker & Daniel Theis For Four Players In New Trade Idea
According to NBA Analysis Network, the Los Angeles Clippers could form a new “Big Three” for the 2020-21 season and address their need at the point guard position by trading for Boston Celtics star Kemba Walker.
As explained by the publication on Tuesday, the Clippers and Celtics are two teams that are “ready to win now,” given their respective exits in the 2020 postseason. The Clippers, led by Kawhi Leonard and Paul George, blew a 3-1 lead against the Denver Nuggets in the Western Conference semifinals, while the Celtics’ lack of size factored in their Eastern Conference Finals loss to the Miami Heat.
In its hypothetical deal, NBA Analysis Network recommended that the Clippers could get Walker and starting center Daniel Theis in exchange for four of their key rotation players from the 2019-20 season — forward Marcus Morris, guards Patrick Beverley and Lou Williams, and center Ivica Zubac. According to the outlet, this transaction could give the team the elite point guard it needs in order to contend for a championship in the 2020-21 campaign, as well as a ball-handler who could take some pressure off Leonard and George on offense.
“With the Clippers interested in winning now, they need a game-changer at the position. Walker is that type of player when healthy. He signed a big contract with Boston but the Celtics shopped him during the NBA offseason but failed to get a deal done.”
Theis, meanwhile, was described as a player who could replace Zubac’s minutes in the middle in the event the proposed move becomes a reality.
In the 2019-20 campaign, Walker averaged 20.4 points, 3.9 rebounds, and 4.8 assists per game while shooting 42.5 percent from the field and 38.1 percent from beyond the arc — all good enough to help him get named to his fourth straight All-Star Game, per Basketball-Reference. These numbers, however, were mostly down from the ones he posted in 2018-19 — his eighth and last season with the Charlotte Hornets before he was traded to Boston.
Talking about how the Celtics could benefit from the trade, the site wrote that Zubac could improve the club’s performance in the low post, thus giving them a better chance of successfully dealing with top centers such as the Heat’s Bam Adebayo. Beverley and Williams were mentioned as two players who could improve their depth at point guard, with their skills potentially being a better complement to those of starting wingmen Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.
While the publication did not discuss how Morris could contribute if the trade pushes forward, he was previously part of multiple Celtics teams that made the playoffs earlier in his career. In the 2018-19 campaign, he averaged 13.9 points and 6.1 rebounds for Boston, according to his Basketball-Reference page.
