The biggest news from Sunday night’s NBA All-Star Game wasn’t anything that took place on the floor in New Orleans. Instead it was DeMarcus Cousins trade rumors swirling and, eventually, confirmation that the Kings and Pelicans had agreed on a trade to unite Cousins with a fellow Western Conference All-Star and former Kentucky Wildcat Anthony Davis.
The trade sent Cousins and Omri Casspi to New Orleans, with the Kings receiving Buddy Hield, Tyreke Evans, New Orleans 2017 first-round pick, a future second round pick and Lanston Galloway.
If that haul seems a bit light to get in return for a talent as big as Cousins, you aren’t the only one. If you try that trade in the NBA 2K17 video game as the Pelicans, the Kings will refuse your offer, as Bryan Wiedey found out.
The Kings won't do this deal in NBA 2K17 pic.twitter.com/ERaK6TzVfq
— bryan wiedey (@pastapadre) February 20, 2017
While video games aren’t the perfect simulation of what should or should not happen in real life, it is pretty funny that even the virtual Kings aren’t willing to move their star for that rag-tag group of players and picks. The move appears to signal that the Kings are planning on going full Sixers over the next few years. The only difference being, the Sixers were hoping to land a superstar talent like Cousins because they couldn’t get one in free agency and didn’t already have one on the roster.
The Kings had that in Cousins and he wanted to re-sign there long-term, but it was clear that something had changed in the last week that made Sacramento want him gone and they moved quickly over All-Star Weekend. The Kings are now shifting focus to trying to land another star through the NBA Draft by piling up picks, but the biggest problem with that strategy, as many have noted since the trade, is that Sacramento has been awful at drafting recently.
