The Los Angeles Lakers pulled off one of the most shocking trades in recent memory when they sent All-NBA forward Anthony Davis to the Dallas Mavericks as part of a deal that brought Luka Doncic to L.A. to form a new superstar duo alongside LeBron James.
While the Lakers and Mavericks have squared off once already since the deal was finalized, a 107-99 victory for Los Angeles in which Doncic recorded a triple-double, Davis was unable to take part in that game due to injury so Wednesday night's tilt in Dallas will be his first opportunity to make a statement against the franchise that, shockingly, shipped him out of town for a younger superstar.
As any basketball fan would expect, reporters are already flocking to get thoughts from Davis on the impending matchup against his former teammates. However, the 10-time NBA All-Star wanted no part of providing the Lakers with any potential bulletin board material ahead of their nationally televised showdown.
When asked by Melissa Rohlin of Fox Sports about his feelings heading into Wednesday night's game, Davis was short, slightly less than sweet, and directly to the point with his response as he maintains he feels "no emotions" prior to facing off against LeBron, Doncic and the rest of the Lakers.
Anthony Davis on the emotions heading into Wednesday’s game against the Lakers pic.twitter.com/xXcvOif5pR
— Melissa Rohlin (@melissarohlin) April 6, 2025
Is this the right response from Davis concerning his personal emotions heading into the matchup? Absolutely. Do I think that he actually believes what he is saying in this instance? Not at all.
The fact of the matter is that regardless of whether Davis has any lingering ill feelings about being shipped from Los Angeles to Dallas ahead of the trade deadline, it is hard to believe he doesn't, the outcome of this particular matchup directly impacts both of these teams and their respective spots in the Western Conference playoff race. So Davis' teammates and coaches, as well as Mavericks fans around the world, would seemingly like to think that he at least has some emotions concerning that as Dallas is currently 2.5 games ahead of the Phoenix Suns for the final play-in spot in the West.
Whether Davis and the Mavericks can make any sort of noise in the play-in without the services of Kyrie Irving remains to be seen but in this moment it probably wouldn't have hurt Davis to use different phrasing in conveying his response to this particular question. For all the reasons listed above, it is hard to believe he truly feels that way about facing his former teammates in a game that will directly impact if Dallas is the home team or the visitors in the 9/10 play-in matchup against the Sacramento Kings that both teams seem destined to participate in.