Starting with New Orleans. One thing was made very clear this offseason. They need a PH to shoulder the load on offense and to help Zion get the ball in better positions. Here, we see them not only add Mitchell to do just that, they also get off of CJ’s contract for some better depth. Some may argue they’re trading too many picks away, but I’d say quite the contrary. To land a player of Mitchell’s caliber in a small market is hard to do. You can only really make it happen via the draft or a trade. I think they’d gladly trade BI and the uncertainty that is associated with the draft to pair up Zion with another star caliber player.

Onto Cleveland. They’re landing a real SF in BI and an exciting young prospect in Trey Murphy. They could potentially even throw in Niang or Strus to try and get a guy like Larry Nance to add to their bench. I think if Mitchell wants out, Cleveland would gladly do this to get younger and accumulate more assets in the draft. Truthfully, they’re probably still a 4 or 5 seed in the East with this roster.

As far as LA goes, they’re losing Reeves, yes. But they’re getting one of their own 1sts back, they’re moving off of D-Lo and they’re grabbing a guy in CJ who fits as the perfect no. 3 along side LeBron and AD. In addition to all of that, LA is getting two solid role players from the Suns in this deal.

Lastly, we have the Suns. They’re sneaking into this deal to get a PG who fits along their “win now” core. As a bonus, D-Lo and Book are lifelong friends so they should fit extremely well on the floor together.