The Golden State Warriors‘ ultimate dream is to pair Stephen Curry with Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James, which they tried but failed to do at the February trade deadline.
The longtime rivals proved their games were a match made in heaven when they led Team USA to the gold medal in the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Bleacher Report’s Grant Hughes proposed a blockbuster trade that could make the Warriors’ dream a reality if James and the Lakers change their minds.
Golden State Warriors receive: LeBron James
Los Angeles Lakers receive: Andrew Wiggins, Jonathan Kuminga, Moses Moody, Kevon Looney, 2026 first-round pick, 2028 first-round pick, 2030 first-round pick (1-20)
This proposed Warriors package is as complete as it gets with a former All-Star wing that could help them in the interim and young players plus distant draft picks that could set them up for the future.
“The cost here is exorbitant, especially considering James is entering his age-40 season. Golden State is giving up all of the first-round equity it has left (swaps excluded) along with a potential star in Kuminga. And yet it still seems as if the Lakers would only consider taking back a package like this if James expressly demanded to be traded,” Hughes wrote.
Do the Warriors Still Have Enough Depth if LeBron James Comes?
Hughes said, “The odds of a trade like this actually happening might seem like they’re somewhere in the million-to-one neighborhood,” but if for some reason it would go down, the next big question for the Warriors is, do they have enough depth around James and Curry?
The answer is yes, as they could still have a 10-man group filled with veterans to contend in the Western Conference.
They would still have Draymond Green, Brandin Podziemski and Trayce Jackson-Davis to join James and Curry in the starting lineup.
The only potential fallout from this proposed trade is the Warriors would be short on big, athletic wings behind James, who is not expected to play the full season given his advanced age.
Rich Paul Prevented LeBron James-to-Warriors Trade
According to Substack’s NBA insider Marc Stein, it was James’ powerful agent, Rich Paul of Klutch Sports, who nixed the talks before they even got past the exploratory stage.
“It is believed that the Lakers would have reluctantly entertained trade conversations with the Warriors before last February’s trade deadline if James wanted them to seriously engage Golden State on a potential deal. Yet league sources say that the reported talks between the teams at the time never got that far in large part because James’ agent, Rich Paul, was adamantly opposed to the idea of James swapping Southern California for Northern California,” Stein wrote on August 18.
Paul was protective of James’ image, according to Stein.
“Sources say Paul implored both teams to scrap the concept — despite some owner-to-owner dialogue between the Warriors’ Joe Lacob and the Lakers’ Jeanie Buss and Green’s determination to lobby James to push for relocation to the Bay Area — largely because he wanted to insulate James from potential backlash over switching teams for the fourth time in his career,” Stein wrote.
James went on record, revealing the trade talks did not reach him until it was reported.
“It [the trade talks] didn’t go far at all,” James said on TNT’s “Inside the NBA” broadcast on February 18. “I actually heard about it when everybody else heard about it. Obviously, you know, Charles [Barkley] has been in the league, Kenny [Smith] has been in the league, Shaq has been in the league… and sometimes, there’s conversations that happen behind closed doors that you don’t even know about.”
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