Thank you, Anthony Davis
An abrupt end to Anthony Davis’ tenure as a Laker should not dampen all he was able to accomplish in purple and gold.
Despite joining the Lakers nearly halfway through his career, Anthony Davis felt like one of the Lakers’ own.
The passion he played with. The loyalty he expressed. The admiration he showed for the franchise. The love he showed the fans. The adoration he had for his mentor, Kobe Bryant. The success he brought. It all blended together to make him a nearly immediate fan favorite.
That’s what made Saturday night’s trade so difficult for Lakers fans to process. Even more than 36 hours later, I sit with such mixed emotions, unable to fully grasp what transpired.
On the one hand, I can accept and understand that effectively trading AD for Luka Dončić is a deal you do 100 times out of 100. At the same time, it’s much harder to accept that, just like that, AD’s time in Los Angeles is over.
No warning. No preparation. No final farewell or goodbye. It’s just...done.
As I write this, the Lakers’ two most recent posts on Twitter are a 56-second “Thank You” video for Anthony Davis and a 16-second video of Luka touching down in Los Angeles. The two clips elicit such strong, polar opposite emotions.
The immense excitement at the possibilities of what could come with a 25-year-old superstar is offset by the immense sadness of the realization the future will no longer include AD.
Saturday was the most recent reminder that sports are a business, nothing more and nothing less. Loyalty is a fallacy relied upon by owners to sway public opinion. Not even AD, who had done so much for the franchise, was immune to the business side of sports.
In seemingly a split second, he was shipped away from a franchise he was committed to for nearly a decade. Had he seen out his contract in Los Angeles, he would have played nine seasons in purple and gold. Instead, his tenure was cut abruptly short.
When AD joined the Lakers, he was the superstar entering his prime that was supposed to lead the franchise through the next generation. And, in most senses, he did just that.
The 2019-20 campaign will forever tie him to the Lakers and is what endeared him to fans. On the court, he dominated on both sides of the ball from the jump, showcasing his elite two-way ability.
But so much of what made that season mean so much happened off the court.
Kobe Bryant’s passing rocked the franchise and fan base and left a wound that’ll never be fully healed. AD was at the center of that, both as someone grieving the loss while trying to return back to normality.
Before anyone could barely even think of moving on, COVID shut down the entire world and impacted everyone. When the NBA came back and the Lakers resumed playing basketball, AD was at the center of that, too.
The bubble will be the defining and lasting legacy of AD’s Lakers tenure. While other teams fell apart, the Lakers grew stronger and closer, eventually ending in a title that meant so much to not just the fan base but Los Angeles as a whole. That he and his teammates never got the chance to properly celebrate that title with the fans with a parade will always sting.
So often in the years that followed, though, AD was judged for what he wasn’t rather than praised for what he was. Too often, his nights of brilliance were not met with acclaim but wonder as to why he didn’t regularly perform at that unsustainable level.
In the eyes of Lakers fans, he was held to a standard higher than his peers around him.
Injuries plagued him as he featured in just 132 of the 236 regular season games after winning a championship. But since January 2023, he played in 173 of his final 187 games. And he was dominant again during that stretch, particularly in the playoffs.
He was, and still is, one of the most dominant, versatile big men in the NBA. In recent seasons, his lack of recognition for his elite defense has become a rallying cry for Lakers fans.
Through all that, he ingrained himself not just into the franchise but also into the community. He might have been from Chicago, attended college in Kentucky and spent the first seven seasons of his career in New Orleans, but he felt like an honorary Angeleno.
None of this even speaks to the bond between him and LeBron James, too. In his storied career, LeBron has had many teammates come and go, from high-profile to low-level, but few of them seemed to have a connection with him like AD.
Together, the pair came to Los Angeles and took them from one of the franchise’s lowest moments back to the mountaintop. They hung banners — plural, because we acknowledge the In-Season Tournament here — together and restored the Lakers to the level they have so often assumed in their history.
The days, weeks, months and years that come will be rightly filled with excitement about what a future built around Luka looks like. It’s a book with blank pages and so many ways to fill them.
But before moving on to what could be, Anthony Davis deserves recognition for what was.
For a franchise with a lineage of big men that reads like a list of inner circle Hall of Famers, AD established himself as a worthy peer.
When all is said and done, LeBron and AD will have their jerseys hung side-by-side in the rafters. The two will forever be linked in Lakers history as one of the franchise’s greatest duos.
So, thank you Anthony Davis. For the passion you played with. For the loyalty that ultimately went unmatched. For the admiration you had for the franchise. For the love you had for the fans. For the adoration you had of Kobe Bryant, like so many of us.
And for your immense role in raising banner No. 17.
You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude.