Lakers trade for Mo Bamba from Magic for Patrick Beverley

The Los Angeles Lakers have reportedly agreed to a trade that will send out Patrick Beverley and bring in Mo Bamba of the Orlando Magic, according to multiple reports. The deal will become part of a four-team deal that will also include the Thomas Bryant trade to the Nuggets.

Shams Charania of The Athletic broke the news:

The Lakers were in search of a center after trading Thomas Bryant to the Nuggets earlier in the day on Thursday ahead of the deadline. Bamba is a name that has been linked to the Lakers dating back to last year and offers far more defensive protection.

While Bryant made his name on the offensive end for the Lakers, Bamba will do so on the opposite end of the court. His enormous wing span and feel on that end of the court allow him to be one of the league’s best rim protectors.

Offensively, the Lakers won’t lose much in the terms of play style as Bamba is still a spacing threat and can help keep the lane unclogged for the Lakers. According to Cleaning The Glass, Bamba ranks in the 89th percentile among bigs in 3-point shooting and in the 97th percentile in non-corner 3-point shooting frequency.

This deal also saves the Lakers a substantial amount of money on the luxury tax, which matters to the franchise as we (unfortunately) know. In this specific scenario, though, it’s more of an added bonus as the Lakers are swapping a negative for a potential positive and will cut almost $30 million from their luxury tax bill in the process.

Bamba is on a non-guaranteed deal for $10.3 million next season, a deal that is set to become fully guaranteed on June 29.

A small catch in all this is that Bamba is still technically suspended for two more games. Bamba threw punches at Doc Rivers’ son (Austin) and if that doesn’t mean he’s born to be a Laker, I don’t know what does. He was suspended four games for the incident and will need to sit out two more games.

As for Beverley, his tenure in Los Angeles never lived up to expectations. After being brought in as a potential 3-and-D guard, Beverley struggled to shoot to start the season and could not make up for that defensively.

The Lakers’ glut of guards also meant he didn’t have as much value in Los Angeles. With Dennis Schröder excelling and the team acquiring D’Angelo Russell and Malik Beasley, Beverley’s role was going to be further reduced.

And, as we noted many times in this space, Beverley was one of the few remaining tradeable contracts the team had left considering he was expiring. They had a plethora of guards, used one of the most tradeable ones to fill a need and only needed a second round pick to upgrade.

Again, it feels like another win for Rob Pelinka and the front office in a deadline that’s been full of them.

You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude.