A wild trade rumor of a possible four-team deal involving superstars Paul George and DeMarcus Cousins has been making the rounds online recently.
In the said rumor, the Indiana Pacers, Sacramento Kings, Boston Celtics, and Oklahoma City Thunder will swap players among each other in a deal that is presumed to improve everyone's rosters before the new season starts later this month.
Sportsrageous indicated that the rumored four-team trade would send Paul George and Rodney Stuckey to the Celtics while Amir Johnson, Marcus Smart, and Jaylen Brown plus OKC's Alex Abrines to the Kings.
Also part of the deal is DeMarcus Cousins and Rudy Gay being moved to the Pacers and Jae Crowder being sent to the Thunder.
While the rumored trade sounds silly, almost all of the players mentioned are actually rumored to be on the trading block of their respective teams at the moment. Some of them had been persistently mentioned in a lot of trade rumors since the beginning of summer and so it is not surprising that a deal of this magnitude is circling online right now.
Acquiring George would allow the Celtics to form a new Big Three with Al Horford and Isaiah Thomas, as per the Morning Ledger, but losing a lot of key players and a potential star in the process would weaken their bench and may not be the best move for Boston at this time.
In reality, it would be hard to imagine Indiana letting go of George even for Cousins and Gay as the former Fresno State standout is now the face of the Pacers' franchise. Team president Larry Bird had repeatedly stated that the team is being built around the three-time NBA All-Star.
Meanwhile, if the deal pushes through Sacramento gets a host of young players and a veteran big man which the team can all use to move on from their playoff-less years with Cousins.
Smart, Brown, and Abrines seem to all fit in new head coach Dave Joerger's system and will inject new life to the squad moving forward.
However, of the four teams, it looks like OKC would benefit the most as Crowder would be a huge upgrade from Abrines. Crowder is a starter-quality player and will bring a lot of toughness to the squad to complement Russell Westbrook.