Anthony Davis' injury immediately proves why Mavericks botched Luka Doncic trade

It took less than one game for the critics to be proven exactly right about just how badly the Dallas Mavericks screwed up their trade of superstar point guard Luka Doncic to the Los Angeles Lakers as part of a three-team deal that saw Dallas land 32-year-old star forward Anthony Davis.

Davis suffered an adductor injury in Dallas' 116-105 win over the Houston Rockets, and while initially, it didn't seem serious, that didn't stay the case for long.

According to Christian Clark of The Athletic, Davis is expected to miss "significant time" with the injury, which will likely deal a massive blow to their postseason push. The Mavs sit just 1.5 games clear of the Golden State Warriors in the last play-in spot in the Western Conference, and losing Davis for an extended period of time will likely make that task virtually impossible.

But more importantly, Davis' immediate injury proves virtually every single one of the critics of that trade right.

The issue with that deal was not that the Mavericks decided Luka's conditioning and fitness were too much of a risk to merit giving him a supermax contract in the coming years. That's a fair (if likely incorrect) assessment of the situation, and certainly enough reason to trade him away.

But when your answer to concerns about longevity and potential injury concerns is to trade that generational megastar for a center with a laundry list of injury issues over the years, who is seven years older than the player you're trading away.

For all their talk about work ethic, and all their leaking to the press about concerns about Luka's durability moving forward, replacing him with the the only non-Kawhi Leonard player who appears to be made out of old fiberglass connected by even older rubber bands was an absolutely baffling choice.

You're worried about your stars' ability to stay on the court, so you go trade for Anthony Davis? In what world did that ever make sense?

Now the Mavs are faced with a fight to make the playoffs with a depleted roster and without the star they were so sure would help get them there.

And at the end of the day, the only ones they have to blame for that are themselves. Maybe if they'd, I don't know, shopped their once-in-a-lifetime talent of a point guard around a little before shipping him off so unceremoniously, they might have gotten some more talent back, or some draft picks to help ease the burden in the coming years.

Instead, they're staring down the barrel of missing the playoffs entirely, all because they were worried Luka was too chubby. But don't worry, Anthony Davis will work incredibly hard and stay in great shape while he's out with this injury. And the next one. And the one after that.

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Anthony Davis' adductor injury immediately proves why Mavericks botched Luka Doncic trade with Lakers

By Sam Westmoreland | 3:09 PM EST