A MAN BY the name of Jake Reedy was drinking with friends at Local Public Eatery in the Knox-Henderson neighborhood of Dallas when his phone lit up in front of him. It was 11:12 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 1. Phones began to ping and buzz and light up across the dimly lit room. The whole bar, he said, saw the news at the same time. Luka Doncic? Traded?
“No one believed it,” he said.
Four minutes later, ESPN’s Shams Charania followed up. It was real. In the dead of night, Doncic had been traded to the Los Angeles Lakers, along with two other players for All-Star Anthony Davis, Max Christie and a future first-round pick.
Sitting at a table, processing the news, Reedy’s eyes began to well. Later that night, walking to Skellig, another bar in the neighborhood, his mind began to race.
He ordered Sharpies, duct tape and poster board on Postmates, Ubered home and came up with a plan — futile though it would be. He got home at 1:22 a.m., took out a Sharpie and began to write down his thoughts. He took famous quotes and altered them. One read, “Talent wins games, but Luka Doncic wins championships.” Another read: “We should have never, ever let Luka Doncic play for the Lakers.” Another: “Mark, it was only $3.5 billion.”
The 27-year-old then walked to the American Airlines Center and duct-taped the poster boards on pillars in front of the main entrance of the arena. He placed another, “RIP Mavs, TOD: 11:23 pm Feb. 1 2025, ‘I need a recovery beer,'” below the Dirk Nowitzki statue.
He wasn’t alone. For three hours, he and dozens of other fans mourned the loss of their favorite star. One fan arrived around 3 a.m., Reedy said, threw his Mavericks jerseys to the ground and renounced his fandom.
Fans gathered somberly later on Feb. 2 in front of the Nowitzki statue outside the arena — complete with a casket in Mavericks colors — to hold a faux funeral. The inscription underneath Nowitzki’s statue — “Loyalty never fades away” — screamed with hypocrisy.
“It almost feels like he died,” said Garrett Bussey, a longtime Mavericks fan. “Weird to say, but that’s kind of the void that was ripped away.”
Doncic jerseys and signs protesting the historic move dotted the crowd. Chris Ebbesen was there. He is 44 years old, has three kids. He remembers exactly where he was the night Doncic was drafted by the Atlanta Hawks, then traded to Dallas in 2018. He’ll never forget the night Doncic was traded away, either.
After more than two decades with Nowitzki and another half-decade with Doncic, he said the trade felt like his last vestiges of childhood innocence had been erased. He had to explain to his kids — aged 12, 9 and 6 — what happened when they woke up.
“They were in shock,” he said. “I had to explain to them the business of sports. It was revealing to them. It’s not a fairy tale.”
