Desmond Bane trade exposes how badly Mavericks botched the Luka Doncic deal

The first blockbuster trade of the offseason went down on Sunday morning, as the Memphis Grizzlies traded Desmond Bane to the Orlando Magic for Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Cole Anthony, four first-round picks, and one first-round pick swap. NBA fans across the world were shocked by the return Memphis got for Bane, as they landed four first-round picks, a swap, and a solid young guard in Anthony. As always, when trades go down or get talked about, this move has already been compared to the Dallas Mavericks' Luka Doncic trade from February 1 that may haunt fans forever.

Dallas traded Doncic, Maxi Kleber, and Markieff Morris to the Los Angeles Lakers for Anthony Davis, Max Christie, and one first-round pick, and seeing the haul that Memphis received for Bane, everyone immediately wonders how the Grizzlies netted four first-round picks and Dallas only netted one.

While Dallas landed a borderline top-10 player in the NBA in Davis in this deal, them not extracting every possible asset they could from the Lakers is why this trade will always be frowned upon, especially seeing how much the Grizzlies got for Bane. This was about as good of a deal that the Grizzlies could have gotten for Bane, and this is a perfect example of the types of trade packages you can get when trading one of your best players.

Grizzlies' Bane blockbuster exposes how little the Mavs got for Doncic

The Mavericks not getting another first-round pick, a couple of swaps, Dalton Knecht, or even Austin Reaves from the Lakers will have Mavs fans angry for years, and the fact that Dallas had to give up a second-round pick to send to the Utah Jazz to get the deal to go through is absolutely wild.

Doncic has the potential to become one of the greatest offensive players this league has ever seen, and the Mavericks gave up on him in the blink of an eye without doing their due diligence of at least shopping him around the league and trading him to the highest bidder. From all of the reporting since the trade, it is clear that Dallas could have gotten much more than the package they got from Los Angeles if they would have made it known to the league that they were looking to trade him.

Teams like the Chicago Bulls would have given up all their assets to get their hands on Doncic, and while they wouldn't have been able to give them a player that is anywhere close to what Davis brings, the draft capital they would have gotten back could have been record-breaking if they listened to offers from around the association.

Comparing the Doncic trade to other trades in today's NBA will always be tricky due to the fact that it was two top players being traded for each other, but it remains true that the Mavericks should have gotten much more from the Lakers, specifically, all of their tradable draft capital.

First-round picks are invaluable in today's NBA, and while you can't directly compare the Bane and Doncic trades just because Davis is worth multiple first-round picks on his own, Dallas not collecting as much as they could from the Lakers will always be one of the most bizarre things about this saga.