Los Angeles Lakers: Did They End Up Winning the Lamar Odom Trade?

When the Los Angeles Lakers traded their versatile forward Lamar Odom to the Dallas Mavericks for nothing but a traded player exception, there was sudden backlash toward management on how Mitch Kupchak and the Busses can do something crazy like that.

Fast forward to March and it looks like the Lakers management got the better end of the deal.

The Forum Blue and Gold visit Dallas on Wednesday night and Odom will be a familiar face they'll have to deal with. The difference, though, is that he's no longer the threat that he once was.

Odom is averaging a meager 7.1 points and 4.5 rebounds per game, pretty much half the output he had last year in his final season with the Lakers.

It's fair to say that the Lakers won the trade.

Even when he was with the Lakers, Odom's main deficiency was that he was unbelievably inconsistent. It seemed like he would show up only when he felt like it.

At the end of the day, he was a highly emotional player. He would get high on his highs and not bring the same energy the following game during his peak with the Lakers. Now, he has gotten low on his biggest lows of his career.

Odom hasn't had an easy year and this has been well documented. 

This past summer, he was attending a funeral for his slain 24-year-old cousin in New York. He was a passenger in an SUV when it hit a motorcycle, which hit a pedestrian and killed him.

He essentially witnessed two deaths in a matter of a few days and he stated that it took a huge emotional toll on him. 

Lamar has dealt with too many tragedies in his life—more than most people can handle. 

There is no doubt that these have made him a stronger person. However, one event that shattered him when it really shouldn't have was when the Lakers attempted to trade him to the New Orleans Hornets as a part of the nixed Chris Paul trade.

One would think that a person being traded from a city they love would be nothing compared to the other things Lamar had gone through. However, it was most likely a confluence of all the negative events that had been going on in his life that made him feel so depressed.

Whatever the reason, Lamar was overly emotional and it seems like management knew that he wasn't going to be 100 percent focused on basketball, thus prompting them to trade him to Dallas. In the game of basketball, a team can't afford to have those kind of players on a championship team. 

Perhaps if he handled the canceled trade in stride like Pau Gasol did, Odom would still be wearing a Laker uniform. 

Trading Odom was an opportunity for the Lakers to save some money from the grueling luxury taxes which will kick in soon and they did just that, acquiring the $8.7 million trade exception.

On the court, they rid themselves of a player who was going to be an emotional roller coaster throughout the season and that's exactly what he has been in Dallas. The Lakers had enough distractions on their team throughout the season and it's a good thing Odom wasn't another one.

From Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum trade rumors, the Derek Fisher trade, a new coach, to Kobe's divorce, it's a surprise the Lakers have stayed afloat on top of the Western Conference.

Although their bench got thinner without Odom, the acquisition of Jordan Hill changed that. The Lakers got a young and athletic big who can come off the bench and make an impact.

So now when we look at it, the Odom trade wasn't all that bad for the Lakers. One may say that the change of scenery is the reason why Odom is struggling in Dallas, but that's just bogus. 

Odom has changed teams more than once and the transition has been seamless. His struggles have to do more with the tumultuous summer he had. It's just difficult to deal with something like that and as harsh as it sounds, it was smart for the Lakers to let go of him when he was not emotionally vested in basketball.

And let's face it, his legs aren't getting any younger, either.

Kudos to the Lakers organization for pulling off yet another bold trade and getting it right.