Chris Paul: CP3's Move to Lakers Does Not Guarantee Him a Championship

Wow. It's actually happening.

"It" in this case would be a trade sending star point guard Chris Paul from the New Orleans Hornets to the Los Angeles Lakers. It's a move that has been on the NBA radar for a while now, but Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports tweeted on Thursday that the deal is done:

In case you're wondering, Wojnarowski originally tweeted that the deal was for Lamar Odom and Andrew Bynum. Hence the correction. He later published a full report on the trade.

But still. Wow. Here I was thinking Paul to the Lakers was just another Lakers pipe dream. Turns out at least one of these pipe dreams is going to come true this year.

I like the trade, of course. Shoot, how can you not? The Lakers are getting something they haven't had in years, and that's a superstar point guard. In fact, CP3 is arguably the best point guard in the NBA, so having him and Kobe Bryant on the same team is almost unfair.

Now that CP3 is in Los Angeles, it's championship or bust, right?

Well, it's always championship or bust when it comes to the Lakers, but yes. I'd say so.

But it's not going to be that simple.

Listen, with Paul at the one and Kobe at the two, the Lakers have the best backcourt in the NBA by far. It's not even close. Don't bother arguing.

At the same time, the Lakers just lost one of the best big men in the league in Pau Gasol and perhaps the league's best sixth man in Lamar Odom. Because of that, I'm not entirely convinced that the Lakers are truly getting better with this trade, and I know that they're getting thinner.

That's not a good thing. The Lakers' depth and the strength of their frontcourt was what made them so good in recent seasons, and those things are gone now. With Gasol and Odom gone, there's a lot of pressure on Andrew Bynum to live up to his potential, and that's a dicey proposition seeing as how he can't even stay healthy.

So when I look at the Lakers right now as they are currently constructed, I don't see the best team in the NBA. In fact, I don't think I even see the best team in the Western Conference. I see a team that is basically banking on two players to lead them to a championship.

Good luck with that.

We now reach the part of our program where I point out how this story may not be finished yet. I'll let Ken Berger of CBSSports.com explain:

Yes, the possibility exists that the Lakers will now swing a deal for Dwight Howard. If they do, they'll have the best trio in the NBA in CP3, Kobe and Howard.

That's when they'll be a championship team.

Until then, they're an incomplete team. Albeit a very, very good one.