Pau Gasol Says “It’s Huge Not To Have To Think About” Getting Traded

A lot of NBA fans (and trade machine aficionados) think of players like commodities to be bought and sold, or faceless cogs in the machine that is their favorite basketball team. General managers sometimes think this way, too, which can lead to teams like the disappointing 2012-13 Lakers with Dwight Howard, Kobe Bryant and the specter once known as two-time MVP Steve Nash. But they’re people, just like everyone else, with frailties and foibles, battling the psychological demons all of us do. Pau Gasol recently brought this human element to the forefront in a conversation with Bleacher Report’s Kevin Ding when he admitted the constant trade rumors sat like an albatross around his neck during his time in LA.

The Bulls are in Los Angeles set to take on a short-handed Lakers team tonight at 10:30 ET. Bleacher Report’s Kevin Ding got Pau to open up about the change in his game this season, where he was voted in to his fist All-Star game as a starter (he’s been named an All-Star reserve four times previously):

“I’m re-energized. I’m in positions where I’m comfortable and effective, so I make a lot of plays,” Gasol said of his wonderful new life as a Chicago Bull instead of a Los Angeles Laker. “And the fact that my name is not on the trade block like it has been for the past three years, that’s a factor that’s overlooked.

“It’s huge. It’s huge not to have to think about that and have it in the back of your mind constantly. It’s nice to have that type of security and comfort.”

Let’s play a little empathy game. Yes, Pau has made over $150 million during his 13-plus years in the Association, and that’s a lot more than your average person. But if you try and imagine performing a job where — at any minute — you might get a phone call telling you have to upend your life and move to a new location with new co-workers, your work might suffer as a result. Then compound that unknowable future with the wear and tear of a grueling NBA season, and you might appreciate more what it was like for Pau during his last few years in LA.

The worst part, as we see it, was that Pau played Robin to Kobe Bryant on back-to-back NBA championships and three straight Finals appearances. During both playoff runs to the top of the NBA Mountain, Pau averaged over 18 points, 10 rebounds and two blocks per game while shooting better than 54 percent from the field. That’s some excellent all-around basketball.

Then, all of a sudden, he wasn’t good enough after the Lakers got knocked out by Dirk Nowitzki and the Mavs in 2011. The next season Dwight came along, and Pau was lumped into every possible trade scenario deranged Lakers fans could imagine.

It brings us a small measure of delight that Pau is playing some of the best basketball of his career in his fourteenth year for a Bulls team in the thick of the race for a top seed in the East. The Lakers, meanwhile, are stuck in the bottom of the Western Conference and have lost Kobe Bryant to a second consecutive season-ending injury.

It’s good to be Pau, these days, and we don’t blame him for enjoying every minute of it.

(Bleacher Report)

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