It turns out the Mavericks wanted to trade Luka Doncic even more than we thought

No, you weren't dreaming - the impossible really did happen. The Dallas Mavericks, for reasons NBA fans are still trying to comprehend, traded Luka Doncic seemingly out of nowhere on Saturday to the Los Angeles Lakers in a deal that sent Anthony Davis, Max Christie, and a future first-round pick to the Mavs. Yup, that's all Dallas got in exchange for one of the most valuable players in the sport.

Davis is a superstar, obviously, but trading a 25-year-old top-five (at worst) player in the world who just willed his team to the NBA Finals in exchange for a 31-year-old is really tough for any Mavericks fan to get behind.

As if trading Doncic wasn't crazy enough, the Mavericks were reportedly eager enough to move on from him to the point where they actually tried to trade him twice, according to Sam Amick of The Athletic ($).

"Yet while there was no shortage of teams shocked that the Mavericks didn’t broadcast their willingness to move Dončić, league sources say there was at least one team besides the Lakers that was approached by Dallas nearly two weeks ago about the prospect of swapping Dončić for another star," Amick wrote.

That's right, another team was approached about the prospect of acquiring Doncic, and, perhaps more shockingly, turned down that opportunity.

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Mavericks were so desperate to trade Luka Doncic, they tried to twice

Which team the Mavericks approached to trade Doncic is unclear. Was it the Denver Nuggets with their eyes on Nikola Jokic? Were they trying to pry Shai Gilgeous-Alexander away from the Oklahoma City Thunder? Maybe Dallas wanted Victor Wembanyama in an in-state blockbuster with the San Antonio Spurs? If any of those teams turned a deal down, that would've made sense. Any others, though, might have some explaining to do.

While that team that was contacted will likely never be revealed, Mavericks fans can only hope that GM Nico Harrison aimed a little higher before eventually landing on the older and notoriously injury-prone Anthony Davis.

So many questions from Dallas' side of things have to be answered. Was the team really eager to trade him due to conditioning concerns? Were they uncomfortable giving Doncic the super-max?

Trading Doncic at all is tough for any Mavericks fan to get on board with. Trying so hard to the point where his name was floated around with another team before they settled on acquiring Anthony Davis makes the whole situation even stranger.

Anthony Davis better lead the Mavericks to an NBA title. Anything short of that makes this whole ordeal a massive failure for the entire Mavericks organization.