Dallas Mavericks guard JJ Redick spoke out against New Orleans Pelicans Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations David Griffin and the entire Pels front office Wednesday following his trade from New Orleans to Dallas at the NBA trade deadline.
Speaking on his Old Man & the Three podcast (h/t ESPN's Andrew Lopez), Redick said he asked for a trade before the season started around the time Jrue Holiday was dealt to the Milwaukee Bucks.
Redick said Griffin told him to "come down for a month" and that if he wasn't satisfied, he would "get you to a situation you like."
The 36-year-old veteran said that when he wasn't traded by that point, he expected a buyout or to be traded to a team in the Northeast so he could be closer to his family. Instead, Redick was traded to Dallas without being consulted.
Of the situation, Redick said:
"I don't think you're going to get honesty from that front office, objectively speaking. That's not an opinion, I just don't think you're gonna get that. I don't think what happened with me is necessarily an isolated incident. I think front offices around the league operate in their best interest. I get that. I understand that.
"Truthfully ... I think I was a little naive thinking I was in Year 15 and I attempted to do things right throughout my career. But in terms of this front office, yeah, it's not something where I would expect certainly the agents who worked on this with me to ever trust that front office again."
Redick has yet to appear in a game for the Mavs since the trade, as he is currently recovering from a heel injury.
Aside from not feeling like he was a fit in Pelicans head coach Stan Van Gundy's defensive schemes, Redick's biggest reason for wanting a trade related to family.
Redick's family lives in Brooklyn, and he said they would have to quarantine for a week before going back home anytime they visited New Orleans. Because of that Redick wanted to be closer to them, which is why he desired a move to a team in the Northeast.
Redick said he told Mavericks owner Mark Cuban that he would be "thrilled" to be traded to Dallas any other year but this one, since the COVID-19 pandemic makes things difficult with regard to his family.
If and when Redick appears in a game for the Mavs, it will mark his sixth team in 15 NBA seasons.
On the heels of an excellent 2019-20 season that saw him average 15.3 points per game and shoot 45.3 percent from three-point range, Redick struggled mightily this season in 31 games with the Pelicans before the trade.
Redick is averaging just 8.7 points per game, which is his lowest scoring output since the 2008-09 season, and his 36.4 percent conversion rate from deep is the lowest mark of his career.
Even so, it is easy to understand why the Mavs traded for him, as he is a career 41.5 percent shooter from three and has 110 games of playoff experience.
While the Pelicans are 12th in the Western Conference at 21-25, the Mavericks are in the thick of the playoff race at 24-21, good for seventh in the conference.
Adding an accomplished veteran like Redick to a squad led by younger players in Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis is a shrewd move that could pay dividends, but Redick clearly feels deceived by the circumstances surrounding the trade.
