Happy Anniversary To The Great DeAndre Jordan Free Agency Hostage Situation Of 2015
Boy time really does fly huh? On this day 4 years ago we were blessed with perhaps the greatest free agency fiasco of our lives. It’s been a while since the whole DeAndre Jordan situation played out, so join me if you will on a nice jog down memory lane.
In the summer of 2015, the Dallas Mavericks had just completed a 50 win season, but unfortunately lost to the Rockets in a quick 5 games in the first round of the playoffs. They relied on a 32 year old Tyson Chandler to hold down the starting center spot, so as you can imagine they were in the market for a big and at the time there were a bunch of options on the market from Marc Gasol to Kevin Love to Jordan. The basketball world all thought that Jordan was headed to Dallas after agreeing to a 4/80M contract, that Cuban had finally landed his big fish, but then all hell broke loose. All of the sudden the great Emoji Battle of 2015 was off an running once there were rumors of cold feet
Chandler Parsons got us started, remember this was when he was still good and Cuban had signed him to a deal in the club. Still an all time signing moment in my opinion. He was also the guy who played the biggest role in getting Jordan to commit to DAL in the first place. Well then the floodgates opened and chaos ensued
Blake Griffin was’t going to let this tactic go unchecked, so he found any form of transportation possible to keep his boy in LA
Followed up Chris Paul who was supposed to be on vacation
Mind you this is all happening at once and Twitter is collectively losing their minds. That went to another level once Paul Pierce got involved, who put out a tweet to this day might be the best I’ve ever seen
We had reports that Cuban was just driving around trying to get in touch with Jordan because it was clear nobody could get a hold of him. That was because supposedly the Clippers were holding the man hostage
It’s one thing for players to have fun tweeting emojis, it’s another when credible reporters are talking about a legit hostage situation. It was almost too good to be true and then Blake put out this bad boy
Sure they were fucking with us, but man what a ride it was. I don’t think NBA Twitter has had a better peak than that night. In the end, Jordan pulled back from DAL and went back to the Clippers, which is funny because he would then go on to play for the Mavs a few years later. It was really one of the greatest THIS LEAGUE moments we’ve ever had, and frankly I don’t think anything will ever top it. Not even this current free agency season which has been absolutely insane.
So happy anniversary and long live the great emoji battle of 2015, one of the best moments in NBA history.