Basketball: Brief NBA turmoil when former New Zealand Breakers star RJ Hampton was briefly involved in Steven Adams reported trade

Steven Adams is ready to head to New Orleans and, for a few minutes, it looked like he wouldn’t be the only player tied with New Zealand in the deal.

The reported deal, which would see Adams move from the Oklahoma City Thunder to the New Orleans Pelicans as part of a four-team trade focused on the Jrue Holiday trade to the Milwaukee Bucks, is, as you could probably infer from the word above, Quite complicated.

So even the man who reported the trade, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, had some trouble explaining it, leading fans to believe that RJ Hampton was part of the deal.

Hampton, who played for the New Zealand Breakers last season as part of the Australian NBL’s Next Stars program, was selected this week by the Denver Nuggets as the 24th pick in the NBA Draft.

The Nuggets acquired that pick from the Pelicans in exchange for a 2023 lottery-protected first-round pick, and the Pelicans decided to send that 2023 pick to the Thunder, along with two second-round picks, in exchange for Adams.

However, Wojnarowski’s reports left some clarity to be desired, and the wording of his tweet left many confused.

After another attempt to clear up the confusion, even Hampton began to wonder if he had been traded, before finally learning that he was staying with the Nuggets.

So the brief possibility of having two players tied with Kiwi in an NBA trade was gone, as was Hampton’s concern.

When the trade is confirmed, Adams will not be New Zealand’s first presence in New Orleans basketball, with Sean Marks playing 79 games over two seasons from 2008 to 2010, when the franchise was known as the New Orleans Hornets. New Zealand Breakers guard Corey Webster also spent preseason with the team in 2015.