The Detroit Pistons traded three second-round picks to the Memphis Grizzlies on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, the Grizzlies traded those three second-round picks right back.
It’s a bit of a goofy maneuver when you look at it that way.
The first half of the deal was so the Pistons could move up from pick 21 to 17 to take Ebuka Okorie out of Stanford.
Memphis fell to 21 and got Karim Lopez from Australia’s NBL.
But then on Wednesday night, the Grizzlies wanted Isaiah Stewart from the Pistons. And the picks they traded back to get the sturdy big man? They were the same three that had changed hands originally the night before.
Memphis is trading these same three second-round picks that the Grizzlies received from the Pistons last night, sources say, back to Detroit, in order to land Isaiah Stewart. https://t.co/sSmat0b9sN
— Jake Fischer (@JakeLFischer) June 25, 2026
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This move has a lot of questions being asked.
Did they really not know they might do this and it was just a coincidence? Or was there some deeper reason for not completing the trade all at once?
Either way, it’s now done.
Memphis gets Lopez and Stewart. The Pistons get to keep their original three second-round picks, and they get Okorie.
It’ll be years before it’s clear who won these double trades that had a ton of overlap, but for now, it’s just a quirky takeaway from the draft.