Shams Charania hit the entire Canadian subcontinent with a generational rug pull on Tuesday.
The NBA insider Charania of The Athletic was among the first to break the news that Damian Lillard had been traded in a multi-team blockbuster. In his haste to get the news out though, Charania mistakenly said that Lillard was headed to the Toronto Raptors in the trade.
Multiple X users were able to capture screenshots of the erroneous tweet.
Shams really did Raptors fans dirty pic.twitter.com/tRobXny06i
— Barstool Sports (@barstoolsports) September 27, 2023
Shams will never be forgiven pic.twitter.com/8bQgYPDeXN
— Vivek Jacob (@vivekmjacob) September 27, 2023
we cannot let shams get away with this pic.twitter.com/IngcY7PVRZ
— Molly Morrison (@mollyhannahm) September 27, 2023
Charania deleted the tweet and posted a new one just one minute later with the (correct) info that Lillard had been sent to the Milwaukee Bucks.
Sources: Portland, Milwaukee and Phoenix have agreed to a three-team trade:
Bucks get: Damian Lillard
Suns: Jusuf Nurkic
Blazers: Deandre Ayton— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) September 27, 2023
Toronto fans had to be feeling some type of way about that tweet, especially since the Raptors had reportedly been in trade talks over Lillard for the last several days. Before Tuesday, it would have been seen as much more likely for Lillard to be traded to Toronto than to Milwaukee (and Charania even mentioned the Raptors in his initial tweet two separate times).
The veteran reporter Charania is one of the top news-breakers in the business, known for his connections and his speed in getting information out there. But in the rush to get on top of a story as big as the Lillard trade, sometimes mistakes can be made (especially with complicated multi-team trades featuring so many moving parts).
There was at least some good news for Charania though. It turns out the Lillard news had social media mostly clowning on somebody else instead.
