The guy who rode the bench behind Jordan Clarkson and Lou Williams for half the season? Laker fans booed him just three months ago for not playing up to expectations and for sabotaging the personal life of a scrub player, but now he's the second coming after a few summer league games? What a generous offer!
Honestly, I think Russell is a valuable young player with a ton of potential whose development was stunted by Byron Scott, but the instant 180 from Laker fans is hilarious.
As you pretty much said in your second paragraph, your first paragraph is vastly underselling Russell. I've lost power, and don't have much time, so I can't touch on everything in your post, but I agree with most of what you said about the Lakers not being a great trading partner. From a Lakers standpoint, I'm not willing to give more than Russell unless I have assurances he's planning to stay (which, as you've said, don't have to be the legally binding form of assurances. From a Thunder standpoint, I'd be disappointed to only get Russell in return, but it's a lot better than nothing. Ingram can't really be traded unless another deal is in place with Russell (which is plausible), because then you have RW, D'Angelo, and Clarkson all in the same backcourt with little else.
As for the instant 180, that's simply not reality. Russell was disappointing for Laker fans early in the season, especially considering the success of the rest of the top 4. A large part of that was the ridiculously high expectations set for him. Right around the end of February he had a stretch where he scored 20 points or more in 7 out of 8 games, and he had the Lakers buzzing like no teenager has done since Kobe. He scored 39 in a win against the Nets, making him one point shy of joining Lebron and Carmelo as the only teenagers to ever drop 40 as a teenager.
When he came out and played well in summer league that was just further affirmation about how far he'd come. Last year he looked hopeless, and it was kinda hard to imagine him developing into superstar in comparison so some of his equally raw but uber-athletic counterparts. He was much easier on the eyes this time around, but that's not what has Laker fans buzzing; it's that 8 game stretch that started in late February.
