"Feeling the need to add pieces that could help them repeat as NBA champions, the Dallas Mavericks aggressively traded their two draft picks on Thursday so they could receive some immediate help.

In a three-team trade, the Mavs traded Texas small forward Jordan Hamilton, and Qatar power forward Tanguy Ngombo to Portland for Trail Blazers small forward Rudy Fernandez and point guard Petteri Koponen. The Blazers then got Denver Nuggets point guard Raymond Felton, while the Nuggets received Portland point guard Andre Miller and a second-round pick from the Blazers.

The Mavs announced that the three-team trade won't be official until today, because it involves so many twists that mustbe approved by the NBA.

Dallas used the 26th pick to draft Hamilton and acquired Ngombo with the 57th pick. But those players' draft rights were traded to Portland.

Still, Mavs general manager Donnie Nelson tried his best to dance around the fact that Dallas had acquired Fernandez and Koponen from Portland.

"We've been talking about this specific situation for quite some time and just within the last couple of days it kind of presented itself as a realistic scenario," Nelson said. "And then it was one of those draft-day trigger-type deals.

"We got youth and experience, and we kind of had an opportunity to have the cake and eat it, too, and so that's what we went with. We were looking for opportunities to trade up, to trade down, to trade over, so we were very active in this draft."

Fernandez, 26, averaged 8.6 points and shot 37 percent from the field in 23.3 minutes mostly off the bench for the Blazers this past season."