Lowry to Toronto played a part in the Harden trade didn't it?
Plus on top of that BOTH our pg's wanted out. Lowry had problems with Adleman and Dragic wanted to go back to the Suns. If i recall we offered Dragic a similar contract that Phoenix gave him but he chose them instead.
At the time, Lin was the best option at pg available. He was a household name, and does bring revenue from the Chinese market (which we sort of lost through Yao's retirement).