No trade was in the works for anyone until Blinken contacted Lavrov to get Griner back. I guess asking for Whelan was to make it not so obvious that it was really all about Griner.
Sounds like a Bergdahl type trade to me. We get a sleazy black America hatin’ lesbo guy and Russia gets a prolific arms dealer.
“Russia gets a prolific arms dealer”
Russia probably isn’t able to spare lots of arms for export currently.