Two possibilities here: Either he knew exactly what he was doing and wanted to send a message(this would be completely asinine, considering that making this public could hurt Utah's ability to move him), or he just said something stupid in a moment of frustration. My gut feeling is the latter, which is NOT the same thing as asking for a trade.
No. He asked to be traded. Period. It's a fact. Whether he was frustrated, sad, or constipated is completely irrelevant.