5 Things: So This It?

I’m having a really hard job connecting the dots on this roster. Last season was difficult, too, especially every move made after we traded for Russ (which I was originally in favor of). This? This is getting absurd. Like…are we setting LeBron up to win the MVP because he’ll have dragged this atrocious assemblage of NBA talent to a playin slot? I don’t get it; still, in terms of the season opening roster it looks like this is it.

1. The choice not to trade Russell Westbrook for either next summer cap space reasons or future draft pick reasons. I have long been harping on Rob for treating first round draft picks like a dude selling old stereos and tires out the back of his van. Every summer he’s been on the job he’s traded at least one. I get it: it’s unlikely we’ll draft the next Laker superstar with LeBron and AD on the team. However, he has often done this while bidding against nobody else (AD and Schroder trades) or to overpay on bringing in talent (Westbrook trade bringing him here). Rob as an agent had a job to maximize the investment a team would commit to his clients. He doesn’t seem to understand that he needs to have a foot in the future as well as in the now as a GM. Win now doesn’t entail simply bailing on the future. Regardless, like the last time we traded for Russ, it’s the moves made after the fact that are more perplexing than choosing to trade for, or in this case move forward with, the mercurial PG. Like last season’s roster we made early moves for easily attainable players, filled the roster out with more players at mismatched positions, and generally didn’t follow the LeBron Rules while filling out the roster.
2. If keeping Russ on the roster was a possibility why did we move so fast on Lonnie Walker IV? I think of Lonnie Walker as a cheaper, guaranteed for one season instead of possibly two, version of THT. Not known for his defense or shooting, scores by getting to the rim while not really generating foul shots and mostly a project player. This, to me, has Klutch all over it. That’s too bad and basically shits in the face of anyone saying the Lakers are in ‘win now’ mode. If we used the sole spending tool available to us to appease a sports agency…on a player as limited and one-dimensional as Walker is…Rob should be fired. Frankly, Dennis is more worthy of that MLE than LW4. If keeping Russ was always in the mix I really don’t get this one.
3. Overloading the PG position. One has to hope these signings came with at least the acquiescence of Coach Ham. We’re carrying 4 point guards to start the season none of whom are knockdown shooters. In fact all of them are drive and kick PGs by rep. Again, why go so much against the grain with a LeBron led team? Frankly I wish we had given Isiaih Thomas a shot, at least that dude can shoot and us not much worse on D. The sole reason I can see carrying this many guards is to make sure at least two are healthy. Beverly has missed significant time due to injury the past two seasons and Nunn has yet to play a meaningful game in a Laker uni.
4. Going all in on next summer. I can see both wisdom and extreme risk in pursuing this line of strategy. We’re bidding against nobody this summer looking to pull from a limited pool of teams to move Russ to. This isn’t a good negotiating environment and that was before the Gobert trade inflated expectations beyond reality. There are better players than what’s available that could be targeted next summer. Wiggins, D’Angelo (since the Lakers seem big on reunions) and, yes, Kyrie Irving could all be on a list of players one could consider to be better than the current crop available in a trade now. We could also whiff on all of them, we’ll only have $35ish mil in money we can offer next summer, well short of a max salary offer. Does Wiggins want to move on from a roster already built to win now? For less than the max? To still be in LeBron’s sizable shadow for at least one, possibly two, seasons? Is Kyrie worth that much, honestly? The dude wants to play 55/games a season at his whim. D-Russ isn’t really a needle mover. I could see a combo of Turner and Russ but I’d there enough money to get both? Lotta risk on that path but it does keep assets we can use on down the line in-house.”

All in all this has been about as disappointing of a follow up to last season as can be imagined. Far from a master class I feel like Rob has flunked out at every turn. Either you’re all-in on trading Russ or you’re not. Either build around LeBron or accept the ridicule and risk of assembling a junk pile of a team. If this is a plan it’s an awful one, too to bottom, inside and out. I had though a Russ trade would be difficult due to his contract size and the amount of the requisite buyout. I didn’t imagine the Lakers would both double-down on bad fits around Russ and LeBronpr impose artificial barriers to getting deals done. I thought Rob deserved to be fired after assembling last season’s team. If he’s not fired after this I just might take a break from this crappy version of NBA reality TV until substantial change happens. I’ve done it with the Angels team I grew up watching and I have no problem cancelling the outlandish amount of money I pay/month in cable bills to watch a clown team play junk basketball. This has become a joke, at least on paper. It looks more like a silly reality TV show than an NBA team. All we need to do is bring back Nick Young. I’ll tune in…for now, but the franchise is walking a line it never even needed to get close to with bad choice after bad choice.