Aloha,
Mark Cuban said that his biggest mistake as an owner was tearing apart his championship roster after they won. If only the Lakers had learned from others mistakes. A championship team should look for roster tweaks to improve but the Lakers over two season went above and beyond a tweak here and there. They burnt the roster to the ground. All in the name of maximizing LeBron’s championship window. What the accomplished was the complete opposite.
There is nothing wrong with a big 3, but it’s extremely hard to accomplish as both the Lakers and the Nets discovered. You almost have to have at least drafted on of your big 3. And a team has to have at least a couple of decent role players left after the dust settles. The last and maybe most important element is your big 3 all need to compliment each other like say the Bucks big 3 do.
The justification for adding Russ was the same reason we acquired Dennis. To take the load of of LeBron. I didn’t mind the Dennis acquisition as much because it didn’t cost as much. The reality was that LeBron is going to play like LeBron plays until he hangs ‘‘em up. All the Lakers really needed was a point guard that plays well with LeBron. A decent secondary ball handler that can defend. Alex Curso anyone? Even Dennis was a better fit, at least he defends. It’s a shame Nunn has been hurt because he fit the mold perfectly. He would be slotted into the Avery role which would have been a real upgrade. If one went into a lab to create the worst possible fit as a co star for LeBron, after the smoke from the explosion cleared, Russ would walk into the gym surrounded by 10 mismatched minimum contracts. That isn’t the way to maximize Lebron’s. Window. Can you imagine how dismal the season would have been if we had not hit on Malik and Melo?
Unfortunately we will probably have a repeat next year, considering we are over the cap with just 6 players under contract, 7 if Nunn opts in, which he may have to since he has not played. Now with a reasonable amount of injurie luck we probably can be a decent team, but not a championship team next year.
2023 is our reset year. It is what the Lakers should be focused on. Only AD and THT are under contract and I think it’s very important that we do nothing going forward to mess it up. We will see how badly LeBron wants another ring before he retires. If he wants another max deal, I would cut him loose. The 2023 class has a lot of aging stars that I wouldn’t look seriously at but 2 names that jump out at me are Gary Trent Jr and Jamari Grant. Trent Jr is having a break out year and we all know about Grant. And they both defend their asses off.
We can start preparing for 2023 now by giving a lot of minutes to THT, Austin and Stanley. They all could develop into championship role players. If Nunn does opt in I would be very careful before I traded him and THT. There would need to be obvious upside there to give them up.
Another aging star? No thank you. I’m not sure if there will be a market for Russ this summer either unless he plays like he did against the Warriors the rest of the year. And even that may not be enough. I don’t see a Russ for Wall trade as anything more then trading one bad contract for another.
What we can’t afford to do is make anymore stupid moves in the name of winning now, because with what we have now in the asset department doesn’t add up to enough to help to win another ring, next year, even with good health.
I haven’t completely given up on this year. If we added a useful piece in the buy out market, the kids begin to develop and give us more good games, if AD can bring beast mode back on a nightly basis, we stay healthy and get Nunn back in time for him to develop a rhythm and Russ can play well like the Warriors game, we might make some noise. Yes that’s a lot and probably not enough to win a ring. But it could set us up for a better year next year, especially if some how we can keep Monk. Still 2023 should be the focus moving forward. Don’t let Rob mess it up Jeanie.
Aloha, Michael,
I don’t blame the Lakers for trying to upgrade the championship team. In retrospect, we benefited greatly from the four-and-a-half-month season suspension and the elite teams like the Clippers and Bucks getting upset. Yes, we were the last and best team standing but it was obvious that this team needed upgrades and that lightening LeBron’s load had to be a priority. I’ve always believed you never stand pat. You assume everybody else is getting better so standing still is not an option.
The problem last year was the same as this year: Pelinka didn’t execute by making the right moves. Instead of a game changer like Markieff Morris, last year we got Dennis Schroder, turned down the Lowry trade to keep THT, and landed Andre Drummond. This year, we scored big on Monk, Melo, and Reaves but missed badly almost everywhere else, especially with Russ and the lack of small forwards. Two years of essentially missing on most of our personnel decisions. The problem to me was not that we broke up a championship team but that we didn’t end up with a better team.
We see summer completely different as expected. I think Russ’ expiring contract and our two first round picks plus THT and Nunn could bring us a legitimate third superstar like Dame if he requested a trade to the Lakers or three quality starters to play alongside LeBron and AD. What worries me is I think the evidence is mounting that the three starters option might be a smarter route for the Lakers to go than the third superstar, although we already know what direction the Lakers will go. They didn’t resist trading the 2027 draft pick midseason because they ever expect to keep the pick. They just want to add it to the 2029 first round pick that they will be able to offer once the season is over. Two post-LeBron and possibly unprotected Lakers first round picks could be very attractive.
While the Lakers have obviously made a big effort to keep their salary cap open for 2023, I’m not sold that clearing cap space for then will continue to be important. The reality of two years lost from LeBron’s championship window should be enough to push the Lakers into a total win-now mode. They want a third superstar for next season and that’s what Russ’ expiring contract and two post-LeBron first round picks and filler can bring. I much prefer going after two non-superstar players like Gary Trent, Jr. or Jerami Grant via trade next summer rather than trying to get them as free agents.
The Lakers have mistakenly tried in the past to create cap space at the cost of not signing players to multi-year contracts. It’s what we’ve been doing since we got LeBron. What the Lakers need are valuable tradeable contracts that can help them create continuity and win basketball games. You can always find takers for those kinds of players if you need to dump salary. I would have no problem taking back Derrick Rose, Alec Burks, Nerlens Noel, and Cam Reddish for Westbrook and a draft pick. The kinds of players we should pursue are guys like Trent, Jr. and Grant. We need youth and we need players under contract for more than just a year. I think that would make the Lakers a better team than adding Damian Lillard.
I also haven’t completely given up on this season although it’s going to take luck more than skill to pull us out of this wormhole we’ve created. The biggest problem is there is no one individual we can count upon to get the Lakers back on track in the face of the daunting decisions they need to make. We’re just another let’s go all-in for another superstar to replace Russell Westbrook style move from crashing and burning as a franchise due to management dysfunction.
Well Tom, as usual we disagree on the value of our trade assets. THT would have to have a whirlwind of a final 25 and be big in the playoffs to get anything big for him in a summer trade. The surging Raptors will not give up a 23 year old 2 way player for THT. Trent Jr fits both as a rebuild piece and a win now piece. PlUs like Trent Jr THT also can opt out in 2023. There will be several teams with assets this summer that will be interested in Grant. Both the Trailblazers and the Pacers will be interested. Sorry but I don’t believe we will be able to trade for either. And then there is Nunn. Would he opt in if he’s going to get traded? Who knows but he is a Klutch client so there will be internal pressure to keep him. Which isn’t a bad thing because his trade value isn’t that high at the moment and he maybe better then anyone we could land. Of course Russ is the big one. While expiring deals can be valuable, one 47 mil contract would be hard to move. Even harder when it’s Russ. Would the Trailblazer trade Dame to the Lakers for Russ if he asked? Considering he is under contract for several more years I don’t believe they would. They have created the space and gathered assets that could be utilized to help build around him. Perhaps the Knicks would consider it but I doubt it would look like your trade package. Rose is Thibs guy, he’s not going anywhere, especially considering that Rose is better then Russ at this point. It would more likely look something like Burks, Walker, Fournier. Only Burks is interesting to me. Maybe Fournier for a shooter off the bench. However both Burks and Walker are expiring contracts and those are better size contracts for trades. To bad we didn’t have better draft capital to attach to them. What I don’t want to see is another high priced aging star, with nothing left to build a supporting cast with.