Frank Vogel said Rajon Rondo is going to be flying back to Florida tomorrow. He’ll be outside the bubble for a period of time before joining the team in the bubble.
— Tania Ganguli (@taniaganguli) August 4, 2020
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Frank Vogel says “Plan right now is to play LeBron & AD” so we can improve.
Lakers are discussing how/when to rest, LeBron, AD, etc., but Frank Vogel says "the plan right now is to play those guys. We still have a lot of areas to continue to improve."
— Lakers Nation (@LakersNation) August 4, 2020
Vogel challenging starting unit to “play with more offensive pace.”
Frank Vogel said he's been challenging the starting unit to "play with more offensive pace."
— Lakers Nation (@LakersNation) August 4, 2020
Vogel acknowledged starting lineup’s struggles thus far in the bubble
Vogel acknowledged the starting lineup’s struggles thus far in the bubble in terms of plus/minus, said it’s been due in large part to not hitting shots. He thinks they could play at a quicker pace, and that it will come along.
— Mike Trudell (@LakersReporter) August 4, 2020
5 Things: Lakers Top Jazz and Clinch Top Seed in Western Conference
Aloha, Michael,
Thanks for commenting. You’re right what we are going to do to improve our roster to try and repeat this season will depend entirely on whether Pelinka continues the plan to maximize cap space to chase a third superstar in the offseason after next season.
Personally, I would prefer that we went all in to win now as we need to get better if we want to win the championship next season because none of our competitors are going to stand pat. I also don’t want to get into the same situation we did last season where waiting for Kawhi cost us opportunities to become an even better team. Finally, having valuable players on good contracts could put us in a better position to land a player like Giannis than just having cap space. We saw sign-and-trades become the preferred transactions among many teams last offseason.
One factor I think strongly favors the Lakers protecting their cap space after next season is the reality that the third superstar plan doesn’t work unless LeBron James is willing to take less than a max contract, which kind of indicates LeBron must be amenable to doing that in the right situation, like Giannis deciding to join the Lakers. I don’t see Pelinka protecting that cap space without at least a token understanding LeBron would be amenable.
Bottom line, while I think Pelinka and the Lakers will still be shooting for the superstar after next season, I also think winning the championship has made taking advantage of the opportunity to repeat more important. Lakers have shown they have the best team in the league right now and it would be foolish not to be in a win now mode to repeat, especially knowing everybody else is going to be loading up to try to dethrone us. We also know some things we didn’t last offseason, including that LeBron is still the King and AD is now the second-best player on the planet.
The result is more of a win now attitude and hopefully an approach that recognizes cap space alone is not the answer. Our overreliance on cap space has at times limited what we were able to do with respect to trades and sign-and-trades. If we can get a player like Oladipo or Turner now, we’re not going to hesitate. If we have to pay to keep Rondo, Morris, KCP, and Howard, we’re not going to hesitate. We’ll still try to keep contracts as flexible as possible but won’t let cap space alone undermine improving the roster to win it again next season.