This time of year always cracks me up. BS online rumors whip folks into a typing frenzy. “Insiders” claiming this and that star are all disgruntled with this or that front office. So much sound and fury…signifying nothing.
If you’re a big fan of the “Throw Pasta at the Wall and See What Sticks!!!” game then, my friend, this is the time of the NBA year for you! Big fan of unsubstantiated BS? Welcome to the last 2 weeks before the NBA trad deadline! Like to follow fellow bloggers posing as journalists? You, too, can report on potential NBA trades that have to no actual chance of going down.
Some enjoy this time of year, getting as worked up as the other “news” outlets in their “Could the Lakers REALLY trade for the Eastern Conference ALL Star team?!?!?!” level of mania. Me? I find it exhausting and boring. It doesn’t take much to pick apart most of these ludicrous deals floating around.
LBJ and AD are…(gasp)…DISGRUNTLED!!!!! Even if true, what of it? AD is under contract until close to the next decade and we all honestly would just prefer LeBron retire. Neither is Jimmy Butler Nuclear Disgruntled and neither is doing anything on the court to show just how truly disgruntled they are. I’m disgruntled, you’re not human if you’re blithely happy about everything. They’re fine.
“The Lakers could get _______ number of these players for ______ and ____ # of draft picks!” In theory, sure. Anything is technically possible but let’s look at some facts:
-Only one team has a decent amount of cap space to help facilitate capped teams in a trade and that is Detroit. Detroit who has a team very much on the rise and is just as leery of tying their finances up with bad contracts as any other team. With a little over $14 mil in cap space Detroit holds every single card as to how that space will get used up. If it even does. They’re 6th in the east and beating good teams. They have multiple picks in both rounds for the foreseeable future. They don’t need to do anyone any favors or disrupt their team with a bad contract/player. You’ll have to pony up more picks for that privilege.
https://www.spotrac.com/nba/cap/_/year/2024/sort/cap_maximum_space
-https://basketball.realgm.com/nba/draft/future_drafts/team
-The Lakers picks five years out are SUPER valuable. Maybe. Only if we don’t restock with a superstar between now and when they convey. But if there’s one team GMs are wary of trusting to be bad for a long time it is definitely the Lakers. You can believe all the dysfunction smoke you want, if we’re paying top dollar there are few better places to play. Especially if you’re an aging superstar looking for one more big run. The Baby Laker Run post-Kobe was a self-inflicted debacle, mainly because of some of the worst free agent signings of all time. Even Rob has shown better stone as a GM than Jimbo did in getting out of his worst messes quickly and efficiently (see: Westbrook, Russell).
-Look at the player in the trade rumor and do the following exercise: are they even playing, are they on an expiring contract, are they recovering from a serious injury, and have they ever been a part of a winning culture, ever? If the answers are: no, yes, yes, and no a trade is not imminent. Why? Because the lakers are in win now mode, not hope for the best mode. Some people equate a win now philosophy to a “manic trade activity” stance. I do not. Win now means building something that can actually, ya know, win…now. Swap Rui for what amounts to a backup center and sure you’ve gotten bigger but have you gotten better. I mean in reality not in “trades fix everything!” land. The answer is usually murky at best. If the player was/is hurt and has a minutes restriction/can’t play in back-to-backs/only recently came back from serious injury issue they’re more than likely off the table for us.
I could go on, really I could. Suffice to say the only move I see happening is us trading Christian Wood to Detroit for a 2nd rounder and even that better get locked up quick. otherwise Detroit will simply watch Miami circling the drain with Jimmy Buckets and wait for Miami to come-a-calling. Which is smart.
We can’t afford to overpay. We can’t afford to swing and miss. This situation is the result of prior trade mismanagement. Them’s my two-bits on all this hoopla.