There’s so much controversy surrounding Russ at this point that it’s hard to imagine him playing anywhere next season, which is a shame because the guy is such an amazing athlete and if he could learn to dial it down and under control could still be a valuable part of a team. Unfortunately, he probably cannot do that for a championship caliber team. For a team looking to tank and wanting to have some reason to attract fans, Russ could work.

I put the blame on Jeanie rather than LeBron. Both know LeBron is going to sign the extension if they trade for Kyrie and won’t if they don’t. That makes Jeanie’s decision simple. Trade for Kyrie or get stuck with Russ. There is no parallel universe where you don’t take the risk. You’ve already cost us the MLE. Stop the baby crying. Do what is needed for Lakers to win. Don’t Ef up the Kyrie trade.

First, you know very well the Lakers can’t make wild or emotional decisions regarding superstars. This is just another rumor that probably matches what most pundits think is going on. There’s a battle between the Lakers and Klutch over the team direction.

Everybody knows LeBron wants the Kyrie trade. They also know Jeanie doesn’t want to commit to multiple years or increases in salary cap. In a way, In fact, if we’re going to start conspiracy theories, The Lakers have done such a great job convincing everybody that they’re difficult rather than desperate. It’s the best job I’ve seen them done this decade.

Of course, there’s a point where talking tough won’t work and the Lakers do desperately need the Russ/Kyrie trade and the last thing they need to do is make a mistake like declining to make the trade due to giving up a draft pick 5 or 7 years away. You have a chance to dump Russ for Kyrie and resurrect the Lakers chances for #18 this season.

Jeanie should sell the Lakers if they somehow screw up the gift from the basketball gods that this trade is. This is not a competition between your will and LeBron’s. It’s a chance to take advantage of a miraculous break that fell into your hands despite your gross mismangement of the team. It’s a slam dunk. Don’t blow it, Jeanie.

I’ve posed this question multiple times. 20-30 guys getting all the money and perks, while the remaining 420-30 get the shaft. The only thing I come back to is that if max salaries were limited to something tenable, and the rank and file able to get more for themselves, then the stars would all pack their bags and join up in desirable markets. AKA – it’s anti-Lakers policy. Plain and simple. They’d rather be forced to overpay to keep their guys than to see max deals amount to say only 20-25% of the cap so the top tier guys can all join up in big, cosmopolitan cities.

I think one thing to temper this down is to limit the teams to one of each max slot. Only the team you signed your first NBA deal with can give you at 30% max deal. Then you have one 25% slot, one 20% slot, and 3 15% slots. They can’t outpace the cap growth, so raises may not be the full 7-12% if the cap doesn’t grow accordingly. Let’s see guys flee small markets or demand trades if they can’t keep their bloated salaries in the process, am I right?

It’s almost as if these things weren’t collectively bargained and voted in by both sides. Maybe Lebron rigged the election….Stop The Steal!!!!!

I think that there are enough mechanisms in place that allow all teams to compete. We’re seeing the largest market team choosing not to spend, we just saw Memphis blast past the cap to keep most of that core together. The Warriors function as if money didn’t matter and to the owner it probably doesn’t. The real issue I have is players not coming close to honoring contracts. Dame Time asks out next summer and the Blazers will be forced to move him for a lesser return, exactly what we’re seeing Brooklyn deal with for the last year. Stars almready are choosing to leave any market they’re in, the contract isn’t much better than the single ply apocalypse TP folks stockpiled.

Whie we probably only signed Walker because of Klutch telling him to take the one year offer to showcase him, I do think he has potential. I’m very interested to see how all of the new players look like in Ham’s offense and defense.

Looking forward to the changes and seeing the Bucks more modern offense with better spacing for LeBron, AD, and young studs like Lonnie who have the atheticism to take advantage of wide open lanes to the rim.

Still need the elite shooting from Kyrie and Joe or Seth to put it all together but it’s a game plan that I think has a good chance to succeed and elevate the Lakers back into legitimate contention.

I can’t wait for camp. Be interesting to see who is still here and who isn’t. Once that’s settled we’ll be a few weeks away from camp and preseason. Then comes the part of the season where I ignore all the “preseason is meaningless” clickbait and try to discern the patterns and trends that’ll indicate how we’ll do, given good health.

The issue with Harris is partly luxury taxes. The Lakers paid $45M, 5th most, and Nets $98M, 2nd most. Neither team wants to increase payroll as a result of the trade. In fact, both would like to reduce salary. Harris makes $18.6 per year while Curry only makes $8.4M. That’s a $10M difference. Eventual trade will likely be a close match with neither team adding salary.

The other issue with Harris is the second year. Unless LeBron verbally agrees to sign extension, the Lakers will not take back contracts that go beyond how far LeBron has committed, which right now is just next season. That’s why we got stuck with Lonnie Walker IV. He’s all we could get offering just 1 year. Now we’re saying we won’t take Harris because of the second year.

Then there’s the draft picks. We’ll give up one I think but need the second one to move THT and Nunn. Solution then is to expand trade to include THT and Nunn but in the end, the Nets don’t have enough 1-year deals other than Curry to make this trade work. So Lakers will have to take back multi-year contracts.

At some point, LeBron has to realize that he needs to commit so that Rob can close the deal. Or demand a trade. Can’t sit on the effing fence like he is doing right now without risking wasting this valuable one of the few remaining years in his championship window.

Great points, Michael. The league need to evolve by increasing the number of two-way players on route to allowing the team to control all the players on their G-League team.

I can’t remember the last time I enjoy watching the Laker’s summer league play. Probably that year Kuzma and the boys went on a rampage and played like men among boys. This Lakers’ summer league squad is loaded. The front office has some very difficult decisions to make. No doubt. Also, just like I suggested during the pandemic hardships last season, Jay Huff should be given a roster spot. McClung? He is that good. I mean, I could go on and on. This Lakers squad is very impressive. They play defense and can shoot too.

“These teams can find hidden gems and develop them, and then watch other teams pick them off.”

That is exactly what I never understood. That needs to change for the sake of fairness and make retention of your own players a reward.

I think a couple of things affect the G-League to NBA pathway. #1 it’s still a relatively new development kn terms of the CBA, it’ll take time for there to be an easier and quicker pipeline between the two. #2 not every team has a G league team, its not mandatory and thats why the league created the non affiliated G-league team (The Ignite, I believe…).I think they will soon, potentially in the next CBA. #3 Coaches may not be all that excited throwing a guy out there who hasnt practiced with the team, been a part of film sessions or knows the habits and tendencies of the other players on the team. Lastly, and this is a pessimistic way of looking atvghjngs,nobody wants to see some two-way guy take out a well paid superstar and make them miss time. It gets bad enough when a vet minimum or some such player does. Having said that I think they will look to add more mechanisms for more two way guys to get PT.

If we do agree to trade future picks they should go out with protection, in case we are really bad by then.

None of the guys who took the TPLMLE were really worth a squat, and LW was yet another bone thrown into the, according to Tom, oh-so-beneficial Klutch alliance. At least this way the Klutch bums all expire with their self-serving egomaniac boss. Other than AD, who should be tradeable still, barring a truly catastrophic injury.

It’s disturbing to no end to hear things like this, MIchael. Lakers desperately need this trade and will be set back by 1 or 2 years if this trade does not go through. Refusing to take Harris because of a second year on his contract? I view the second year as an advantage because we could have him locked for two years.

While it’s not a guarantee the Lakers will be winners because of Kyries’ baggage, there is no way the Lakers don’t do this deal because they want Curry or won’t make picks unprotected. Do what you have to, Rob, but don’t come home empty handed. If you do, you should lose your job. And Jeanie Buss better be ready to pay luxury taxes to keep Kyrie if he cleans his act up. You’re in the big leagues now, Jeanie. Don’t fuck up.

The articles leading up to the draft/free agency are 90% bullsh!t. Guys like Woj & Shams don’t have any real “inside” info…they’re just parroting what they’ve been spoon-fed by the agents & GM’s and the bloggers take it & run with it. None of these “journalists” are actually in the room.

As for the hardball question…you can play hardball all you want but these players & agents all talk to each other and that stance can bite you in the azz down the road when you’re trying to get free agents to your franchise. That’s one of the main reasons the superstars usually get their way in these things and the teams rarely get equal value in return. Like one analyst said yesterday…in the NBA, 4 quarters don’t necessarily equal a dollar.

I don’t parrot that stuff, it’s mainly from when we traded Shaq and ended up with not Dwayne Wade. Also from the failed Kobe trade demand. You have to look at why a team not named The Los Angeles Lakers would make a trade. The problem with the whole period between being booted from contention and the opening of free agency is anyone with a job as sports writer needs to fill content. They can’t just take a few weeks. Since the league cracks down on teams and players for prediscussing anything at all they frame it all as semi or actual fact and then fans repeat it as being even more of a certainty. This is why a lot of Laker fans get worked up when they would be better off just being objective.

Aloha, Michael,

I still see Kyrie logically ending up on the Lakers and Russ leaving. Sometimes, you just have to believe something good is going to happen instead of always expecting the worst. Of course, it’s hard not to have those feelings considering the hole the Lakers have dug for themselves.

Odds are heavily in favor of the Lakers ending up with Kyrie. Doesn’t mean something could spoil the ending or that Kyrie won’t be a huge disappointment due to his weird personality and behavior.

Just means thay the Lakers are favorites to get Kyrie and he is a superior player and fit than Russell Westbrook. That’s why I think it’s silly to continue to post negative expectations when things are looking up.

Michael, I think you have helped temper my expectations of Kyrie coming to the Lakers a little bit. I was getting so overconfident about the possibility that I fail to err on the side of caution. I had to recalibrate the way I was looking at the whole situation after reading your post. It is full of cautionary points, and they all made sense. Thanks for the post.

Exactly. They just endured an entire season of basically not having Kyrie until 2/3’s of the way through. Granted they had a motivated KD and James Harden. They have almost none of their draft picks, same as us. Every good player just re-upped with their current team or did that last summer. They already have a $37 million dollar deal expiring next summer in Kyrie, they don’t need to lose another quality player just to pick up Russell for even more expiring money. They will want draft picks and not ones 4-5 years out but next summer. If you watch the draft special from Lakers Fastbreak Tom was really trying to speak into existence and I applaud him for his dedication to the sunny side of the street but the reality is the Nets will probably work from a strategic place like Michael indicated.

Joe Tsai is done with all this stuff and Kyrie & KD won’t play another game in a Nets uniform. And he’ll be the proud owner of a 40 win franchise for a coupla years. The fact of the matter is that once a superstar player decides he wants to be traded, he gets traded (regardless of how many years left on his contract) and it’s almost always to one of his preferred destinations. The nature of basketball is that when one of your top players is unhappy it has an outsized effect on the entire organization. That’s why the Nets won’t keep them and they won’t end up someplace they don’t wanna be. But I wouldn’t be surprised to see KD expand his list of preferred destinations.

Three things that caught my attention.

First, almost every player the Lakers were supposedly targeting ended up getting paid more than the Lakers could pay with just the MLE. Waiting to confirm this but that’s the sense I got. Lakers would have needed somebody to take less and they didn’t.

Second, was Klutch Sports the backup? Who was helping whom is always the question. Hopefully a win-win. I value the Klutch/Lakers alliance and hope we continue to take advantage of it so I’m happy to see

Third, I agree with you that we really got a lot younger, taller, and longer with the players we added. The guys we got we’re probably guys Darvin thought could be plus defenders and competitors. Now we will need to develop them but that’s supposedly our staff’s strength.

But we need the shooting, scoring, and playmaking Kyrie and another shooter could bring us. It’s a gift from the basketball gods if it happens and the perfect solution for the Lakers. If it works, it could be multiple championships for Lakers and each of their three stars.

Kyrie and I think a rebounding LeBron and AD will transform the Lakers superstar long range shooting game. Frankly, we could even win with Reaves at the 2 and Jones at the 5 for defense. Suddenly, the Lakers Big Three fit problems are solved.

We did what we could with what we had to work with.

Hardest job in pro sport is NBA general manager followed by coach. I feel like the players are over-empowered at this point, makes it impossible to actually build anything sustainable. Also why ratings are dipping every season. Nobody really cares about entitled whiners playing a little game.

The Pacers hold a team option for Neismith this year and Theis next year. So they can cut them for very little if they choose too. That’s how it’s done.