The 2022-2023 Lakers was the biggest low to high season I’ve experienced as a fan of the Los Angeles Lakers. To start the season, I’m not a fan who lays the blame solely on Russell Westbrook, can ask those close to me, I was weary of the fit before the trade was ever made, but did my best to support it and him as the trade was made. It didn’t work. It was never going to work. LeBron James and Russell Westbrook is the epitome of a bad roster fit that you could possibly make. So the beginning of the season was a real low for me as a fan of the Lakers, there was no joy in watching that team play basketball. The lone shining moment was watching LeBron become the NBA’s All-Time Leading Scorer, but even that game was marred by the fact that they lost it.
Cut to the trade deadline and the team afterward. I’ve made no secret that I like D’Angelo Russell, post Kobe he has been my favorite Laker to watch until this season, so bringing him back into the fold with the team that drafted him and the other trades really turned the team around, there was a joy and cohesiveness I hope the Lakers don’t forget as they head into this off-season, particularly because the team never had a training camp together and was really putting this thing together on the fly.
I think the wheels fell off in the Western Conference Finals because of this. They were playing catch up from the jump of this team being built and I think they gassed and because the Denver Nuggets core has largely been together their entire careers, their chemistry is natural. This is what I want from the Lakers. Cohesion. We keep hitting the reset button every season and it can either work well as it did here, or it can lead to disaster as it did the previous season and a half.
So, addressing the elephant in the room. During his press conference post game last night, LeBron made this comment.
To which I’ve already written my thoughts on:
So that’s that, what I want to focus on now is the six options I see ahead for the Lakers and LeBron and I have written these down in my personal order of preference.
1.) Stay the course.
As I said, this team was being put together on the fly and with no training camp made it to the Western Conference Finals. I do believe they were tired. I think LeBron’s ankle is probably worse than we know and why he is mulling retirement, doesn’t want to extend his career and go through an injury like Kobe Bryant had at the end of his career. So run it back. This is my order of importance of their own free agents:
Austin Reaves
Rui Hachimura
D'Angelo Russell
Dennis Schroder
Troy Brown Jr.
Tristan Thompson
Malik Beasley
Lonnie Walker IV
Scotty Pippen Jr.
AR-15 and Rui are self explanatory. Youth and a lot of skill and promise and drive to become better. And this is what I was referring to, AR has replaced D’Lo as my favorite post-Kobe Laker.
The biggest decision seems to be what to do with D’Lo, obviously I’m on board with re-signing him, but he’s probably the biggest candidate if they wanted to do a sign and trade. I’m on the record, if they don’t keep AR-15 and they go for option 6 here, I’m taking a 1 year sabbatical as a Lakers fan.
I would love for the Lakers to keep Schroder, but wonder if he’ll take a pay cut again considering he played pretty well, I have no doubt he’ll have suitors.
Troy Brown Jr. is still young, though I have a feeling $ wise it’ll come down to a choice between him and Schroder if Schroder wants to stay, I doubt they both take pay cuts.
The rest I think likely to be gone between a mix of can’t afford/will have better opportunities/may not be in the league.
Help from without, IE signing free agents from other teams, well it looks pretty slim pickings to me. Their biggest issue and I think Tristan Thompson (who I wouldn’t mind keeping as an end of the bench cheerleader and the fact that he gave some good minutes in Game 4 against Denver is worth a minimum contract) highlighted this is they really need to put AD back at the 4. They won in the Bubble with him there and pairing him with other bigs. So my targets would be:
Brook Lopez
Nikola Vucevic
Kevin Love
Brook Lopez has already been a Laker, so there’s familiarity here. Don’t know if they can afford him, same with Vucevic, who I imagine would have to be involved in some sort of sign and trade. Love wouldn’t really help the issue as much as it’s primarily a defensive issue.
2.) LeBron retires, they find another star to pair with AD and keep the rest of the team.
So I’m against option 6 here. However, I’m not against this particular person as a basketball player. I think he’s a very useful player so this is the scenario I could see the Lakers getting Kyrie Irving under and I would be accepting of it. LeBron retires, that frees up the Lakers cap space in order to be able to go after Kyrie. Keep the rest of the team. Lineups with D’Lo, Kyrie, AR would be pretty sick as long as AD and Kyrie stay relatively healthy.
3.) LeBron retires, trade AD and build around Rui/AR-15/D’Lo.
I would prefer the previous option to this over this one. AD, can be frustrating as a fan at times, but when he’s on, he’s unstoppable as an offensive player and defensive force, I would hate to see him on another team, but if he doesn’t want the previous option, building around this core group of young guys could make for a pretty fun team.
4.) Complete blow up and rebuild.
I guess the only scenario where I see this as possible is if they believe in this guy, Max Christie, so much that they see a 20+ year career with him developing into a Kobe type player. You know, I think he showed some decent flashes, but is probably a couple years away from being a real contributor. And I just don’t think that this is what the Lakers do, much to my chagrin. I’d like to see a built from the bottom up Lakers team and we were close to it, but other Lakers fans just aren’t patient enough for this.
5.) Trade LeBron and AD.
I don’t see the reason why they would do this? They just made it to the Western Conference Finals doing an on the fly rebuild. But I mean, crazier things have happened. I guess maybe the why didn’t AD cheer for LeBron when he became the All-Time Leading Scorer theory would come into play here. Maybe they have a Shaq and Kobe like relationship at this point? Who knows. Seems real unlikely.
6.) LeBron stays. Wants Kyrie.
This one is already floating around the ol’ interwebs. It’s likely. It’s the scenario I’m most worried about. I think it would work better than LeBron/AD/Westbrook did, but these three guys haven’t had the best of health lately so my biggest worry is when the three of them would be off the court and of course, if Kyrie gets his bag, who knows what will come out of his mouth and just having the repercussions affecting my team is just 🤮
That’s not to take away from Kyrie as a player. He’s really, really good. But the scenario this only happens if the Lakers renounce everyone but LeBron and AD and then you’re once again building a roster around these guys with minimum contract players. Anyone tells you elsewise is just trying to do clickbait. Which is fine if these guys are healthy and available, but because of the stated reasons, would they be?
I hope Rob Pelinka and the Lakers have learned their lesson from the Westbrook era. But has LeBron? If the threatening to retire is a chess move LeBron is making to enact this scenario, I hope the Lakers call his bluff.
So that’s the options I see. Who knows, something entirely different could happen. Already off to a real interesting off season with LeBron’s comments and as we all know, as great as the NBA Season/Playoffs are, the NBA off season is the best thing in professional sports going on. Oh, quick mention I guess because I could see a scenario where option 1 happens and they get a bought out Chris Paul. I suppose also a scenario they sign and trade D’Lo for Trae Young, though I’m not sure why the Hawks do that. A Young for AR-15 scenario I’d turn down. Who knows though? Should be fun!
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