@abeer3 if Lonzo was on the Lakers he'd have a reduced role + stats going into free agency next year. I'm sure we could manipulate his value as our RFA. If not, we could trade him for assets. Either way it's a better problem to have than Kuzma who's absolute trash.
Aren't you silly? That was S. Meat's wet dream for the Lakers rather than having AD here now likely for the next most of a decade and not having to deal with it ...... or crazy old man Ball.
Very surprised with how well he's playing so far in 2020. Looks like he's put his early season struggles behind him.
^I agree. Lonzo is contributing and he is doing it rather consistently. His 3 ball is falling at a 38% rate which is another plus. It seems like he might finally come into his own... its funny though...all the Laker "busts" might turn into all-stars at some point lol (Russell, Ingram, Ball). With that said, I'm happy Lonzo is gone. He will probably still get hurt and his dad is still a pain in the azz. Also his 56% FT shooting to me is not acceptable, no matter what else you can do. As a PG that is unheard of.
It helps that Lonzo has not had a significant injury this season. We saw promising stretches of play by him only to get derailed. I'm happy for him that he's doing well in NOLA and as trodgers said, the bright lights and pressure of LA overwhelmed him like D'lo.
the bottom line for us is that we are now firmly in the mix for winning a ring this year. Without that trade, we are NOT in this position and would have little hope of being in this position for the next 5 years, at the least. Frankly, I think ALL our youth that was traded, were solid NBA players. The narrative is NOT that those kids sucked and we had to get rid of them. The narrative is that they were so good that we were able to trade them for one of the top 5 players in the game and put together a solid roster, ALL in a single year!!! Come on everyone, these kinds of team building typically take a minimum of 2-3 years to achieve. While, we can say it took us 2 years already, we had no real chance to work on anything of significance last year when we first got Lebron. Last year was just a one shot deal for us, he knew it was a stop gap year and he would be competing for very little that year. Everything was about if we could land Davis this year and they had plans within plans. We may, or may not, win it all. We are in the mix and any other team who doubts us, doubts us at their own peril. I frigging love this team, I love their mentality, I love their respect of the opposition. They don't play ANY BS games with anyone. When other players try to disrespect us, or play us, we beat them down. Plain and simple, we do it while showing respect. It rubs their faces in their own BS. (See Beverly). Personally, I'm feeling it for the first time in a decade!
When you watch Zo play and run the offense you can just see it, he has it the times he was able to shine. He knows how to run the team with him being the 1st option. I think the seniority of BI, Randle had something to do with it. It really didnt make sense for Zo to bring up half court just to stop to ball and pass it to randle/BI. They had to run with it every single time down the floor and take what the defense gives them. Then lebron came which just hindered his ability to take over and get minutes. Well, given that everyone knew it wasn't rebuild anymore and win now as soon as lebron game. In a perfect world we would of kept Zo. Kuzma, was a favorite of mine but hes looking pretty expendable at this point. He's just chucking like JC after he got recognition instead of making smart plays.
Lonzo signed with Klutch https://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/259569/Lonzo-Ball-Signs-With-Rich-Paul-Of-Klutch-Sports
It should never, ever have any impact on such decisions, but the attachment of the father that lavar is makes me cringe at the very idea. And I like Zo.
could make it even less likely, as the only we lonzo comes back here would be as an MLE player, and Klutch don't play dat.
God, I hope not. Klutch clients I'd rather have (contract terms aside) : Bledsoe Clarkson Anthony Edwards Darius Garland Draymond Green Dejounte Murray Nurkic Mitchell Robinson Ben Simmons John Wall
As enticing as Lonzo's talent is, that ship has sailed at this point. Lonzo is going to be looking for $15 million to $25 million or whatever the max is these days a year. We're not going to pay him that, it doesn't make sense for us to.
yeah, ball has a GREAT feel for the game on both sides. but he's an average ballhandler, he's too light/weak to be an elite one-on-one defender (he's a great team defender), and his shot is still broke despite improvement. he's barely improved in three years and will soon be up for big cash. glad i'm not making that choice.
