I would trade Kuz, the 22nd pick, S&T Drummond or Harell for Barnes in a heartbeat. Barnes is not 3rd star but he's a big upgrade from Morris and Kuzma as the Lakers finally fix the stretch 4 problem they've had: a guy can hit the open 3, finish at the rim, and also be switchable on defense. A finishing lineup of AD, Barnes, Lebron, Schroeder, and KCP would be very tough to score or defend against. He's a perfect non star add on for the Lakers particularly since he seems to have been able to overcome peeing on himself in the Finals against the Cavs. Barnes advanced metric show a guy who was neutral on defense but a big upgrade on offense - just the type of guy the Lakers need. No way I would move KCP as I consider him and Caruso absolutely vital for the Lakers defense/offense despite their inconsistency. I mean everyone seems to forget that he got hurt against the Suns and he was playing great defense even when not scoring
i'm a barnes fan, it's just tough to match salaries/value. maybe if a third team got involved? still, we're not sending out enough to bring folks back. we'd have to essentially s&t some minimums and spread them across multiple teams (no biggie), but that's the kind of thing that annoys the league office. i suppose we could try to S&T schroder for two smaller pieces, one of whom would be aggregated with kuz to get barnes. could work. schroder for re-signed derrick rose/joakim noah then noah and kuz for barnes.
Noah retired this year. Edit: Seems like he is going to retire a Bull but either way he won’t want to participate in a trade but I’m sure we can find someone else. https://www.slamonline.com/nba/13-year-nba-veteran-joakim-noah-officially-announces-retirement/#:~:text=Per The Athletic's Shams Charania,retirement since at least December.
joakim noah? hes been retired few yrs now or are you referring to trading for his contract thats still on nyk books?
Hehehehehe, a 22-year old wing who averages something like 23/5/6? And shoots over 40% for 3? Yeah, I would too.
yes. this is true. he was a good find in the second round, and they wisely locked him into a low-dollar contract for a few years. i think people are overreacting to a very anomalous game (it's his leon powe game, imo), but he is a better basketball player than kuzma. yeah, i misread their cap sheet. i don't think his salary is moveable (like deng's).
These are the kids I like: they work hard on both ends, they're always consistent in their effort, etc. Kuzma has worked on a lot of these things; he's improved. Mann just pops out more to my eye test in these PO's to me even before this big game.
he didn't pop out to me before, honestly. but i looked up his stats from the regular season, and he looked good there. he sure made utah pay for disrespecting him. boy howdy. and yes, i wish any of our role players did that this year. without AD, it probably didn't matter anyway, but it would have been nice.
Kuzma doesn't step up when the team needs him to. AD being out was the perfect opportunity for him to take shots and be more assertive. He looked lost out there. Yeah, he's improved but they are slight improvements... He's been in the league for four years. I'd be more surprised if he didn't show any improvements. They just don't come to fruition when the Lakers need it.
If he plays his cards right, he might get a statue next to Marbury. Or does he have to eat Vaseline first?
As productive as some of our other kids have been after we let them go, they have been duds when the chips were on the line. JC stunk in the 2nd half last night vs LAC, Randle % was in the toilet in the playoffs, D'Lo is just lost, Lonzo can't handle the bright lights, BI might be the best of the group but he's too timid. All of these guys we let go are supporting cast/role player types, not the ones who become cornerstones to lead you to playoff success. Might as well use Kuz correctly in his role while we still have him.
