2026-27 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

Latest from Fischer

RFA updates on Eason and Watson

If the center market wasn't tight enough, a new team has joined the hunt

Why are the Bucks playing hard to get?

Because Dolan is loony regarding spending following a championship, he's considering Looney as a replacement big

Woike on the center search



Buha and Price had a good discussion about the center market as well

 

We can’t talk about guys who are under contract. Missi New Orleans is not going to trade him.


Gafford under contract and Masai is going to want two number 1 picks that’s the hold up.

Kessler Ainge wants a house tickets to the Oscars Inn and Out and 5 picks and Luka and Reaves not a realistic trade Partner.

Last season yall wanted Clint Capela for lob threat how that work out?



Realistic Scenarios Mitchell Robinson/proof of concept he stopped Wemby the most dominant force in the league.

bring back Jaxson Hayes


Bring back Ayton and we are fine.

I heard Lebron is flirting with Miami and he has other suitors

I can tell you the suitors Golden State Warriors and L.A. Clippers. The Clipper thing is real.

but I still thinks he comes back. We gotta get the Center done. I think Mitchell Robinson gets done Monday.

I’m really excited about Cam Carr 46 blocks that’s OG s***. Prototypical 3-D. Great job Rob. I heard the kid. What a great kid. He really sounds like he has his head on straight.

 

Buha's bargain target list


I'll update it with the twitter link to the pod when he gets the full pod uploaded

 

Stop it. He played 13 mins a game in the finals. Who checked Wemby the other 30 mins he was on the floor? No one stopped Wemby, the Spurs guards just couldn't get it done, Wemby was 26/11/3/4/1.

The truth is, Robinson isn't a starting center, he averages less than 50 a games a career for his career at 23 mins. He can't stay healthy and he is a 40% FT shooter.

If all we get is Mitch Robinson, it's not a good offseason for our Center spot.

 

I'm interested in the top 6 wings - especially Thybulle and Spencer Jones - and all of the guards - especially Shamet and Ellis. I don't know if any of the bigs are super exciting, we'd need to trade for someone, otherwise Mamu and Kenrich?

 

was speaking he could be a bench option with Ayton as the starter and Hayes off the bench.

 

Kenrich isn’t bad.

 

I could see Precious Achua as an option. He’s a rover type. Kenruuich Willian’s. Williams. He’s intriguing. I think it comes down to Robinson. He fits the profile. He’s a lob. I get the free throw thing. But yall act like Daniel Gafford is Stephen Curry.

Ayton makes free throws. We gotta get Luka some type of Lob this isn’t A list but it’s something.

I like Pj Washington maybe we can see if he’s available for one of the 1st round picks.

if yall keep talking crazy you gonna f*** around and force Rob to trade Vando for Embiid. Oh I’m here for it Embiid Luka and Reaves. Well we gotta your lob threat.

 

If Smart gets poached, then just LOL.

 

Why sign Robinson when you have Ayton

 

That's fair given Robinson's health issues.

Good luck, Rob. Was listening to a little of Trevor, Pete, and Jovan yesterday; Pete mentioned having "high expectations" and having pitchforks if this team isn't ready to be in the mix for a championship after 3 straight offseasons of touting the summer of 2026. I think that's going to be a lot of the fanbase.

On another note, Rob doesn't have to get everything done "this summer"; he does have 1 more transaction cycle: the trade deadline. Essentially, he has two transaction cycles. But if he fails these two cycles, he's f***** more than likely.

 

I’m getting Klay Thompson vibes with Cam Carr. Relative same height. Not that great of a handle. Carr way more athleticism. And an exceptional shooter.

 

I’d rather give Rob Williams something near the MLE than Robinson. I like Willliams’ skillset better for us.

 

NY dont even want Robinson and they won the title

 

i still think portland will go over the mle to keep williams. we'll find out soon.

gotta admit i'm getting nervous about the fact that we weren't in on claxton. it didn't take much, and we're leaking that we have bigger plans, but every dispatch from every corner says those plans are basically being actively foiled at every turn.

 

I hope that if we get Robinson is for a bench role on top of Duren/Kessler.

I'm really thinking we are going all in on one of those 2 centers. Every contender has a big paid big bucks. We need one. It's also in Lakers history to have good centers. Each is an overpay but I think we are maxing one of those guys

 

Maybe this is a good segue into your question from the Carr thread - why am I already acting like free agency is over.

Take the bigs for example: the ones that were available, 2nd tier and in our price range have all been traded and or resigned, that effectively takes Ware, Claxton, Reid, Hartenstein, Stewart off the table.

We’re effectively left with two RFA’s that we have no control over because their team can just match and two backups that don’t play more than 24 mins a game and 50 games per season. Neither are good news for us.

When you explore each option deeper:

- Detroit cleared space to resign Duren up to the max because they can’t afford to lose him for nothing.

- Jazz offered 5 years 150m. The most we can offer is 4 years ~175m, which won’t be enough to steal him. But almost anyone plugged in to the offseason doesn’t suggest we offer more than 35m per because of what it does to the rest of our team building. There’s also the fact that Kessler came out this week and said he wants to be in Utah

That leaves Robert Williams and Mitch Robinson that have interest from multiple teams including Portland, Nets, Atlanta, Chicago or Spurs.

But even if we get one of those two guys, they’re just a backup quality center. We don’t have the starter.

Like abeer said, Claxton was there for the taking and he got moved to Chicago for cap space while we were figuring out if we could steal Duren or Kessler.

 

When you look at the wing options, New Orleans wants more than we have for their guys. Watson and Eason are RFA’s and unless you shoot yourself in the foot to overpay, you’re most likely looking at the reduced to sell section of the market.

Guys like Grimes, Ellis, Shamet, Jones, Thybulle etc. they’re not bad by any means - but they don’t make us contenders outright. We could maybe add two of the bargain wings and one of the backup bigs to the rest of our squad from last year and go on a tear.

So that’s why I’ve been saying we’re going to bring everyone back. Although I’m still hopeful we can help one of Denver, OKC or Magic to dump salary and get something good out of it - Caruso & Sorber is probabaly my favorite outcome. But I would take any of Denver’s guys right now too.

 

I dont see why Lakers dont just sign Durden to a contract. If Detroit match they match then move on to the next.