D'Angelo Russell Discussion: Adopting A Professional Attitude

I wanted us to draft Russell pretty bad and I love his talent. You can't have your best player not buying into the culture. Very gutsy move that shows lots of confidence.

 

I'm sure Kobe was asked for his opinion as well as to whether DAR had any of "the right stuff".

 

or ball

 

I just got home and here are additional thoughts on the situation and future possible situations that I want to add to my previous post. This may be long but be patient.

1. Luke Walton- I hope he is our coach since he is one of the architects that helped build and coached one of the greatest teams in history. With Pelinka and Magic, we don't know what they are thinking and in my opinion overreacted by trading one of our so-called 'core'. Lets say we draft Ball...in the next few years what better guy to have coach a team that can possibly beat the Warriors....Ball, Dlo, Randle, Ingram and Zuba/Lopez/whoever. At least with this core there is a chance that they can come together and become the next Warriors. When I say the next Warriors I mean ball movement, small ball, 3 ball, get in transition and play good defense. There is a possibility since Luke is the coach. This is the modern NBA and the Warriors are the benchmark. Now that Russ is traded the idea of this 'core' coming to existence is over.

2. We traded a core player in HOPES/TRY to land big free agents. I get it...who would want to turn down PG and Lebron but at the same time....it's been proven that Lebron cannot beat a Durant Warriors team. Heck, he got torched by Durant and will continue to get torched 4 games a year if he comes to the Lakers. He's not proven against this current Warriors team. He will not help us. Also, Lebron has a tendency to get coaches fired. He has also been the GM of past teams and proved to be a failure. Adding George to the team? I also don't think a combination of Lebron and George + another 'star' can beat them either. Did you guys watch George's choke job this last playoffs? He threw his teammates under the bus and complained about not getting the last shot. No thanks to both these guys. Maybe one of them and I would only take George.

So let me ask again....was this trade really worth it besides getting rid of Mozgov? We didn't get any value in return. We lost the potential of becoming Warriors 2.0 with Luke as the coach in HOPES of landing Lebron and George.

I take my chances on our young core turning out to be the next great team, we're sort of heading that way with the players we have then some fantasy of landing George and Lebron. Let say we land these guys...they have already proved that they can't beat that team that plays in our division.

 

Thought I'd leave this here:

 

I think there's way too much overthinking. We didn't trade Russell in hopes of landing a FA, or simply to dump Mozgov's salary.

We traded Russell because 1) we didn't like him and 2) we no longer wanted him on our team. Simple as that.

 

And D'lo rebounded better.

 

Also, a 22 million expiring K IS AN ASSET. Either expiring or in a trade.

That alone could net some interesting pieces if in fact Zubac is ready. He probably needs to only play 15-20 min max this year, so a platoon is ideal. This creates some pretty cool options. Solid move.

 

Let's hope the George and 2018 plan will work out , if not this trade will end up being a complete disaster .

I never was going to be a fan of the Ball/DLO backcourt defensively speaking but I do believe we gave up on Dlo too fast ...

 

We can at least try--Jeanie Buss

 

But I don't want you to think I'm totally happy. He was our most gifable player for a number of reasons good and bad

Lots of work will now be archived

Bring on the new characters!

 

I really want an All Star this year guys. Pleaze!!!! We're hosting the ASG at Stsples. ---Jeanie

 

I'll be sad, let me tweet some dogs in Laker unis---Jeanie

 

I'm a little surprised at the return from Russell, as it would seem like a higher pick, like Mavs at 9 or Pistons at 12, would have been a better, but time will tell. Brook Lopez is a good player, so that shouldn't be overlooked. Always possible to flip him at the deadline or keep him around long-term. The tough part for me is that this puts Magic/Pelinka in a difficult position. They made a move now to free up cap space next summer instead of waiting until the deadline to see what they can get, and the third year is usually when guards really take off. If DLO comes out on fire for Brooklyn it's going to look bad dealing him for a less-than-ideal return.

Additionally, they kinda have to pull off a Paul George trade now. Frankly, I thought they must have had something already lined up and ready to go when they made this move, which is what they needed the extra pick for. IND was rumored to be asking for 2 firsts and a young player, and 27/28 & Clarkson would satisfy that. I'm sure IND wants better picks, but again, it probably would have been better to have the PG deal done and ready to go before making this trade.

Plus, the cap space acquired by Mozgov's departure has to be used on a difference maker. Has to. If Magic & Pelinka come up short in free agency then this deal was a big miss.

I do wonder whether Jimmy Butler telling the Cavs he won't stay changed things. CLE could shift quickly back to George, which would greatly complicate things at the worst possible time for the Lakers.

Finally, I'll say this: Over the last few months I've spoken with a number of people who have connections in the Lakers organization, and all have brought up Russell's issues with maturity/work ethic/attitude, while from all reports Ingram is the opposite. Based on what is seen on the floor, Russell has a lot of skill, but the behind-the-scenes stuff had them questioning whether or not he has the right mentality to find success.

 

Nugget from another team that was called about DAR. Maybe could have gotten more if we didn't salary dump.

 

ah, original report in dallas left out the mozgov rider. so it's possible russell could have netted a lotto pick, just not with mozgov attached.