Bunch of the usual coming out of all their mouths. S A Smith though bringing up the harm Magic did Rob and why the media was especially turned on him due to that interview. What I have been saying all along. Mag put him in the worst light possible to get done what we needed to get done.
Again, rob won’t win a PR match against magic because he’s already established in laker lore. He wins by being a great gm. Which in my book, he’s done... Magic was a great douche that tried to save face byngoing to first take twice and bashing rob and Jeanie... Meanwhile, rob gets AD, keeps kuzma, has another max slot available, has the potential to sign some max free agent, and if not, can get some really good role players. It’s a helluva lot better than what magic did for his brief pathetic tenure here.
Cool story.... KCP-Bron-AD Klutch team-up started how exactly? Bron-AD recruit Kawhi or Ky. Or do you really think that has to do with Rob entirely? Does Kawhi's camp want to talk to Magic? Did they want to even talk to Rob? Were we surgical in creating our cap space? Hardly. But kudos to Rob for getting a crude design done. Magic & Rob both dropped the ball. But both also had their victories. If I had to take a stab at it and credit anybody, then give it up to Rich Paul, our de-facto team Prez. Yeah, that should be the story.
I apologize for believing Woj with his “scrambling” bs and Ramona for her “Rob didn’t know and called the Pelicans back after the deal was done” nonsense
The more I think about this, I am beginning to think that Magic quitting and putting Pelinka in the cross-hairs was a ploy. Magic is still recruiting for the Lakers but NOW the league can't stop him. He is NOT working for the team officially and he is just another ex-player. He can talk to anyone at any time. Maybe he can't be at meetings, but he can still meet with players and there is nothing the league can do about it. What IF, he, Rob and Jeannie came up with this plan on purpose and have executed it to everyone's liking???
Nah, not buying that, I don’t think any of these people are that clever. I might buy into jokingly had Magic not gone on First Take and torched Rob for backstabbing, but the dislike between them was clearly real and Magic didn’t want to do the job anymore for multiple reasons, one of those being he and Rob didn’t have trust going on.
Based off the reports ATL said no to waiting a month so we needed to add more salary in place of a signed 4th to trade for AD and preserve our 32m in cap space. Zo/Bi/Hart/signed 4th aggregate to bring back 31.4m in salary...enough for AD plus his entire trade kicker. This is why when the date got moved up to July 6th, the was so much made it of his trade kicker being waived or not. I think we even drafted THT to grease Rich into having AD waive that 4m, cause LA wouldnt be paying it... Gayle Benson would. So Rob went into the deal knowing that the Pels were shopping the 4th but as the deal stood, it would be completed in August. ATL essentially made us "scramble" to reformat the deal to have it completed at an earlier date. Like I said, I don't mind the use of the word cause if we're scrambling to preserve our 32m, that means we have a good indication our max cap space is going to be used on a max guy. I know trades are tough AF to construct and execute, but if we really wanted to avoid having the deal pushed up to July 6th, then we could have traded the 4th for 8, 17, 35. The Pels would trade Solomon and their picks for ATL's future 2nds. Then we turn to the Pels with Atl out of the way to deal Zo, Bi, Hart, 8, 17, 35 and our future picks and have those picks signed and aggregated to finish the deal off in August while still having 32m in cap space.
Cap, crap, it's all about the forces of dark and light going on behind the scenes. There are powers at work here people have no concept of.
I still don’t like the word “scrambling” here. Scrambling implies a mistake was made and you hurry like hell to fix it, which doesn’t appear to be the case here.
The Rob hate came quick and the credit slow. I think we are in better hands than most will admit. He is obviously a cap Master.
In the end, it’s rob at the helm. Say what you will about klutch and them being a de-facto team president. It’s rob that got AD, it’s rob that created the space for another max agent, it’s rob who is our gm officially. It wasn’t rob who quit and complained on live tv about some things that were said that hurt his feelings.
Agreed. ESPN continues to spin the story to save face for magic, or running with it because they like magic, etc....
True Rob didn't quit, but how you think we're in our current position? Last year's 1yr stop gap mud squad maintained the space we had. You know the space that was created when Magic was still at the helm. That AD guy doesn't forced himself here and that doesn't happen if Bron doesn't come. Magic took the heat for the DLo deal, but without it, no Bron and we're left klutching at straws. Btw that AD deal...how did Rob get the 4th? Was Rob talking to Demps or Griff on the other line? Props to Rob for getting the job done and for finding a way to position himself into better job security (it's that #MambaMentality)...but let's not overlook the fine Details. The Mamba wouldn't.
