2023-24 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

Why sleep in the middle of the day?

 

I was up all night - work related. It happens supporting US based clients.

 

Back to the Lakers can't shoot 3's

5-29 17.2% oof

 

that's SOOOO BAD

 

couldn't believe it watching the game. i actually (foolishly) thought were finally past that kind of stuff. phx wasn't even pretending to contest most of the time.

 

can't say I'm sad I missed the game. Some things you're ok missing sleep for. But not that.

 

AD played pretty well throughout, and lebron had a great close to the game (after a rough 3 quarters for him, imo).

if you're a kd fan, he was pretty impressive?

 

Yeah KD was an animal, my wife and I were shouting NOOOO!!! every time he has the ball lol

 

Which is it?

Cause Keith is 100% right. It was how great of a job James Jones did. Hitting home runs on all these minimum signings. They're all perfect fits on this team. Can do xy&z.

To it was KD and 4 Little Caesars workers on the court.

It cannot be both.

I think they wisely knew they weren't in a position to get bigger contracts guys, so while every other team was doing that they went straight to the dollar movie bin at Wal-Mart and got their pick of the litter because everyone else was bidding on and waiting for decisions on better players. They got good minimum players... but that's just it, they're minimum, limited players who are available at that price point for a reason.

A good player and a good minimum player are not the same thing and that's been widely overlooked when crowning this team with anything. Cause when you ask more of a minimum player (as you have to with injuries on a thin team), you enhance their role and the blemishes shine through.

I'll also give them credit for getting higher tiered depth back in the Ayton trade BUT Ayton for Nurk was a failure. There's 4 teams they'll have to go through (us included) who Nurk cannot see the court against. Personally with Vogel being good with bigs, I would've seen what he could do with Ayton first or if the locker room was poisoned from last year, then get a better big in return from a team that's not Portland (they were locked in on that one since July according to reports).

As I said in the optimism thread, I consider them a fraud until they stretch together a 15 game stretch with all 3 of their stars. If they're not available, they're going nowhere fast.

 

yeah, rob got some good old guys on vet mins for the full russ year, and a couple just fell apart, so then we got interesting young vet mins and...they were still vet mins.

i'm inclined to think phx's supporting cast really isn't very good, and all the adulation for jones was pretty silly.

 

Players always get up to play us and I feel like last night was no different.

 

Zach Lowe and Kendrick Perkins are saying Lakers should trade for Harden.

Dlo/Rui for Harden. No picks since we only have to beat the Clippers s*** offer and Harden is an FA at the end of the year.

Trade checker is down for me so I can't see if that works.

Harden/Gabe
Reaves/Max
Vando/Prince/Cam - Vando has to start to be the point of attack defender
Lebron/Hayes
AD/Wood

I know we all hate Harden, but his skillset would help the team. An elite playmaker that can run pick and roll with AD/Lebron and others. Good 3pt shooter and gets to the line a lot where he is great. Shrinks in the playoffs but still has a career Ts% of 58.5 so his threes and fts keep him efficient.

Some cons are he's a weak poa defender so it would be frustrating watching both him and Lebron be pylons, but like Lebron, he has a high IQ and posts positive DBPM metrics. He's a free-agent so we also would have to sign him for substantial money in the offseason money which is scary. He's 34 years old.

I'd probably do it if Rui continues to be lost in the rotation and Vando gets healthy. We would have enough wings with Vando, Prince, and Reddish to eat minutes. Harden would be able to spoon feed AD a lot of baskets and this maximizes our shot to get another ring with Lebron and AD. Also we wouldn't have to gut our team or give up too many assets as only the Clippers are interested and don't ant to trade Mann. Plus Rui is better than Mann.

Something to think about but I know you all are gonna hate it.

 

Yeah hate the idea and especially if a rental one season but DLO can’t even be traded until like December or later anyway …. right? Fortunately.

 

December 15 and January for Rui I think.

 

Hell , nooooo

 

A blast from the past. Elmore Smith set a record as a Laker, that might never get broken.


Wilt Chamberlain has basketball feats that have stood for more than 60 years, including a 100-point game in 1962 and 55 rebounds in 1960. Bill Russell once grabbed 32 rebounds in a half in 1957, then grabbed 51 boards for a game in 1960.

We often hear of the legends who were NBA big men, the icons who have held some of the league’s longest-standing records. Fifty years ago, another NBA big etched his name in the record books.

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On Oct. 28, 1973, Elmore Smith recorded an impressive triple-double to lead the Los Angeles Lakers in a 111-98 win over the Portland Trail Blazers. He had 12 points, 16 rebounds and 17 blocks in front of a home crowd at The Forum in Inglewood, Calif.

The NBA began keeping blocks as an official stat during the 1973-74 season, months after Chamberlain played his final NBA game and four years after Russell resigned as a player-coach with the Boston C Bags. While Smith made only 5 of 16 shots that Sunday, he reminded fans that he was a reliable defender, and protecting the rim was something he did well.

Smith’s 17 blocks set the NBA record. His efforts against the Blazers came as a shock then. It’s still something of a shock — and an untouched milestone — 50 years later.

Saturday will mark the 50th anniversary of Smith setting a record that has withstood the test of time with several star big men who have made an impact in the league. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Dikembe Mutombo, Hakeem Olajuwon, Mark Eaton and Shaquille O’Neal all made a living swatting shots — and all eyes are on 7-foot-4 rookie Victor Wembanyama as he starts his career — but the one nicknamed “The Rejector” is credited for having the official record.

“I didn’t even hear about it until days later,” Smith said of setting the record. “I’ve never been much of the kind of guy that would look at the stat sheet.”





At a time when the NBA was ruled by centers, Smith set the mark for blocks. Smith replaced Chamberlain as the Lakers’ center in 1973, as Chamberlain retired months before the start of the season. With the game evolved and the 3-point shot becoming more of a priority, few defenders have even come close to Smith’s mark. Only O’Neal (Nov. 20, 1993) and the late Manute Bol (Jan. 25, 1986, and Feb. 26, 1987) have recorded 15 blocks since the league made it an official stat. Hassan Whiteside’s 12 blocks for the Miami Heat on Jan. 25, 2015, is the only time an NBA player has come within five of Smith’s record in the last 10 years.

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Smith, 74, recalled it being somewhat comical that the Trail Blazers continued to challenge him around the basket. He played the entire 48 minutes against Portland.

“I said, ‘Can you believe they keep coming in there like that?’” Smith said. “But you know, when you’re working, you don’t always focus on what you’re actually doing. You’re trying to win the game.

“The more I look back on it, I think, man, that really was something.”

Smith recorded a triple-double on that record-setting Sunday, and while the blocks earned a lot of recognition, he said the spotlight should have been on another teammate.

“Gail Goodrich,” Smith said of the five-time All-Star guard who finished with 49 points in the win. “Every time I blocked a shot, it seemed like he was making a layup.”

Smith was listed as a 7-foot, 250-pound center who was the No. 3 pick of the Buffalo Braves in the 1971 NBA Draft. He averaged 17.3 points and 15.2 rebounds as a rookie for the Braves after a standout career at Kentucky State. He was traded to the Lakers in September of 1973. Smith played for the Braves, the Lakers, the Milwaukee Bucks and the Cleveland Cavaliers throughout an eight-year NBA career.



He finished with 1,183 blocks for his career, 393 of those coming during the 1973-74 season. Knee injuries slowed his career, and he played only 24 games for the Cavaliers during the 1978-79 season.

Smith averaged 4.9 blocks per game and led the league in 1973-74. Two days before blocking 17 shots against the Blazers, Smith had 14 blocks against the Detroit Pistons. He also blocked 14 on Nov. 4, 1973, against the Houston Rockets.

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Smith, who still works in the Cleveland area with the Cavs in addition to his barbecue business, Elmore Smith’s Smokehouse, believes his record is attainable. He said he’s seen players over the years who he felt were capable of breaking his record.

“(Hakeem) Olajuwon, I thought he would break the record because he had that natural ability to leap, and his timing was good,” Smith said. “Manute Bol, I thought maybe he would have broken it. Shaq, I think he could have had he really wanted to.”

The odds of that record being broken by a big man camped outside the paint are low but possible (Wembanyama has shown his ability to block long-range shots). Smith added that he wouldn’t be shocked if the record is chased by a wing or guard who roams the court.

“If you look at the guys my size now, they’re jump shooters, 3-point shooters,” Smith said. “All of us would have loved to have had that opportunity to do that. … The game has changed quite a bit.

“But it was really fun to be able to lure people into the lane so that they could get their shots blocked.”

(Illustration: Eamonn Dalton / The Athletic; photos: Focus on Sport / Getty Images)

 

Please stop that Harden nonsense. No one wants him. Ignore it so we don't speak into existence

 

I just threw up in my mouth a little