2025-26 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

there was someone a season or two ago who was out for weeks, came back to play the lakers, and then ended up missing the rest of the season

 

i'd argue almost all FA classes are equally terrible these days, simply because all the stars agree to extensions, and the ones who are FAs clearly already know where they're going.

they key is to do be one of those places. again, nobody saw laravia coming last year, and there are certainly other players of his caliber that will be FAs.

i also think there may be some opt outs and trade scenarios. like--if miami wins the giannis sweepstakes, do we take on wiggins along with some draft capital (instead of giving up draft capital to get him like we would have this year)?

also, with all the pre-agency trades, some are bound to fail (like DFS for us last year). for example, we wanted dosunmu and ellis--they're still UFAs on teams with pretty tight financial situations. someone like that may shake loose. or minny may have to dump ddv with a second to have space to sign dosunmu and not be second-aproned.

 

Well...we will have a lot of room to absorb some more buyout guys this summer. This might become the new trend. Did anyone see the Ayton buyout coming? There could be some more surprises.

 

btw, not a huge deal, but why is john collins never mentioned as a good UFA this summer? he's having a good year, is only 28, and could definitely find a role here, imo. maybe the clips want to keep him, and his bird rights matter there now with the garland addition. that said they've got mathurin as an RFA, so pursuing both could squeeze them a bit.

 

Does Marc maybe think he can lure Luka back in a couple years?

 

lots of dallas fans seem to think this is happening (including some in my college pal group text literally last night!).

i do not envision this.

 

Nice shout, I've been overlooking him too. He's solid and a nice replacement of Rui, if he can keep his 3s up, he's actually a better fit then Rui, even after we lose Bron.
JJ would play him at the 5 a lot though ahah

 

and cuban claims he doesn't regret selling lol

wonder if the league plans to give the adelsons ownership of the vegas expansion team

 

I think Collins is a good UFA, but considering he's currently on a $26.5 mil contract, I'm a bit hesitant to recommend him as a FA target for us, since I have no idea what kind of contract he'd be looking for this summer compared to everyone else. If he'd be willing to take a significant pay cut with us, then sure, go get him.

On another note, I keep bouncing back and forth on who the right Center would be for us to go after this summer. Given the news from the trade deadline on the Jazz, I'd wager that we won't be able to poach Walker Kessler or get Ainge to finally trade him to us, so that removes one obvious name from the list.

There's a chance that Hartenstein might be available and he'd be great... but also pricey and his health would be a risk throughout the season. Obviously, there's also Nic Claxton, but IDK if the asking price for him in a trade is worth it for us, especially given that he can be bullied around by bigger, bulkier centers and would require us to go get a huge PF to help cover him. Not to mention how limited Claxton's offensive game is. Onyeka Okongwu is another guy who I think could work, but raises questions. Jarrett Allen would be great too, though he'd take up a huge chunk of our cap space with his extension.

Weirdly the two guys that I keep coming back to are Yves Missi and Kel'el Ware. Missi fits the Explosive Athletic Defensive Anchor and Lob Threat archetype of center that Luka swears by, but he's still rather raw in his development and started playing basketball at a later age, so it could take him a couple of years to fully come onto his own alongside Luka. Ware is similarly athletic, can protect the rim and is a great lob threat while also being a floor spacer- but he's got motor problems not unlike Ayton and isn't as lockdown on defense as Missi already is. But if we can get Ware and have him lock in and develop his defensive game, he'd be a monster for us.

That said, they're both still on their rookie contracts and both seem like they're potentially already on their way out from their drafting teams, so we could probably get Missi from the Pelicans for a First at least. With Ware... IDK. If we try to trade for him from Miami, I have no idea if Riles would ever agree to it, but if Giannis winds up going to Miami and Ware gets shipped off to Milwaukee as part of the package, I could maybe see us prying him away from the Bucks with draft picks to further help their rebuild.

 

collins is in line for a pay decline, imo--above mle, but not too far. like rui.

i was surprised when the word was missi was available in trade at the deadline, but then he wasn't moved, so it might have been smoke (i.e., others were asking about him, but NO wasn't really interested in selling).

i continue to think that we don't need to spend a ton on a center, though. like, if we just had two hayeses, we'd be fine. especially if we had a bobby portis type backup big who could play smallball center.

nothing's changed my mind from wanting to add two athletic players, one a POA defending guard with size and the other a switchable forward. in theory, there are paths to make those happen this summer.

POA/smart/bufkin
reaves/kennard (?)
luka/laravia
athletic switchable forward/vando/thiero
ayton/hayes

with 50 million to spend, we could probably nab two guys there and keep rui, tbh. but we could at least find two rotation quality guys, imo.

anyway, it's a long way off, but i'm sort of in post-deadline hangover.

 

Since we are the Lakers, I am almost positive we'll try to swing for the fences... so all these "let's get a SF and C" are a little unlikely to me

 

Like, time machine "get"?

 

Uhhh, he needs to be able to play defense for more than the last 5 minutes of each game.

 

I am pretty sure I am saying no to LeBron even at 10m per...

 

I’m pretty sure our new owner has already said “no” to LeBron for next season.