Lakers Young Core Rank List

With news from Ireland, that TheRealDeal posted somewhere in the depths of the DAR thread, that the Lakers could be remodeling this offseason with as many as 7 or 8 guys off the roster, where do you guys rank our young guys with each other? And who/how many are you willing to give up this offseason? What is your outlook on maximizing the young guys you want to keep?

For me, my list is....

1.) Ingram
2.) Zubac
3.) Randle
4.) Russell*/Top pick*
5.) Nance
6.) Clarkson
7.) Black
8.) Nwaba
9.) Hou 1st

(Guys that aren't included: Ennis, MWP, Moz, Deng, TRob, MWP, Young)

1-3 are my keepers, 4-9 can go in a trade to get a star player back. If we end up with a top 3 pick, that gets placed at 4 in an either/or scenario where a team can take Russell or the pick, not both. IMO to adequately develop players we need to limit how many we have and get great veteran players around them. If we keep everyone and get lucky enough to keep both picks, we will be going into next season trying develop 7-9 guys and that's just not going to happen.

Ingram - Get PG in here so that we have a star two player that Ingram can emulate his game after. Have him work on his 3 all offseason and try to develop him more towards dominating in the post. With his playmaking skills if he can get his shots down, he's going to be fun to watch on offense. Defensively he's already miles ahead of the game. Just tighten up on the little things like not get caught ball watching.

Zubac - Cut down the fat, solidify the post game, work on expanding range to three point line, work on lateral quickness for defense.

Randle - Get a defensive coach in here that actually knows what they are doing, I don't think anyone on the staff is teaching the defense appropriately given that everyone sucks and does everything wrong. Keep expanding that range and playmaking. Ideally I would like to get Biff to push Randle to a small ball 5 vs 6th man based on matchups. Surround him with shooters that can actually make baskets and let him have the middle of the floor to do his thing.

* - I guess I really have 4 keepers, but since we don't know if the pick is ours yet, DAR would go in the trade.

I think three is the perfect number of guys to develop, 4 is pushing it but I would love to keep at least one of DAR/Top pick.

 

I guess I'll come back to this after I've had some time to relax a bit because at this point I don't have a keeper. I'd give anyone on the roster up for George and probably Butler too right about now. I honestly don't see how you bring in anyone of George's caliber without including Ingram.

I won't shed any tears to see anyone on the current roster go as long as we don't get completely fleeced on the trade and give all of them up for one guy or something.

 

I'm pulling for an about face, and would like to see all of them figure it out quickly. I'd like to add to what we have, and for them to all give us the signs of life we need to see. I might not be happy, but I really don't want to start ranking which one of my children I have to give away.



Except for Tyler Anus. He plays like s***.

 

Nobody is untouchable to me for the right price. None of these guys have proven enough to me to warrant being untouchable.

 

Ingram
Russell
Zubac
Top 3 pick
Randle
Clarkson
Nance
Black
Nwaba

 

I wonder if we do get the pick and get a "Ball" like player, would we keep him at the 2? Would we give that lineup some time to grow?

 

1. Ingram
2. Randle or Zubac
3. Top 3 Pick '17
4. Russell
5. Clarkson
6. Nance
7. Black
8. Houston's 1st '17
9. Nwaba
10. T-Robinson
11. Ennis

A lot of the value many put on Ingram is based on his intrinsic skills and his body (length), neither of which are totally in sync yet, or close to mature but damn that kid just fights and doesn't complain and does the work, it's hard not to throw in with him. I think he mentally just has a confidence that his complex game will all come together at some point and he'll be someone's Pippin. That's why I absolutely don't want to trade him. He will draw in that star big guard, the next MJ/Kobe or close as we can get. Give them Zubac and we roll. I have Randall tied with Zu because Randall is a starter on many teams in the NBA right now and Zu is still a project but one with a very foreseeable outcome IMO.

Lot of questions about these guys to ask over summer. Maybe the biggest questions are Russell, Randall & Clarkson. Are these guys going to improve or is this the plateau? Randle picked up the pass game this season, flashing those trip-dubs, brought his FG% up to .487 and added a few dimes so he's the one I would expect to do work and come back improved. I can't help but think that he might be our most valuable asset in some GMs eyes right now from a trade-now perspective. I think he's matured a bit more than the others and is just about ripe for trading value-wise.

Assuming we get our top 3 I don't have a problem with Randle and Russell going out for a star. Clarkson either. Part of me says wait until next season but what if Russell is revealed as an at-best off the bench scoring option, JC shows that what you see is what you get and Randle has basically peaked?

Just a note on picks; if we get our top 3 pick this summer, we lose our 2nd round picks for both '17-'18 to Orlando but instead will get back our '19 1st rounder we traded them since we can't trade firsts in consecutive years. We'll take two seconds for a first though and it makes retaining our top3 even more important.

 

Agree with @Barnstable I hope to keep those 3.

Ingram leads the pack by quite a large margin. He's got all the qualities of becoming a franchise player; talented, coachable, and hard-working. Love his maturity and overall demeanor.

Zubac has replaced Russell as one of the big 3 imo. And I'm a Randle fanboi so he's untouchable. One thing to note about Zubac and Randle is that they were always a die-hard Lakers fan. They bleed purple and gold. That matters to me.

 

Whoever did this gif will be extremely disappointed that it had a life span of 1 year before it was obsolete.

 

1) Ingram
2) Zubac
3) Russell
4) Randle
5) Top 3 Pick
6) Nance
7) Clarkson
8) Black

The rest can fight it out.

 

For me, here's my order:

1. Ingram - great feel for the game, puts his head down and works hard, has greet instincts on the defensive end, has all star potential
2. Zubac - big man with skills, once he gets stronger, he'll be a very solid NBA center
3. Russell - Our most enigmatic but clearly our most skilled player. He just needs to get right mentally. I'm not ready to give up on him.

 

the original was pretty awesome too
They used different parts of the clip to do it



side note:

Just ran across this one while doing a search, kinda cracked me up.

Spoiler: funny gif