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

The whole point is to get a true POA guard quicker and better at staying in front of all the speedster PGs than AR is. He needs to be defending 2s. Of course everyone gets burned at times defending those guys. But it would be like ideally having Max Christie back here to do that with AR handling the 2. Or someone better than Max who also has some offensive game. Not rocket science and not really debatable.

 

I get that, I don't think that guy, is Melton tho, but we shall see, if we pick him up.

Me...I'm lusting after Mathurin currently, but I think we improved the team, and we aren't going to miss Finney-Smith at all.

Gabe is still here.

 

See I agree, but to do that, I think you need a legitimate 1-3 defender. You need someone that can play the best offensive player and not rely on Luka or LeBron defending a dominant wing. That’s where my Herb Jones/Jaden McDaniels/Camara pining comes from.

It allows us to leave Reaves in the starting lineup. To do that you kind of need an all team defensive wing that can defend 1-3.

 

Oops in Jake's thread I got too carried away and wanted him in Rui's place starting plus (Melton or someone else good POA) starting alongside AR. That's 6 guys with Ayton, Luka and LeBron. So seems with the continuing AR defending against speedy PG problem this (Melton or ??) makes the most sense for starters. But any time LeBron is out still seems like Jake has more of what we need than Rui in the areas of perimeter defense and rebounding and playmaking on secondary actions. He "might" even play some small ball center with his speed (relatively for his size and strength) handles to put it on the floor if closeouts come to him shooting playing JJ's desired 5 out and offensive smarts with moving the ball, PLUS rebounding well beyond what Rui gives us as a small ball 5. Just more all around skills and motor and perimeter D switching and similar ballpark strength wise.

 

Pump the breaks a little bit. Per 36m numbers have them rebounding the same. Defensively, LaRavia is better on the perimeter while Rui is better in the post - Rui is STRONG, like defend Jokic strong. I’m not sure LaRavia has that, but he’s better against quicker wings.

As for distributing, he’s probably better but Rui is just so much better in his role as a finisher - he can finish at the rim, hit the midrange and the 3 all at high levels. I can’t tell you how valuable that is with 3 high level playmakers. You want a guy that just puts the ball in the hoop efficiently. As a laker Rui’s TS is 62% - just an efficient guy and a perfect Lebron replacement, I think he can bloom into a third option scoring an efficient 18-20 with 5 rebounds and good defence. Rui is a 50/40 guy with 75-80% free throw shooting. Efficiency matters and Jake isn’t the caliber of scorer Rui is.

 

We don't need much of that small ball 5 stuff IMO. Now..Al Horford would have been the perfect pickup, he can play 4 with another big, and fill in as a stretch 5 if needed. Shrug we work, with what we have.

Besides Ayton, the new guys have to prove something, before I start them over the guys we already have. Vando can still impact a game. We just need to scale back, on this 5 out junk that we run...

 

Some conservative types will love this, two of the most liberal areas of the country hate each other over inconsequential things. Keep up the hate!!!

 

Give me Rollins. I hope we see a 3 for 1 trade with our expirings soon.

 

All good points @svtzr

I just hope Rui wants to stay a Laker enough that we can extend him early at a good price and won't go into a funk if we do get a really good 3nD option to put next to AR in the starting lineup to handle the speedy PGs and he has to come off the bench whenever Ayton and LeBron are starting. LeBron won't be here likely a lot longer past this year. This is assuming Rui gets some kind of a raise he's happy enough with to be able to stay a Laker as opposed to maybe getting more in free agency. All that assuming he is in the Lakers' future plans and not traded. Then back to DK the more likely of the 2 to go out just because so lacking on D comparatively and seemingly in the basketball IQ department.

 

The most pressing question of course is how speedy is he and good at POA defense, to be able to slide AR to defending the 2?

 

lol, i'm a college professor. i meant his bias in terms of teams he probably grew up rooting for.

we need bruce bowen. or kcp from five years ago. keon ellis is that guy right now. if we can't get him (i get why), we need to be turning up stones for the next one.

the derrick jones signing unlocked both luka and djj, imo. we need to be mindful of this. someone who looks like junk somewhere else could be great here.

 

I’m with that s***.!!!!!

 

Lebron really needs to check himself if he thinks he can’t win with this team.

it is loaded. And we can’t just hand seal him a championship.

We are doing the best we can. We had inconsistent outside shooting and scoring from the guard spots.

We get arguably the best scoring guard shooter in the league Luka Doncic. Three point shooting. Handled.

let that set in. In one season we traded Deangelo Russell and ended up with Luka Doncic.

sucked that we traded AD but we weren’t winning with the way that team was constructed. Because his scoring was getting canceled out.

I saw something different when we blew out Denver and beat OKC Luka couldn’t be stopped.

So we had no Center nothing. And still got a 3rd seed. And we’re respectable in that series with Minnesota.

in the end their bigs just ate us up. Naz Reid and Gobert.

We aquired a player better than Shai unheard of.

Then LeBron off season we are hamstrung potentially having to trade our depth and core to get you your center Jarrett Allen or Nic Claxton GMs licking their chops as if all of us our ready to chomp down on a steak dinner at Lawrys on La Cienega.

We were potentially trading Reaves Knect 2031 first round pick Vincent and Hachimura to get that.


and then the favorite word for everyone in here happened Buyout.

Portland gifted us an opportunity to sign Ayton our Center to open up the offense for Lebron and Luka. And they were paying 25 million of it.

Of all people Portland. The same Portland where the 18 point fourth Quarter comeback happened in 2000 at staples.

Thank you Portland.

then Milwaukee threw a bag at Myles Turner. And we got Ayton.

Steven Adams got 3yrs. 39 million Deandre Ayton got 2 yrs. 16 million. Let that sink in Lebron.

As much as I love me some Steven Adams no coach is putting him on a scouting report on offense.

Rob is doing work. Rob Pelinka is doing work. He deserves his extension. He knows the cap. And knows how to maximize it. Let me say something. He is our Andrew Friedman.

he gets Jake LaRavia. What a sign to help the bench 22 yrs. Old got some defense to him. But can make that corner three on the pass from Luka.

getting Milton for matchups.

we have Hachimura Vando Knect Reaves Hayes Vincent. Your son James. We kept all our depth.

so what am I missing here Lebron??? OKC won a championship with depth. With the best depth in the league. So did Golden State and Boston.

Porzingis opened up that spacing for Tatum and Brown.

Holmgren opened up that spacing for Shai and Jalen.

look at Holmgrens stats and Aytons stats. A number 1 pick and number 2 pick. Aytons 26.

We are trying Lebron. We are really trying. This is the best shot Lebron has at a championship. I truly believe that.

happy 4th yall.

 

Rui can extend from the 6th of July. I offer him a similar contract to Jabari Smith but over 4 years. Something like 105m for 4 years (starting at 22.5m per with 10% yearly increases). That takes his career earnings to almost 180m with one more big contract left.

Then we should extend Roovesy next year for 162m for 4 years (starting at 35m per with 10% yearly increases). I know it seems like a lot, but it's 15-16% of the cap over it's lifespan.

Luka I think extends for the full 4 years this offseason - $229m for 4 years with a player option in year 4 for a bigger extension in 29-30.

This would be how much of the salary cap these three guys would take up per year moving forward (note: the cap are estimates from Sporttrac, Luka probably reps in 29-30, most teams go above to above 125% of the salary cap):

25-26: Salary Cap: 154.7m

• Lebron 52.6m (34%)
• Luka 46m (29.7%)
• Rooves 13.9m (8.9%)
• Rui 18.3m (11.8%)

26-27: Salary Cap: 165.4m

• Luka 51m (30.8%)
• Rooves 14.9m (9%)
• Rui 22.5m (13.6%)

27-28: Salary Cap: 182m

• Luka 55.1m (30.2%)
• Rooves 35m (19.2%)
• Rui 24.7m (13.6%)

28-29: Salary Cap: 191.1m

• Luka 59.5m (31.1%)
• Rooves 38.5m (20.1%)
• Rui 27.3m (14.3%)

29-30: Salary Cap: 200.6m

• Luka 64.2m (32%)
• Rooves 42.3m (21%)
• Rui 30m (14.9%)

Over the lifespan of these 3 contracts the Luka, Rooves, Rui combo takes up 53.4-67.9% of the cap.

 

Maybe Reaves starts a little closer to 30m and would be good with that. Let’s see how he’s looking this year first? Am assuming his lifelong Laker wish and might give hometown discount because of that though your numbers may be closer to or even under market for him if he’s playing great.

 

Those Beal stats are really enticing without Kevin Durant. Last two games of the season he had 25 and 29 points respectively.

the guy could score a bunch.

and Luka was so good with Kyrie cause that other guy in the backcourt that could shoot and score was such a threat.

you add Beal with Ayton and the spacing that’s alot of firepower.

So if he signs awesome. He would be close to his kids and wife in Phoenix.


We’re else is there Milwaukee.? Could be enticing him and Gianiss.

We shall see.

 

Thanks for posting this

First time I heard this

Why would we be involved over moving up a few places in the second round?

 

Going on from the above post, I wrote a while back on how to build a team from a cap percentage perspective and this seems to be how the league is doing it give or take (an example of this year's salaries as well):

1st - 30% of cap (max) - 47m
2nd - 30% (max) - 47m
3rd - 15% (mid size) - 24m
4th - 15% (mid size) - 24m
5th - 10% (MLE level) - 15m
6th - 9% (MLE) - 14m
7th - 3.6% (TPMLE level) - 5.5m
8th - 3.3% (BAE level) - 5m
9th-14th - Minimums: 8% - 12m

That sort of gets you to 120-125% of the cap which is the first apron and what most teams are going to. Here are a few different ways teams were built this last season:

- Boston: Brown 35% (Supermax) + Tatum 25% (Rookie Max) + Jrue 21% + KP 21% + White 14% + Horford 6.5% + Pritchard 4.8% + Minimums 10% = 137.3%

Their major issue was Tatum this year goes to 35% alongside Brown, and White goes to 18.2% so they would of been so far over they had to break it up.

- Knicks: KAT 35% (Supermax) + OG 26% + Brunson 17.8% + Bridges 16.6% + Hart 12.9% + Robinson 10.1% + Precious 4.3% + McBride 3.3% + Minimums 7.6% = 133.6%

- Denver: Jokic 35% (Supermax) + Murray 25.6% (Rookie Max) + MPJ 25.5% (Rookie Max) + Gordon 16.2% + Zeke 6.3% + Saric 3.7% + Westbrook 2.3% + Braun 2.2% + Minimums 11.4% = 128.2%

For this season, they did great job in replacing MPJ at 25% with Cam Johnson at 13.6%, it gave them the ability to go for a MLE player on top of what they got now.

- OKC: they basically built their whole team off the back of SGA 25% + iHart 21.3% + Lu 12% + Isaiah Joe 9.2% + Aaron Wiggins 7.8% + Chet 7.8% and players close to the minimum on rookie scale contracts - it shows the power of rookies, but also the short window because when everyone reups, they'll have to get rid of half of their team = 115.6%

Moving forward I think we built our team how Houston and Minnesota have. One single Max with a bunch of cost controlled assets around them at that 15-20%. I'm envisioning:

Luka - 30%
Reaves - 21%
Ayton - 18% (or another center if he doesn't work out)
Rui - 14%
Defensive Swingman - 14%
6th Man (MLE level) - 10%
Backup Center - 5%
Backup Wing (TPMLE) - 3.6%
Minimums - 8%
Total: 125%

That leaves 3 other pieces to go with our current core 4 of Luka, Reaves, Rui & Ayton. Imagine a Herb/McDaniels type as the 5th starter, the 6th man would be a backup combo guard like NAW, backup center as an older vet like Horford, backup wing as a young guy with 3&D potential.

 

Still waiting
Can you imagine how many dunks he can get with Luka and LeBron