LABron James Discussion: The Final Year?

I am unequivocally okay with giving LeBron James a max contract. No hesitation, I'm fine with it. Your numbers are good, but here's a different window:

What are we going to spend that money on instead? Over the next 4 years we'll have to pay Randle, Nance Jr., Zubac, and of course Ingram in consecutive years. We won't have free money forever. Eventually those great rookie deals expire. So it's this year or we go all in on the kids. It's this year or we punt on some of them, trade them for picks, and start the cycle over again trying to find new Nances, new Randles, and maybe new Ingrams.

If this summer is it, then we're looking at Westbrook, George, LeBron, Paul, Cousins, Isaiah Thomas, DeAndre Jordan. Every single one of those players is asking for a max deal. Or you could get the guys who will be expensive on shorter term deals: Aldridge, maybe Avery Bradley, Wilson Chandler, Greg Monroe, Brook Lopez, and Danny Green. All of those guys are going to cost a lot of money as well. There's some RFAs in Aaron Gordon, Rodney Hood, Jokic, Nurkic, Jabari Parker, Clint Capela, and Joel Embiid, but you're going to have to overpay to get them out of their markets, so you're probably still looking at near max deals (look at Otto Porter).

So what it comes down to is: what are we saving for?

There is a risk of having an older player, absolutely. There is a risk of sinking money into a ship with holes in it, sure. But what do you stand to gain? You stand to gain Wilt at the end. I want Wilt at the end. I want Kareem at the end. I want the guy at the end when there's something left in the tank, but they can teach the young players what it means to win games. You get a player who has been to the Finals more times than anyone in the NBA today. You get a guy who will instill a work ethic and desire to win in these kids the way Kobe was too old to help with.

And by the time LeBron expires (and Lopez and Randle presumably), it'll be just in time for the kids to be growing into their own primes. Ingram will be 23, Ball will be 23, and we'll have freed up cash to get them another FA to run into their primes with. We'd presumably have 70+ million coming off the books which would take a ballooned salary down to a level where we could add another piece.

That's assuming of course that we don't also bring in another star with LeBron (which I'm very sure we would), which would mean probably Westbrook (who would be 32 at the time) or George (who would be 31 at the time). Those guys would be eligible as well to continue here and they'd be in the same situation you're talking about with LeBron.

In the end, there's no better way to spend our money than LeBron James, even at the end of his contract. Not even considering the kind of boon he'd be to the franchise as a financial gain, there's just no way we'd spend our money more effectively elsewhere. There's no combination of players that's a better way to spend the money we could free up. The closest we could come is Westbrook/George which I am 100% open to, but LeBron/George would be even better.

 

Hell no. I'm just going shot for insult with sirron.

 

Luxury tax is $1.50 for every $1 they're over the the salary cap.

Say the Lakers have a chance to pic up Giannis in 2019 but are over the cap. I doubt they want to pay up to 95 mil for him in his first year because the team is over the salary cap (worst case scenario)

I don't care how much we're making in TV revenue, it will hurt a lot if Labron's contract is multi year.

 

We are not in a desperate position here IMO. We will have a good team with just the pieces we have and the freedom to pick up the big names if we don't get stuck with old immovable players like Labron will become.

Karl Anthony Towns and Klay Thompson becomes free agents at the end of next season. Kawai Leonard becomes a free agent the season after that.

This isn't sign Labron or be in the gutter forever. We are in a really good position, but risk hampering all of our room for an old player that won't be worth it.

 

I like the direction this thread has gone in (aside from one clearly fake YouTube video of him making “clutch” shots), humorous, yet good arguments being made on each side. That’s why this is IMO the best Lakers forum. Also, f*** LeBron.

 

I strongly agree with this, we are not LeBron or bust here, and if we are then we’re in trouble because who truly knows how likely that is. Yes, the 2018 plan is the same as every other offseason and it gets old, but young stars/superstars are always on the rise and coming into free agency, we always have other routes to explore.

 

Stu Gotz is a wildly idiotic piece of s*** who doesn't deserve a platform to speak on.

 

Karl Anthony Towns is an RFA and will absolutely not be going anywhere. We just saw Durant take less money to stay in Golden State, that party is far from over. Kawhi Leonard is somewhat more realistic, but you're talking about two season away. What are we doing with our cash until then? Nothing? We're sitting on the roster we have today? Are you comfortable winning 30-40 games tops for two years, because that's what I'm seeing at best from this roster.

LeBron will always be worth it. He prints money. Luxury Tax? Who cares? We'd be making playoff runs (big checks per game), the Lakers merchandise would be flying off the shelves, you'd have people waiting outside Staples hoping to get into every sold out game. Our world wide presence would be ridiculous, especially in Asia. The Lakers are right now the most profitable team in the NBA and that's without any major stars. You bring in LeBron (with or without a costar) and we're in the black regardless of the Luxury Tax.

But let's play the game: Kawhi actually has a player option and I expect him to opt out as he'll make a great deal of money in the summer of 2019. At that point our roster salary would be (assuming we brought back Lopez on a "wink wink" deal and Randle to 4/50):

LeBron- 35.5
Deng- 18.81 (expiring)
Clarkson- 13.4 (expiring)
Randle- 12.5
Lonzo- 8.7
Ingram- 7.3
Nance Cap Hold- 6.8
Kuzma- 2
Hart- 1.9
Zubac Cap Hold- 1.9

You trade the expirings and Nance Jr. and you end up with enough cash to sign another max free agent ala the Rockets. Or hell trade Randle and the expirings if you need to make space. You could still go get Kawhi if you wanted to.

 

Taking into account an offseason that featured 26 Lakers wins, but PG asks to be traded to the Lakers, Labron wants to sign here, and Irving decided to leave a championship contending Cavs team, I don't think we should assume KAT and Klay are a lock for staying where they are.

In your scenario Labron will be 35 starting, 36 after playing a year with Kawai and hopefully gelling and we'd have to pray they can make it all work immediately.

No, I'd rather go after Kawai and KAT, or many of the other free agent combinations that will be available over the span of what Labron's contract would be because I don't think he'll stay healthy. Age will catch up to him somehow. In declining stats or injuries.

Point is this Labron thing is on a serious clock. In any scenario where we get Labron, but not that additional piece (Cousins will not be good enough IMO) immediately THIS YEAR, we are going to be hoping the team can come together in record time, instead of getting young players that will be a staple for years to come.

It's not worth the risk of hampering our options for free agency IMO.

 

I said yesterday I didn’t have a problem with LeBron calling Kyrie a kid, but that aside of course LeBron is passive aggressive. He’s the king of passive aggressive, that’s his signature move. Kobe was an a**hole to your face, LeBron is passive aggressive, and Durant is an emo milennial venting his insecurities behind fake twitter accounts. It changes by generation I guess. I don’t think Kyrie is blameless in this though, and as much as I don’t want to see it, I think it’d be kind of funny to see LeBron win a title with Wade again instead of Kyrie. These young NBA players are babies for the most part and I do like to laugh at some of them.

 

KAT is an RFA. He won't be able to move anywhere. Minnesota is bound to offer him a super max rookie extension and even if he goes to RFA, there's a less than zero percent chance that they wouldn't match a max offer.

LeBron on a team has risen their record immediately. If we win 30 games this year, LeBron raises that total to 50 games by himself. We're at worst a 2nd round team for at least the next two years. After that, we're going to rely on more of the kids, but that's true no matter what.

Let the clock tick on LeBron. There's no greater way to spend our money. It wouldn't preclude us from going after Kawhi (another guy I don't expect to ever move like Westbrook). Once LeBron's clock stops ticking, our young players are still not really in their prime. We'd have plenty of time to make things work.