LeBron James Discussion: Not Returning To The Lakers

LeBron has a big decision to make. I was absolutely sure he would stay with us but after today it hit me that he may not.

He's aware that it will be very difficult to compete for a title with this group. Unless we upgrade the roster, we are not able to beat the Denver (and may struggle to beat other teams that are on the upward trend in the West). If he's choosing solely on title aspirations, he would probably go to the East and join the Knicks or Sixers to have a better shot. He could also join the Warriors and play with his buddy Draymond and go together with Curry for a last shot in a winning culture.
If he values legacy and non-court activities (his brand, Hollywood, getting a new team...) it makes sense to stay with us and use that uncertainty to can Ham and force a trade for a new superstar

It will be fun to watch how this developed and curious to see his exit interview, I bet he makes a big claim like he did recently like "I'll have to think really well about where I'll play next season" that gets everyone's attention and media can milk it until July.

I wouldn't be against him going, but we may keep Ham in the process. I'm also not against getting another superstar (if it's Murray or something like that. If it's Trae, Lavine or Dame, I'm out) because we need one for the post-LeBron era.

I think we end up caving and promising to go hard on Trae, hopefully that's not enough for LeBron to decide staying.

We must get Dejounte at all costs, Reaves needs a defensive minded guy to play with. He tries hard but he's just not a good defender and gets attacked often. We can go after Caruso too, but that means another superstar would be a forward who handles the ball, that doesn't make sense if LeBron stays while it's not something that exists a lot. Dejounte makes a ton of sense for our future

 

no way you can get murray without giving up reaves, and it might be difficult to do so even if you do include reaves. btw, i'm not as high on murray as everyone else. he's a very good two-way player, but he has more warts than people realize. emptying all depth for him will lead to other problems that we can't afford to fix, and he's not a foundational piece.

anyway, re: lebron: i honestly don't care what he does. we're in a similar position regardless.

if he and dlo opt out, we'd have about 40 million plus the room exception (7 million) to flesh out a roster around AD/reaves/rui/vando/vincent. i think you could find three players with that money that makes us a non-laughing stock next year. not a contender, but not the pistons. which is good because we don't own our pick.

if he chooses to stay, he'll have to understand that it's for a farewell tour, not a ring chase. we just don't have the assets. his westbrook trade ended his title contention unless he wants to jump ship again.

 

Eh...Austin, Rui, Jarred and Gabe, might all be up for grabs with D'Angelo this summer. Once again, I'm 99% sure, that Trae Young is not on our radar. Unless for some reason, we flipped him in a three way trade.

We are going to draft Bronny, and make a trade. All of the kids aren't getting moved, but..it depends on what, we can get in return.

After all that talk, Rob made about stocking up assets, to be in a better position for the summer? Some of these players, are about to get moved.

 

ok bro.

 

We'll see soon.

 

oh, i'm not doubting folks will get moved. i'm questioning whether any sensible objective will be accomplished in doing so.

 

If you don't think the team can contend as is, what's the point of running it back? Outside of James and Davis

What's so special about we have now, that's supposed to be irreplaceable?

 

I don't think we can run it back with this group. Its broken at this point.

I think there are ways to make moves that will actually improve the team overall though. We don't have to go all in on one guy. We can make a series of moves to improve things and/or bring in some additional role players along with a big name.

We've got some assets to play with here and we should use them IMO.

 

at this point, we might as well draft Bronny Jr, except that Lebron wants him to have a good coach and a team with a good development program.

 

Murray and Turner works.
Murray and Capela works too.

It's way,way early, but some names not being mentioned will probably be up for grabs this summer. It's the NBA, the arm's race never stops.

 

You can see the end coming. Didn't have that extra gear to just take over on offense to carry his team. Missed at the rim which he never did.

Hell need to become even better from 3 to make up for it but I don't know of that possible at this time.

 

not sure i care about running it back. i just think we could easily get much worse next year and into the future by hastily shipping folks out.

probably the wrong thread, but i'd like to hear them. dlo opts out, and our salary to match in trades drops substantially and now requires moving pieces you'd want to keep (e.g., reaves in particular, but also rui and/or vando--both of whose trade values are in the toilet right now anyway).

i see no path right now. rob will have to surprise me more than he did with the westbrook trade.

we don't have salary matches nor draft capital to make any of that work, imo.

he's struggled and shied away from finishing at the rim all series.

 

D'Angelo, Rui and Gabe, or Austin, or Vanderbilt is 47-49M.

 

are we not gone talk About Bron constantly being backdoored? AG had 29 and 13, he was constantly ball watching, I agree the others gave him nothing but still he was guarding Gordon all game

 

You’re getting 32/13/3 with 61% shooting from AD. Playoffs are when your stars shine and your sidekick is doing fine keeping toe to toe with Jokic. The current state and condition of the Lakers is solely on Bron.

 

He looked tired in the 2nd half, whcih sucks bcuz there was a lot of talk of him being "fresh" this year versus last year, but I'm not seeing that.

I think LeBron missing a few critical games this year also cost us playoff positioning - we easily coulda been in the top 6 but LeBron decided to "rest" so that he's fresh for the playoffs but none of that matters now because we're about to get swept once again by the Nuggets.

 

because it’s not a chase down block and magically the 39 year old age excuse works

 

I agree as well - LeBron got outplayed by Aaron Gordon of all ppl...and was atrocious defensively.

 

It would have been fools gold to play anyone else cause this team still can’t beat Denver.

 

dlo is likely opting out. rui and gabe have two years left on their deals, vando missed the entire season due to injury and has three more years left on his deal.

rui/gabe/vando/reaves totals 52 million. that's 52 million in salary, a good chunk of which is going to be deemed undesirable, particularly at the negotiating table.

great, so you add picks/assets. we have: a mid-first rounder in a bad draft, a 2029 pick and, on draft night, a 2031 pick and swaps. even if you use all of that, you're not getting turner/murray. there's no configuration.

you could probably use less than all of that and have a shot at murray/capela, but i think atlanta will get better offers for murray and would prefer to move young. and they have the luxury of pitting those offers against each other.

we're just not in a good position.