With Larry Nance Jr. expected to be sidelined until late January, the Lakers brought in free agent big man Donatas Motiejunas for an audition, report Ramona Shelburne and Marc Stein of ESPN.com. According to Shelburne and Stein, Los Angeles didn’t immediately strike a deal with Motiejunas after working him out prior to Christmas Day.
It has been an odd year for Motiejunas, who was involved in both a February trade and a December free agent contract that were scuttled. A deadline deal that would have sent the 26-year-old from Houston to Detroit was vetoed due to concerns about his back. In July, D-Mo became a restricted free agent, but was unable to find a deal for about five months due to similar health concerns.
Eventually, the veteran power forward signed a four-year offer sheet with the Nets, which Houston matched. Following a dispute about the incentives in that offer sheet, Motiejunas and the Rockets came to a new agreement, but that deal fell apart as well, resulting in the team renouncing its rights to the former first-round pick and making him an unrestricted free agent. The only team Motiejunas can’t sign with now is the Nets, due to a CBA rule.
The Lakers don’t currently have any real cap room, which makes it a little surprising that Motiejunas’ camp would be seriously considering the club — he was believed to be seeking about $7-8MM per year. Los Angeles, right up against the cap, could offer its $2.898MM room exception, and perhaps Motiejunas would be willing to do a one-year deal at that price to prove that he’s healthy and get back on the market in the summer. There are only a handful of NBA teams with cap space, and one (Brooklyn) is off the table, so his options are limited.
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Still, it’s not clear yet how serious the Lakers’ interest is. Shelburne tweets that Motiejunas looked good in his workout, so the team’s decision is based more on how he would fit in the rotation, rather than his health. According to Shelburne (via Twitter), Los Angeles is weighing whether adding D-Mo would take too many minutes away from its young players like Julius Randle and Tarik Black.
The Lakers also have a full 15-man roster, so they’d need to waive a player to create an opening for Motiejunas.
Hopefully the audition was for the role of NBA player, because he’s a terrible cheerleader.
Odd he’d want to go to LA. Would be nice if the Pacers swooped in and got him they need another body at the 4 other than Thad Young. While they only have about $4 mil in cap space I’d assume they could go into the MLE for him.
Although I like Donotas and his shooting ability, I agree that it would be a bad idea to try to fit him into the 15 man rotation that is already in place. (And I need Julius randle to get minutes-he’s the best)