New Lakers coach Darvin Ham declared his “love’ for the current roster during halftime of the team’s 104-84 summer league loss to the Suns, Dave McMenamin of ESPN writes. Rumors persist that Kyrie Irving‘s most likely destination if he’s traded is Los Angeles.
“We love everyone on our roster,” Ham said. “And until you’re not on our roster, you’re ours and we’re going to try to get better with the group that we have. That’s just the bottom line of it. I don’t know a player that’s come through this league in my 26 years that hasn’t had their name part of a trade rumor a time or two.”
We have more on the Lakers:
- Russell Westbrook offered some ball-handling advice to rookie Scotty Pippen Jr., who signed a two-way contract . Pippen had a team-high 19 points but also five turnovers. “He gave me some pointers and I ended up using them,” Pippen said.
- Westbrook and LeBron James didn’t exactly act like bosom buddies while watching the game, Kyle Goon of the Orange County Register notes. They sat in opposite corners of the Thomas & Mack Center and made no public acknowledgment of one another before Westbrook left the exhibition at halftime.
- GM Rob Pelinka foreshadowed at least one big move to come while speaking on the NBA TV broadcast, Goon relays. “We’re not done,” Pelinka said. “We still have more work to do.” The Lakers have an open roster spot.
- The Lakers tried in vain to engineer a multi-player trade with the Pacers, McMenamin said on ESPN (video link). McMenamin said “those talks basically went nowhere” because the Lakers’ offer wasn’t strong enough. McMenamin didn’t elaborate on what players were discussed, though it’s fair to speculate they might have either been targeting Myles Turner or Buddy Hield, who nearly got dealt to the Lakers last offseason.
- In a wide ranging interview with Andscape’s Marc J. Spears, Ham hinted that Anthony Davis is the key to the team’s success. “With AD, I would say he’s the biggest factor,” Ham said. “I’m looking forward to him having a huge year this year. I know the way we’re going to play is going to benefit him. The way I’m going to take care of him, make sure we take care of him, it’s going to benefit him.”
Russ isn’t the guy I’d look for advice from about minimizing turnovers
Lol why not? I bet he’s heard all the advice in the world
Russ probably going to be a decent coach with all the advice he’s gotten, lmao
Westbrook has past his prime.
Mid range shooting
10-16 feet: 40.4% in 2019-20 season
My prediction this season
10-16 feet: 30%
No matter who is the coach or what is the system
Why not play in Vagas Summer League?
I’m going to play AD less to “take care of him”.
-Ham
We’ll see how that turns out.
Why didn’t Lakers waive and stretch Westbrook and sign Irving a few days ago?
Because Irving isn’t a free agent.
Magic and coach Ham are satisfied about new players they acquired but Lakers reporters are not
How far can the Lakers go this season?
Hey Sillivan
What’s your deal man? Who are you?
Not intending to be rude, but if I’m going to read your posts for a whole off-season I’d like to think you’re a fellow basketball fan, perhaps with English as a non-native language?
Some think you’re a bot – can you reply giving an indication of who you are?
Nothing personal, just, how you came to be interested in hoops; have you played at any level? Favourite team/players?
I think if you can do that it would be a good thing for this forum, if not I’m considering asking the admin to block your participation, as it reads as nothing more than spam at this point.
I await your response with interest!
Thanks
Joe
Mute him if his posts bother you so much. People take this stuff way too seriously.
I second
Shouldn’t you have to do the same Joe? Didn’t know there were qualifications to post on the site.
Lakers are a 41-41 team at best.
You know ball.
I wonder what they offered for Myles turner and buddy hield, I don’t understand how they could believe they had assets to acquire both, both first rounders max Christie and westbrook is their best possible trade package right?
The answer is the lakers front office is delusional. The rumors about Hayward/rozier were nonsense as are the rumors for turner/hield
lakers GM is in a big denial. There is not much in tradeable assets they have on the team which is his fault to begin with. So how does he expect to make trades for good players? Nobody wants Westbrook. So it comes down to THT, draft picks, and Reeves. Other than that nothing of any value at all.
He’s not in denial. He’s just trying to not make a difficult situation worse. LeBron is the one who pushed to acquire Westbrook and most knew it wouldn’t work.
He is in denial thinking he can bring back a very good player with those trade assets. Nobody is going to give him a player for nothing. If I was him I would put AD on the trading block and see what they can get back.
I’m going to laugh when Pelinka’s one big move left is signing Jake Layman or Yuta Watanabe.
Step 1 for the Lakers to trade away Westbrook
Attach both 2027 unprotected and 2029 unprotested picks
If Lakers are trying to keep one of them, then Pacers or Spurs are not interested.
My question
Should the Lakers owner trade away both picks?
Lakers can hire a better GM to acquire 2 superstars after 2024.
No GM could do good trades with such limited assets. they could wait until next year sign a big name player then do a sign and trade with Lebron for a bunch of assets.
Bron and Russ such frauds, you’d never see such petty behavior publicly from Steph/Klay/Dray/Iggy. I know who the real heroes of this game are, and its YOUR 2021/22 NBA CHAMPION GOLDEN STATE WARRIORS!!!
Yeah, Draymond is such a stand-up guy. I’ll give you the other 3, and your enthusiasm is commendable for a team you’ve probably been a fan of since 2015 (just like pretty much all GSW fans outside of Northern California).
lol dude from the UK is a warriors fan, shocked
Lakers are a circus right now. Lebronze will go else where next year unless they get Kyrie!
Let him go, he’s ruining this team
GSW
They look really excited so Kyrie must be on the way and they must have found enough super glue to hold AD together.