It remains very possible that the Lakers move Russell Westbrook in a trade before the 2022/23 season begins, but if Rob Pelinka and his front office can’t find a deal they like, new head coach Darvin Ham is determined to “carve out a real role” for Westbrook, Marc Stein writes at Substack.
Sources tell Stein that the Lakers have thus far resisted the idea of taking the John Wall route with Westbrook and having him sit at home while he remains under contract with the team. The Rockets took that approach with Wall last season and spent the season exploring the trade market before eventually reaching a buyout agreement with the veteran point guard this summer, when he had one year left on his contract. Westbrook is entering the final year of his own deal.
As Stein observes, there were indications on social media last week that the Lakers are prepared to incorporate Westbrook if he’s not traded in the coming weeks. LeBron James tweeted that he expects his teammate to “go off” this season, and the Lakers’ official Twitter account included Westbrook in a series of videos and photos of players’ offseason workouts.
Here’s more from Stein on the Lakers:
- League sources tell Stein that the Lakers initially resisted the idea of trading Talen Horton-Tucker for Patrick Beverley when they started to discuss a potential deal with the Jazz in July, since L.A. wants to get younger and more athletic this season. However, after LeBron signed an extension, the club seemed more willing to shift into win-now mode, Stein writes, which made Beverley a better fit than Horton-Tucker.
- Stein, who first reported last Tuesday that the Lakers were giving “legit consideration” to the idea of signing Dennis Schröder, says it’s unclear whether the acquisition of Beverley eliminates Schröder as a possibility. The team has a good deal of depth at point guard for the time being, with Westbrook, Beverley, and Kendrick Nunn all in the mix, but if Westbrook is traded, that might re-open the door for Schröder.
- In case you missed it, we outlined on Friday why it will be challenging for the Lakers to include meaningful protections on their 2027 and 2029 first-round picks if they trade them.
Rank these Laker pg duos on who you’d rather have as your team’s pgs, Pat Beverley/Kendrick Nunn 2023, Nick Van Exel/Sedale Threatt 1995, Smush Parker/Jordan Farmar 2007, Derek Fisher/Ty Lue 2001 & Lonzo Ball/Rajon Rondo 2019…
Van Exel/Threatt and it’s not even close.
Lol @ its not even close even. I feel like u wouldn’t have felt comfortable replying without saying that
Nick was a big time player back then tho…link to youtube.com
It’s gotta be the 2001 champs
Nick the Quick and Threatt easy.
The Lakers are the most confusing team in the league. I really don’t know what their looking for? Randle and Fournier turn them into a 6 or 7 seed in the West this season. I have the hardest time imagining they would have a problem parting with Westbrook and a future #1? Smh
So the Lakers just dictate that they are taking Fournier and Randle for Westbrook and a pick? Do the Knicks get a say in this? I would think after a $100 million investment the Knicks would want to at least try out their newly acquired PG first.
@Tacocat1331- the newly acquired Westbrook would be bought out right after the trade with the Lakers by the Knicks, then he would then be going to the team of his choice(probably the Nyets) then the Nyets could then trade Cancer Irving. Sounds doable.
Stop trying to make Nyets happen.
Saying ‘Nyets’ makes absolutely no sense. It was a derogatory play on words for when they were owned by Prokhorov, who has had nothing to do with the Nets for three years now. Are you unaware that he doesn’t own the team any more?
This team has zero front office leadership. How can they trade youth for Beverley unless they know they can also deal Westbrook?
Just adding Beverley to the wasteland that is the Laker roster after LBJ and AD doesn’t do anything.
But then this is the $4 billion franchise that decided THT was more valuable that Alex Caruso and also decided that $10M in payroll taxes made AC expendable. As if dollars make any sense when you then add Westbrook and his league worst contract after that.
It’s amazing experience to watch the leagues most prominent franchise being run by amateurs!
You do know certain players cannot be traded until August 30?
Jeanie Buss has no idea what she’s doing and is getting advice from a bunch of clowns
Under her watch just won a championship less than 3yrs ago LOL what does that say about the other 27 team’s clown
@LAKERS4LIFE stop being a homer. Everyone knows Jeanie is in over her head. The Lakers won a title in 2020 because lebron wanted to play in LA, not because the team was well run. Not to mention the front office completely destroyed that championship roster in 2 embarrassingly bad offseasons
Again won a championship on her watch LOL clown
Being run by family members is more like it. Petlinka is either a Buss side nephew or a married in in law. A Kent Cooke/Buss hook up is what I believe.
After that most of the management teams in the lesuge are first or second cousin related with a 4 degrees of separation spread throughout.
The incompetence among them is so bad on some teams I can just short of tell you where the crosses come from.
Other could use some crossing. It certainly can’t hurt.
Here’s an idea on how to carve out a real role for Westbrook — point guard.
No, that doesn’t work, at least in the traditional sense, you can’t really take the ball out of Lebron’s hands.
Yall are both right (extremely rare for the comment section on this site). Russ is best as a pg, running the show & putting pressure on opps with the ball in his hands. But Bron is (still) among the best ever at this so Russ can’t be his best self on the Lakers.
Yeah you can. Will he let you is the question.
Lakers=Yawn
Keep yawning
Schroeder still makes sense for LA, assuming they can get him on a vet min. For one, Nunn hasn’t played in a year, and Westbrook is gone as soon as they find something halfway palatable.
This roster just doesn’t have enough talent for Pelinka to be discriminating based on position.
For all of his faults Schroeder’s level of talent is so much higher than, say, Austin Reaves that signing him seems a worthy risk to take.
All what faults?.. I basically agree with the rest tho
They should just have Westbrook be their #1 offensive player the first 10 games and not worry about losing. If he looks good than trade him immediately. Most teams are waiting to see if its old Westbrook or last year terrible Westbrook.
Westbrick can conduct a fashion show in staples center during the Lakers games.
LA is a city of debauchery and plenty of weirdos there will like to try out Russell skirts.
He might show up wearing a bra in next pregame smh.
What in the world are you talking about?
I’m guessing he got bullied by the basketball team in hs or something. Now he hates basketball. Bright side is he didn’t shoot up his school
That’s actually funny! Go Sankara!
You do know the weirdos going to LA are from outside of the state right lol
@LAKERS4LIFE. Plenty of weirdos born and raised in Cali lmao
A Lot more people here and you find more weirdos in the rural areas of this country AKA small market LOL
They shouldn’t take the Wall route and send Westbrook home. The Lakers are in a different spot then the Rockets were with Wall. The Rockets were trying to tank and wanted to give minutes to the younger guards. The Lakers aren’t going to tank with LeBron and Davis on the roster.
It’s the rest of the roster you have to worry about. One I like. Mostly because they don’t fit the fakeness that is the city of Los Angeles and will not be cried about not doing this or that because of it.
I’m a huge Russ fan
I hope he’s comeback player of the year!
If he goes to the Thunder or Wizards, sure. The award hate against the Lakers by the media is a promise no one will win nothing of any kind.
The Wizards should make a play for him.
Lakers need to move off Russ get a SG and then depth pieces then sign Dennis Schroder.
The most likely Russ idea is being include apart of a Donovan Mitchell deal and taking Evan Fouriner and whatever contracts the Jazz want to offload at the cost of 1 first round pick.
If you can get Evan Fouriner and then say Bojan for the bench for only 1 first round pick, that’s good business.
The other commonly suggest idea is Russ and 2 firsts for Heild and Turner. This would be a good move also, however I think the Jazz one is slightly more realistic, the only thing holding that back is the Knicks reluctance to give away their back up PG and SG Miles McBride and Quietin Grimes.
The Pacers deal would be easier to complete but I think the Lakers would rather keep 1 of their 2 firsts.
Either which way get one of these deals done, then I’d get Tristan Thompson and Dennis Schroder.
Bron AD Beverly Thompson Schroder Walker Bryant JTA then either Fouriner+Bojan or Heild+Turner. 10 man rotation good mix of talent. Shooters, experience, hunger, athleticism, defence, basketball IQ. Would resemble a nice well rounded team with potential, which is a massive improvement from last season.
You just want everybody don’t you?
The problem in dealing with the Jazz is that Danny Ainge now thinks every aging veteran is worth 3 first round picks after that ridiculous Gobert trade. That’s going to gum things up for a while. My guess is Mitchell ends up staying in Utah this year, because not even the Knicks are crazy enough to meet their ridiculous asking price.
You can’t teach Westbrick to shoot at this stage. You need guys that can shoot, create, and dish to take the load off of LBJ and AD. Conley, Bojan, and Clarkson would be your best bet. Clarkson had a down year shooting, but is at least league-average or better most years.
Re-up Melo too. See if Schroder will take the min.
Bryant / Jones
AD / Bojan
LBJ / Melo / Brown / TCA
Bev / Clarkson / Reeves / Walker
Conley / Schroder
That’s 14 spots.