The Los Angeles Lakers are prepared to cash in their best remaining trade assets if the right deal materializes.
“We would do a trade with both picks if that leads to sustainable Lakers excellence,” general manager Rob Pelinka said Wednesday. “We would also use one pick to make a marginal upgrade if we felt that was the right thing to do.”
The GM added that any such move would only happen after a lot of deliberation.
Rob Pelinka, when asked about pursuing trades to turn the team into a contender, says “we believe in this group” but added that it will take 30 games or so to properly evaluate what the team has this season.
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) September 25, 2024
A lot of Lakers fans will feel like they’ve heard this before.
Rob says the philosophy is “sustained Lakers excellence” in reference to trading both of the 2029, 2031 firsts. Pelinka said the Lakers could use one first for a marginal upgrade.
— Dan Woike (@DanWoikeSports) September 25, 2024
Back on the Lakers’ 2022 media day, Pelinka said he and the front office were “being very thoughtful around the decisions on when and how to use draft capital in a way that will improve our roster.” Since then, Los Angeles has failed to execute what one would consider a blockbuster trade.
A midseason reshuffle ahead of the 2023 deadline helped get L.A. into the Western Conference Finals. The sweep at the hands of the Denver Nuggets showed how that was all largely a half-measure which failed to meaningfully raise the team’s ceiling.
Once again, Pelinka is sitting behind a table on media day preaching restraint over acting too rashly.
There’s a fine line between being patient and being passive. The latter is not how the GM of an organization with championship aspirations should operate.
In addition, a hypothetical standard of “sustainable excellence” is both incompatible with Los Angeles’ current timeline and almost impossible to realistically attain with one trade. Pelinka is taking a long view when his two best players are both into their 30s, and in the case of LeBron James, there are no assurances about his future beyond 2024-25.
Exercising the need for time to evaluate is also questionable when this is the lineup the Lakers are going to be throwing out there. Even with a new head coach in JJ Redick, it’s hard to see what a sample of 30 games will tell fans what they didn’t already know.
JJ Redick reveals the 2024-25 Lakers starting lineup, per @ZachLowe_NBA
What will this squad’s record be this season? 👀 pic.twitter.com/1wO5t0Im5i
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) September 25, 2024
Pelinka isn’t necessarily wrong to tightly guard the first-round picks he controls in 2029 and 2031. Having sacrificed so many assets already, an eventual post-LeBron/AD pivot would be downright brutal in terms of having to rebuild.
One could even debate over whether it makes sense to trade those picks at all. By this point, the championship window may have closed altogether, so you’d be throwing good money after bad by making the kind of trade Lakers fans would want.
Therein lies the dilemma for Pelinka, who has to balance what’s best for the long term with the optics of basically sitting on his hands while one of the greatest players in NBA history finishes out his career.
