Tag: Update

The trade deadline is one week away and the Lakers are still searching for the right answer to their problems.

Is that a center? A point guard? A third star? A combination of those three?

The front office will assess those questions in the coming days. While fans wait, let’s catch up on the latest rumors and reports.

Myles on the move?

One of the names to emerge over the last week has been Myles Turner from the Pacers. Effectively, there was no report linking him to the Lakers other than people citing a history of links to the Lakers and Turner’s contract expiring at season’s end.

Naturally, since this didn’t have a starting point, there really isn’t much smoke to this one, at least according to longtime NBA reporter Marc Stein. In his latest Substack newsletter, Stein said the Pacers are only looking to move Turner if they get another starting center in return.

Yet the prevailing leaguewide sense, one week out from the trade buzzer, is that the Pacers do not want to trade Turner.

There is a strong belief among some league personnel that Indiana would need to see proposals that return a starting-level center to even consider the notion.

There are three-team machinations of deals that could potentially send the Pacers a starting center while landing the Lakers Turner, but those are complicated deals. And those are only possible if the Pacers want to move Turner, which remains to be seen.

Center not the biggest need?

While there’s been plenty of talk about the center position — and more to come shortly — that isn’t the only position of need for the Lakers currently.

After trading away D’Angelo Russell, the Lakers have been short on playmakers on the roster. There has been a heavy reliance on Austin Reaves and LeBron James in the starting lineup while Gabe Vincent’s recent strong play has come at a critical time.

However, that might not be a sustainable formula moving forward, and the Lakers know it. According to Dan Woike of the LA Times in a recent extensive piece, the need for another ball handler is very apparent even to those in the locker room.

A center also is not the Lakers’ lone need. According to players inside the locker room discouraged from publicly discussing trade targets, there’s a desire for more playmaking, a need that’s become clear since the team traded D’Angelo Russell.

As much as the discussion has been about the need for center, perhaps equally important is the need to bring in another guard. With Vincent out, the Lakers have to turn to one of Shake Milton or Bronny James and, as fans saw on Tuesday against the Sixers, those are not good solutions.

Looking for a big man

Ultimately, the Lakers’ trade deadline will probably be graded on whether they land another center. Although this has been a need for some time, Anthony Davis’ public remarks amplified the pressure on the front office to find an upgrade.

But the Lakers are not alone in searching for a center. As Woike also noted in his piece, the price for big men is high as the deadline nears.

In conversations with executives inside and outside of the organization, it’s become clear that the costs for starting-caliber NBA centers are high — particularly ones good enough to force the Lakers into the kind of seismic change that moving Davis to power forward and LeBron James to small forward would cause.

Trading for a big man just for the sake of bringing in another center isn’t going to solve any problems. Finding one that can both complement AD and also excel without him is quite the needle to thread.

But, Woike still reports that the team is looking for potential options.

The Lakers have been actively exploring adding a big man, though it’s not being done recklessly, according to NBA executives. Concerns about cost, fitting Redick’s preferred style of play and the ripples from moving Davis — namely playing James major minutes at small forward — are being weighed.

With Walker Kessler, the No. 1 target for most fans, seemingly unavailable at the deadline, it really thins the list of players who fit all the criteria the Lakers need.

The Lakers aren’t in a particularly easy situation to find upgrades, but they certainly are under a lot of pressure to do so. Sure sounds like fun!

You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude.