Chris Bosh wants to come to La

[Slava]

That's 3 max players on one team. We'll be very lucky to get by with role players on rookie contracts/MLE type money for the next 4 seasons with that.

Kobe(Locked up for 3 seasons)
Gasol (Locked up for 3 seasons)
Bosh(Will demand 5 years?)
Artest(locked up 3-5 seasons based on options)
LO(locked up for another 3 seasons)

That's close to 70 mil right there.

[semi-sentient]

... and with Bynum, it's going to be $65 million. Either way, we're pretty much screwed as far as salary is concerned.

The only way we can improve, either way, is to use our MLE and make something happen with Vujacic's expiring next season. Heck, we might be able to get rid of him in a Bosh/Bynum trade and also take on Calderon -- a shooter that we desperately need and a guy that already knows Gasol's game. Then all we need to do is worry about bringing in some solid bench players to back up Kobe/Artest (Mike Miller, Kyle Korver, JJ Redick come to mind) and we'd be set for a while.

All things being equal, which they aren't, I'd rather hang on to Bynum because I know what kind of impact he can have. I also know what kind of impact he DOESN'T have due to his constant injury issues, so I'd much rather role the dice on a 100% healthy Bosh/Gasol combo than a 50% Bynum/100% Gasol combo.

[Ronathinyo]

if you've been watching these finals, its pretty evident how important Bynum is to us, he causes so many problems for other bigs, Chris Bosh is soft on defense

[Free Rider]

if you've been watching these finals, its pretty evident how important Bynum is to us, he causes so many problems for other bigs, Chris Bosh is soft on defense

The issue has never been whether Bynum is important to us. We all know how valuable he is to the Lakers and the vast majority of us would take a healthy Bynum over Chris Bosh. But we continue to see that we can no longer depend on Bynum being healthy. If we lose in Finals are big part of that will be due to Bynum's injuries limiting his ability to stay on the court. I just don't think we can roll the dice and hope that his knees hold up until the playoffs next time. Whatever faith I had in Bynum's health was shattered when he went down for the third straight year.

[Puffthemagic]

so bosh said i wanna be a laker...so did artest before he became one,how many years did he have to wait.so is there anything other than bynum that we can work around...anyone

[mavs4life123]

What you guys need to do is somehow trade bynum plus fillers for marc gasol and rudy gay. Rudy gay is the perfect fit in LA which gives youth, athletic ability like ariza but with better offense and defense..

[Cqc_Nastyn8]

What you guys need to do is somehow trade bynum plus fillers for marc gasol and rudy gay. Rudy gay is the perfect fit in LA which gives youth, athletic ability like ariza but with better offense and defense..

hey thats not a bad idea really.

[The Skyhook]

What you guys need to do is somehow trade bynum plus fillers for marc gasol and rudy gay. Rudy gay is the perfect fit in LA which gives youth, athletic ability like ariza but with better offense and defense..

Memphis took enough criticism when the Gasol trade went down. I don't think trading with the Lakers again is on their mind. However there would definitely be fans open to the trade if it came up.

[Dr Positivity]

That's 3 max players on one team. We'll be very lucky to get by with role players on rookie contracts/MLE type money for the next 4 seasons with that.

Kobe(Locked up for 3 seasons)
Gasol (Locked up for 3 seasons)
Bosh(Will demand 5 years?)
Artest(locked up 3-5 seasons based on options)
LO(locked up for another 3 seasons)

That's close to 70 mil right there.

Bosh actually only makes 3 and 3.5 mil more than Bynum the next two years. After that it'll cost a lot more. But at least IMO... and don't kill me for this... Kobe will be washed up after two more seasons and playoffs. With two more years like this one he'll be around 52,000 minutes after the 2012 playoffs and will be at 55,500 by the end of the following playoff run. Not even Kareem and Karl had longevity like that.

So the way I see it the Lakers should go all-in the next two years and then take the lumps after.

[richboy]

If Bynum could stay healthy you would keep him but lets be real. He is always injured. Even when he isn't healthy it seems rare that Gasol and Bynum play well together. Not to mention sometimes having Gasol as your number 2 can be scary. He can completely disappear at times.

If the Lakers traded for Bosh you would know that almost every game you would have 3 guys getting you 20. As of right now you only have 2. Then you can use the MLE on a Nate Robinson or maybe a JJ Redick. Shaq maybe? Would definitely have the offense even against a elite defense.

[Icestorm959]

Just a thought:

Gasol for Bosh + Toronto first round pick this year.

I don't think you really lose anything swapping bosh for gasol, and you gain a lottery pick in a deep draft.

[Free Rider]

Just a thought:

Gasol for Bosh + Toronto first round pick this year.

I don't think you really lose anything swapping bosh for gasol, and you gain a lottery pick in a deep draft.

Even a soft Pau Gasol is a better player that Chris Bosh. The only reason why we would want to trade Bynum is because he's injury prone and therefore unreliable in the playoffs in the future. Trading Gasol would do nothing to address that; at best it's a lateral move that gets us the same type of soft big man with less of a post up game.