The Lebron Thread | 2021 & Offseason

[mademan]

I think people like the allure of Ibaka more than what he is. He blocks some shots here and there, but he is not a good defender. If his shooting holds up from last year, he's one of the best shooting 5's in the league, but on a bigger stage, i think a lot of people will quickly realize that a lot of his defensive reputation is just that, reputation.

[Freighttrain]

I wonder if Markieff joins us again for the minimum or tries to find a team that will pay him more than the minimum vet. I thought he had some decent moments and overall played well, besides that godawful pass which costs us the game in the finals.

[Mos_Heat]

Ibaka would have fit nice into this lineup. Assume he wanted the clippers

I assume that Klutch knew that Harrell didn't have a market, so they told Rob you can have him for MLE. And Pelinka jumped the gun.

Obviously Ibaka is a much better fit, it's not close

[Dupp]

Ibaka would have fit nice into this lineup. Assume he wanted the clippers

I assume that Klutch knew that Harrell didn't have a market, so they told Rob you can have him for MLE. And Pelinka jumped the gun.

Obviously Ibaka is a much better fit, it's not close

Maybe I dunno. He has that kawhi championship connection and Lakers just traded green. Might be a factor I have no idea.

Ibakas old maybe he has a bad season. We’ll see but I agree they missed out here.

[Mos_Heat]

Ibaka would have fit nice into this lineup. Assume he wanted the clippers

I assume that Klutch knew that Harrell didn't have a market, so they told Rob you can have him for MLE. And Pelinka jumped the gun.

Obviously Ibaka is a much better fit, it's not close

Maybe I dunno. He has that kawhi championship connection and Lakers just traded green. Might be a factor I have no idea.

Ibakas old maybe he has a bad season. We’ll see but I agree they missed out here.

What does kawhi connection even mean tho? I would buy KD's connection, but Kawhi. Nah

[xb3at band1tx]

I assume that Klutch knew that Harrell didn't have a market, so they told Rob you can have him for MLE. And Pelinka jumped the gun.

Obviously Ibaka is a much better fit, it's not close

Maybe I dunno. He has that kawhi championship connection and Lakers just traded green. Might be a factor I have no idea.

Ibakas old maybe he has a bad season. We’ll see but I agree they missed out here.

What does kawhi connection even mean tho? I would buy KD's connection, but Kawhi. Nah

ibaka and kawhi are legit friends

[Dupp]

I assume that Klutch knew that Harrell didn't have a market, so they told Rob you can have him for MLE. And Pelinka jumped the gun.

Obviously Ibaka is a much better fit, it's not close

Maybe I dunno. He has that kawhi championship connection and Lakers just traded green. Might be a factor I have no idea.

Ibakas old maybe he has a bad season. We’ll see but I agree they missed out here.

What does kawhi connection even mean tho? I would buy KD's connection, but Kawhi. Nah

They won a title together so that’s gotta mean something. People can for pretty close relationships in a year too who knows what their relationship is.


And yes I’d also assume him and kd would be closer but who knows.

[Mos_Heat]

Maybe I dunno. He has that kawhi championship connection and Lakers just traded green. Might be a factor I have no idea.

Ibakas old maybe he has a bad season. We’ll see but I agree they missed out here.

What does kawhi connection even mean tho? I would buy KD's connection, but Kawhi. Nah

ibaka and kawhi are legit friends

really? Ok, I didn't know that

[Mos_Heat]

So Kuzma now a sub par wing off the bench. He will have even less touches.

[MyUniBroDavis]

So Kuzma now a sub par wing off the bench. He will have even less touches.

Sub par is a bit harsh lol

Hes aolis defensively (more so man to man) other than against really craft guys like harden now (although he did well on kawhi when they played) and a good finisher and off ball, just not a good passer and misses rotations. Shooting is iffy but it was a bit better in the bubble overall

Harrell/schroder/kuz are all risks in different ways. If schroder shooting regresses then he is a trash signing for us, if harrell doesnt pan out its a bad use of the MLE, kuz could be how he was this year

Otoh, schroder was a legitimate contender for 6MOY, harrell deserved it and I think theres potential in his defense, and while i get why people dont like hyping up kuz, as someone thats a laker fan before a bron fan to be honest theres clearly talent there vs your average wing, but who knows if thatll pan out

Im pretty confident schroder will pan out, and i think at least defensively harrells gonna be better. Offense is gonna be odd because i feel we might feel comeplled to play him more than he should play with AD and bron, although neither did bad with the bigs in its still concerning.

Kuz objectivelt prolly wont pan out and will be a bit better than he was this year but my gut tells me he'll be good. If we had a longer offseason id be more confident. Otoh he hears the noise

[Mos_Heat]

So Kuzma now a sub par wing off the bench. He will have even less touches.

Sub par is a bit harsh lol

Hes aolis defensively (more so man to man) other than against really craft guys like harden now (although he did well on kawhi when they played) and a good finisher and off ball, just not a good passer and misses rotations. Shooting is iffy but it was a bit better in the bubble overall

Harrell/schroder/kuz are all risks in different ways. If schroder shooting regresses then he is a trash signing for us, if harrell doesnt pan out its a bad use of the MLE, kuz could be how he was this year

Otoh, schroder was a legitimate contender for 6MOY, harrell deserved it and I think theres potential in his defense, and while i get why people dont like hyping up kuz, as someone thats a laker fan before a bron fan to be honest theres clearly "something" there vs your average wing, but who knows if thatll pan out

Nah, I don't see it in Kuz. He's neither a shooter nor a defender, average with the ball and has low bbiq. He also won't have opportunities to grow on this team. If they bring back Morris, Kuz would be 8-9th player in the pecking order

I don't see them banking on Schroder's shooting, tbh. That's not the reason he's in LA

[MyUniBroDavis]

So Kuzma now a sub par wing off the bench. He will have even less touches.

Sub par is a bit harsh lol

Hes aolis defensively (more so man to man) other than against really craft guys like harden now (although he did well on kawhi when they played) and a good finisher and off ball, just not a good passer and misses rotations. Shooting is iffy but it was a bit better in the bubble overall

Harrell/schroder/kuz are all risks in different ways. If schroder shooting regresses then he is a trash signing for us, if harrell doesnt pan out its a bad use of the MLE, kuz could be how he was this year

Otoh, schroder was a legitimate contender for 6MOY, harrell deserved it and I think theres potential in his defense, and while i get why people dont like hyping up kuz, as someone thats a laker fan before a bron fan to be honest theres clearly "something" there vs your average wing, but who knows if thatll pan out

Nah, I don't see it in Kuz. He's neither a shooter nor a defender, average with the ball and has low bbiq. He also won't have opportunities to grow on this team. If they bring back Morris, Kuz would be 8-9th player in the pecking order

I don't see them banking on Schroder's shooting, tbh. That's not the reason he's in LA

Theres schroder brings alot to the table outside of his shooting but if hes a bad shooter and doesnt space the floor, and cant attacj drop coverages hes gonna face he loses a ton of value

I mean with kuz its talent. The fit on the team is weird but hes growing, and the adjustment from being a teams second option to being a distant, distant third if even is huge, so his bad season makes sense.

I always viewed him as the worst of the young core three but while i agree his play last year is at that spot i do think he could end up quite good, although idk if itll be with us

It sucks for him that the offseasons so short, he clearly improved year 1 to 2 and year 3 was an odd scenario for him but at some point he kinda showed alot of defensive improvement

[Greyhound]

I hope Markieff does not sign with the Clippers now. He would fill the void left by Green.

He would round out their rotation and make them flat out better then they were last season.

The Lakers need to keep Markieff Morris (or hope that he gets paid somewhere else). If he signs for the minimum (to play with his brother) with the Clippers, that will be a blow.

[KTM_2813]

I'm a bit less optimistic now that I know the Lakers could have had Ibaka for the MLE. I thought they went with Harrell because Ibaka was out of their price range. He would have been perfect.

[thebigbird]

I'm a bit less optimistic now that I know the Lakers could have had Ibaka for the MLE. I thought they went with Harrell because Ibaka was out of their price range. He would have been perfect.

If Ibaka was interested in going to the Lakers then I agree. But for all we know he wasn’t and so Pelinka moved on to Harrell. It could’ve been a repeat of last year had we held out for Ibaka, and he’s not good enough to take that risk imo.

[MisterHibachi]

The more I read about the Ibaka signing, the more it seems like he was always going to either stay with Toronto or join his former teammate Kawhi with the Clippers. I’m not sure he ever really considered going to the Lakers. It’s really the Kawhi situation all over again. Except this time Rob Pelinka didn’t bother waiting on the desired free agent’s decision when an intriguing alternative (Harrell) popped up as an option.

The lakers trolling he did last week was shady af lol

I think this is likely what happened. Good point about about the Lakers hints he seemed to drop last week on social media. Lakers fans should've learned their lesson with Kawhi and Collison

[limbo]

Lakers have done a lot better than i anticipated. So far, they somehow managed to lose only Rondo, Dwight, Green, and replaced them with Dennis, Trez and Matthews... Out of the players they have lost, only Danny Green is somewhat significant, imo, and even then i perfectly understand not clinging on to a 34-year old declining role player at all costs, especially when you can replace him with someone like Matthews (which i'm not that high on, but should be good enough to fill that void for the most part).

Ok, they lost Avery Bradley too, but i don't really think it's worth tripping over that... They didn't miss him during the Playoffs, and Caruso is arguably a better player anyway.

I think Dwight and Rondo were fools gold to an extent. There's a reason why nobody wanted to sign these guys before LeBron and AD made them relevant. That does not mean the two didn't play well and provided important contributions during the Playoffs, but let's be real... Rondo sucked during the RS and faced ZERO defensive pressure in the Playoffs. Teams literally let him do whatever he wanted and gave him every open shot because they were more concerned with LeBron and AD... This would make any player look much better than they actually are. With Dwight, the Lakers weren't even using him for half of their series... He's still a good defender when motivated, but extremely limited in all other areas, to the point that he's unplayable most of the time, and really only comes in handy situationally... Schroeder and Harrell are better than both Rondo and Dwight, and pretty easily at that. Would i rather have Ibaka than Trez? Sure, but i guess you can't have everything...

The players outside LeBron/AD that had the most value on the Lakers were KCP, Caruso, Green and Kuzma... and the Lakers managed to retain all of them except Green... and they added Schroeder, Trez and Matthews on top of that, and will probably resign Morris as well... The Lakers are in a MUCH better position right now than they were a year ago. Both in terms of competing for a championship and in terms of maneuverability... Now, if they feel like they need to make more changes, they have Schroeder, Trez, KCP, Caruso, Kuzma, Matthews to bargain with... Which was better than last year when they had a bunch of old, volatile veterans and KCP and Caruso's value was lower than it is now...

The Lakers are going to be better than last season and should win a title. The Bucks and Clippers are the closest competitors, but i don't think they've done enough so far to close the gap.

[MisterHibachi]

I think Dwight will be missed, especially if the Lakers don't replace him with Gasol. It's not out of the world to think the Lakers end up playing Ayton, Jokic and Embiid on the way to a title, and Dwight would help against all those guys. AD cannot guard Embiid or Jokic effectively, and given Ayton's size, he might prove some trouble as well.

[Firebird1]

WCS could be nice.

[limbo]

I think Dwight will be missed, especially if the Lakers don't replace him with Gasol. It's not out of the world to think the Lakers end up playing Ayton, Jokic and Embiid on the way to a title, and Dwight would help against all those guys. AD cannot guard Embiid or Jokic effectively, and given Ayton's size, he might prove some trouble as well.

Embiid isn't coming out of the East, Ayton is not an elite offensive player and the Lakers are good enough to straight out-talent the Nuggets despite what Jokic does.

It's a non-issue. But just in case, the Lakers will probably still aim to sign another big man just for insurance and, again, most importantly, to not over exert Davis when there's no need... If it's not Gasol now, it will be someone else... They can even wait until the middle of the season.