Lakers – a franchise in need of attention?
It’s time to rebuild on one side of Staples Center. As tough as it is for Lakers fans to hear (I expect a bite back); the writings on the wall.
Their biggest hope for a new era, Dwight Howard, has spurned them to move to Houston with James Harden and his boys. The face of their franchise, and the most Jordanesque player since MJ, Kobe Bryant, is almost 35 years old and ruptured his Achilles in April.
If that’s not bad enough, the rest of the Lakers’ core is 30-years-plus and battle hardened, they have a coach who doesn’t understand his roster and a power battle at the top of the organisation. So, what to do now?
Bottom out? Hit the lottery? Wig out for Wiggins?
Weighing up the whole situation, the Lakers have little choice but to look beyond this season and focus all their efforts on the star studded summer of 2014. As of now, there’s a good chance the Lakers could be lottery-bound for the first time since 2004-05.
And that should be their plan. If there was ever a time to drop your pride and forget about winning, clear off the books and garner as much cash as possible, now is the time to do just that.
That’s when Lebron James along with Carmelo Anthony, potentially John Wall, Chris Bosh, Dwayne Wade and Dirk Nowitzki can all become free agents. Next summer also brings us the most anticipated draft class since 2003, boasting; Andrew Wiggins, Jabari Parker, Marcus Smart, Julius Randle and Andrew Harrison.
Now that Howard is gone and Bryant will be closer to 40 than 30 next season, it’s time for the Lakers to look to the future.
No-Howard
Despite the critics saying otherwise, life without Howard will not be easy next season in Los Angeles. Despite the off-court antics, annoyance and injuries Howard was a pretty damn good player last year. He couldn’t hit a free-throw but he led the league in rebounds, 12.4 PG, scored 17.1 ppg on 58% shooting.
His absence will be felt mostly on defense. Without Howard, the Lakers will struggle to put together a league-average defense next season, even it means that Pau Gasol goes to his more natural position at center. With Earl Clark upping and leaving for Cleveland, Jordan Hill remains the only natural power forward on the roster.
But Howard’s gone and not only that, he’ll be joining a Western Conference rival, whether through free-agency or a sign-and-trade. That should be enough to convince the Lakers to write off 2013-13 and start from scratch.
The Amnesty Question
The post-Howard rebuild can now begin, starting with Kobe. Though it’s unlikely, the Lakers could wipe the $30.5m that he’s due in 2013-14 off the books and waive Kobe under the ‘amnesty’ provision. With the Lakers already tied up to $79.8m in salaries for the 2013-14 season, using the amnesty clause could save the Lakers millions in tax penalties. But they surely would only consider this PR disaster only if Bryant’s recovery from April surgery to repair his torn Achilles has gone poorly.
However, all indications are that Bryant is shooting for a return by opening night (you can put nothing passed the Black Mamba) but that still seems a real long shot seeing as Chauncey Billups suffered the same injury at a similar age in February 2012 and needed the entire calendar year to recover. A year of recovery for Bryant would mean he’d be back just in time for the last two weeks of the regular season. In other words, despite his mentality it’s not out of the question that Kobe misses the entire 2013-14 season. And deep down, the Lakers would like it if he did. There had also been whispers of the amnesty provision being used on either Pau Gasol or Metta World Peace, however ESPN.com reported this morning that both have been informed the Lakers will not be using the clause on them.
The Nash Conundrum
If you’ve been paying any sort of attention to the NBA over the past few years, you’ll have noticed the Lakers are positioning themselves for a big splash in the summer of 2014, much in the same way Pat Riley and the Heat stripped their payroll in 2010. Only Steve Nash’s $9.7m is on the books for the 2014-15 season and the Lakers would do well to find the 39-year-old a new suitor, which would wipe their books completely clean for their free-agency hunt.
So who’d be interested? The Lakers will likely kick the tires on a possible swap for Dallas’ Shawn Marion’s expiring $9m contract, which would make great business sense for both franchises, allowing the Mavericks to reunite Dirk Nowitzki and Nash for one last hurrah as they too search for their next star to build around.
What to do with Pau?
If the Lakers are serious about ‘tanking’ for Wiggins, they may also explore offloading Gasol and his contract. As the roster is set now, the Lakers will struggle to make the playoffs without Howard (dependent on Kobe’s return). Gasol was completely misused by D’Antoni as a stretch four last year, but could easily hold down as a five in the league with double-digit efforts every night.
How does it serve the Lakers to get rid of him then? The worst case scenario for the Lakers would be too narrowly miss the playoffs and end up in the 12-14 range of the 2014 Draft. By keeping Gasol around they would risk being smack bang in the middle of the NBA and sat outside the top 10 of the lottery.
No matter how much the Lakers would like to move Gasol’s contract, they’ll have a tough time finding a trade partner at the current price while making sure they keep their books clean for the 2014 sweepstakes. The only possible landing spot I see if Washington, who desperately need some help in the paint and have some decent expiring contracts to offer LA e.g. Emeka Okafor.
Ultimately, the goal for the Lakers has to be to find the next big NBA Superstar, as with my Boston Celtics, all eyes are fixed on 2014. Holding on to Gasol and Nash won’t help their cause, and neither will Kobe’s will to return ahead of schedule.
The Lakers’ immediate future is extremely bleak and pushing for the playoffs will only damage their long-term future. Better to tear it down now, clear the books and look to grab the stars in 2014.
