The Los Angeles Lakers trade rumors continue. While it seems like the team is relatively happy with their offseason moves, they could still be trying to upgrade their roster. The team is newly committed to building around Luka Doncic, and that could mean some more Lakers trades to get him the perfect complementary pieces.
Those pieces should all have a couple of things in common. They need to be able to defend and stretch the floor with three-point shooting. We’ve already seen that a team centered around Luka’s offense with spacing and elite defensive options can take you to the NBA Finals. The Lakers could be interested in copying that process.
SB Nation’s Jacob Rude presented three different Lakers trade ideas that would help perfect their offseason.
The Lakers’ trade idea looks like this:
“Grizzlies get: Gabe Vincent, Maxi Kleber
Lakers get: Caldwell-Pope
Let’s start with one that pretty much any Lakers fan can get behind. Caldwell-Pope eventually became one of the best role players in the league, starting with the Lakers’ 2020 title team and carrying through his years in Denver.
His career has gone on a bit of a downward trend since leaving Denver, as he was little more than matching salary in the trade that sent Desmond Bane to the Magic this summer. He feels very attainable considering Memphis just traded away Bane and clearly aren’t in a win-now mode.
Lakers fans have seen how well KCP plays next to stars firsthand. Even if his game has dropped off, he’s still a 3&D wing and you can never have too many of those. It’s a far more useful way for the Lakers to spend their money than on Vincent and Kleber.”
It seems like a Lakers-KCP reunion would be an ideal move. That being said, there is almost no shot they can get him without including more. The Grizzlies wouldn’t be incentivized to do a move like this, as Kleber and Vincent are both worse players than Pope.
This Lakers trade idea while ideal, isn’t that realistic.
