Breaking: LeBron James’s injuries nearly killed him…
Due to their slow start to the season, the Los Angeles Lakers have been the subject of trade rumors and innuendo for the past month. However, Jovan Buha of The Athletic reported that the team intends to take a patient approach to the trade market and would prefer to see what their group looks like as a whole before making a significant roster decision.
For a team whose offseason efforts have not shown results on the court yet this season, it is the propedecision.
Rui Hachimura has missed just under half of the season, Jarred Vanderbilt has not yet played in a game, Gabe Vincent has only participated in four, and Cam Reddish has missed four games since stepping in as a starter.
Even though LeBron James, Anthony Davis, Austin Reaves, and D’Angelo Russell have all been largely healthy so far, injuries have severely impacted the team’s depth, making it nearly impossible for team executives to gain a sense of what this Lakers team looks like.
Just months after competing in the Western Conference Finals and losing to the eventual NBA champion Denver Nuggets, the Lakers made several offseason moves in hopes of building depth behind their starters so that the team would not miss a step should James, Davis or anyone else need spelled due to injury.
Sadly, the depth components that have been negatively impacted by the injury bug are those.
Executives naturally want to look at the trade market to see if there are any players who can help quickly turn things around and make up for a disappointing start to the season, but it is hard to imagine a situation in which Zach LaVine, the player most closely linked to the Lakers in trade rumors, would be particularly helpful right now.
Although he has not done anything to help his own Chicago Bulls squad maximize its season thus far, his stats are not noticeably superior to Reaves’.
Buha’s study suggests that the Lakers are making the proper decision by evaluating the players they now have, waiting for the team to be complete, and then evaluating what they have at that point.
If not, the front office’s plethora of moves before the season began to engender goodwill and excitement will have been for nothing. It only makes sense to wait and see exactly what Los Angeles has on its hands, given that any deal would require moving some of those pieces and hope for speedy development of in-season chemistry.
