With the NBA season finally coming to an end, every team will now start trying to improve. The Los Angeles Lakers may have won the championship but they’ll still need to get better as a lot of teams around them will. There’s been a lot of talk about how the team wants to go after Washington Wizards superstar Bradley Beal. In fact, pretty much every team in title contention or on the cusp of title contention has been linked to Beal.
He’s good enough to get a number of teams over the hump but it’s sounding like he’s happy to stay in Washington for his whole career.
“That would mean the world, man,” Beal said, via HoopsHype. “I’m a loyal guy. I want to be here. I’m here. I’ve signed my extension. And that will mean the world to me. That honestly would you know, being able to finish your career in one place? You know, you don’t see that in today’s game.”
It was recently revealed that Beal bought a house in Los Angeles, which led to speculation he was aiming towards joining the Lakers. He wouldn’t be the first player to say he wanted to spend his career with one team and then change his mind. However, Beal has been pretty adamant about staying with the Wizards.
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Beal Believes Wizards Can Win
The only thing that would likely cause Beal to change his mind is if the Wizards keep losing. He thinks that they have what it takes to build a winner.
“So that would definitely be an honor, you know, but my ultimate goal is to win,” Beal said. “I want to win and we got to win. And I know we can win. I know it’s a place where we can win and I know it’s a place where we can get guys to come here to win. But we got to go prove it on the floor for sure.”
The Wizards do have some really good talent but they missed the playoffs the last two seasons and haven’t made it past the second round of the playoffs since 1979. Not even Michael Jordan could get them to the playoffs. When healthy, John Wall should still be a very good player. Wall and Beal do form a strong duo. That said, they’ve been playing together for years and haven’t been able to get over the hump. It’s unlikely it’s just going to happen now.
Lakers Likely Wouldn’t Be Able to Trade for Him Anyway
The Lakers reportedly love Beal and he’d be an absolutely perfect fit with LeBron James and Anthony Davis. If the Wizards were to trade him, they’d probably want pieces to start a rebuild with. The Lakers are not the team who can offer that. They gave up most of their young talent to land Davis last offseason.
Unfortunately, Kyle Kuzma and change isn’t going to be close to what other teams could offer for Beal. The Wizards star can hit free agency after this upcoming season so the Lakers could stay patient and try to sign him but it sounds like he wants to stay in Washington. He’s probably not going to force his way out. The Wizards could accept the fact that they need to rebuild and just trade Beal to get some younger pieces.
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Lakers Rumors: Bradley Beal Has Revealing Comments on Future Plans