There has been plenty of noise surrounding Dalton Knecht’s future with the Los Angeles Lakers.
With the 2026-27 NBA season marching closer and the Lakers having decisions to make, Knecht has been rampantly speculated as a potential candidate to be waived this offseason. L.A. currently has 16 players on its standard roster, which means a move has to be made to trim that number to 15.
All things considered, it makes sense why Knecht could be on his way out of L.A. He is, by all accounts, coming off a brutal second season in the NBA and has failed to meet the expectations of a former No. 17 overall draft pick. With the Lakers already having far younger and more promising prospects on their hands, Knecht may have already fallen out of line on the depth chart.
Lakers Have Moved On From Knecht, Analyst Says
Among the young, acsending players on the roster is 2026 first round draft pick Cameron Carr, whose breakout performance in the summer league generated major excitement among Lakers fans. According to anaylst Trevor Lane, Carr has already replaced Knecht on the roster.
“You just don’t get as much time as you used to,” Lane said. “If you’re a first round pick and (in the) first year-and-a-half or so it’s not working out, teams are much quicker to move on from them, and you can find yourself out of league very, very quickly. I hope it works out for Dalton; I hope he can find a path there. I do think they’ve replaced him with Cameron Carr in terms of the skillset, the role, all of that.”
Lane added that the Lakers’ “most likely” next move will be a trade involving Knecht, the 25-year-old who averaged just 4.2 points per game and failed to crack double-digits in minutes per game after a somewhat-promising rookie season. Most would agree that Knecht was even outperformed by his draftmate Bronny James, who was selected near the bottom of the draft.
The Expectations Already Rising for Carr
Knecht’s fallout in Los Angeles may only add to the pressure on Carr’s shoulders. The 21-year-old was dealt to the Lakers from the New York Knicks, who selected the rookie with the No. 24 pick in this year’s draft.
“Cameron Carr is better at everything that Dalton Knecht does well,” Lane said flatly in an earlier episode of Lakers Nation.” When it comes to his ability to score, he is also a three-level scorer, he’s longer, lankier, reads the game a bit better, better defensively certainly, and he’s got work to do defensively, but he’s better defensively right now than Dalton Knecht. All the stuff that you were hoping Dalton Knecht would do — provide range, have the ability to shoot the 3, score from the midrange, get to the basket — Cameron Carr is better with all those things. So they’ve replaced him already. They already replaced Dalton Knecht. They’ve moved on.”
Things change rather quickly in the NBA, as Knecht is now learning. The good news is that Knecht is entering just his third season and has shown enough upside in the past that another team out there should give him another opportunity.
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