Getty General manager Rob Pelinka of the Los Angeles Lakers talks with media.
All signs point to the Lakers using their three tradable first-round picks and potentially players such as Austin Reaves and Rui Hachimura to try and acquire an All-Star level player in the 2024 offseason.
One of the Lakers’ targets is three-time All-Star guard Trae Young, who could be placed on the trading block by the Atlanta Hawks, per several insiders.
At least one NBA insider has urged the Lakers to avoid trading for Young.
“I don’t see how that [hypothetical trade] improves any aspect of their ceiling to win a title,” Bill Simmons said June 10 on “The Bill Simmons Podcast.” “They’re gonna get worse defensively, and they’ll have LeBron James in Year 22 playing power forward and taking plays off. I think that trade would be crazy.”
Simmons argued the Lakers would be better off trading for Young’s Hawks teammate Dejounte Murray because he would likely cost “fewer picks” and not force the Lakers to part with Reaves. “Doesn’t it make more sense to trade for Murray? Isn’t the price less? It’s a cheaper contract,” he added.
Simmons proposed a trade that would see the Lakers send Gabe Vincent, Jarred Vanderbilt, their 2024 first-round pick (No. 17), their 2029 first-rounder and a future pick swap in exchange for Murray.
“I thought that would make more sense for the Lakers,” he added.
Trae Young a Good Fit with Lakers?
However, ESPN’s Chris Herring said the Lakers could shake up the league by pulling off a trade for Young, citing the potential two-man game of Young and Anthony Davis as a game changer.
“His efficiency can wane — particularly from deep — but he’s also a playmaker whose penetration would create easy looks for [Anthony] Davis, who would immediately become the best big Young has ever played with,” Herring wrote on May 28. “You can already imagine how confused defenders will be in trying to decipher Young-Davis pick-and-rolls, and ascertaining whether Young is shooting floaters — he ranked in the league’s 98th percentile, per Second Spectrum, in terms of how often he attempted them — or throwing lobs for Davis.”
“All that said: Young isn’t a free agent. Acquiring him would mean the Lakers deciding to part ways with draft picks and a handful of very solid players: guard Austin Reaves, forward Rui Hachimura and one of either Gabe Vincent or Jarred Vanderbilt.”
Lakers’ List of Trade Targets Is Long
According to The Athletic’s Jovan Buha, the Lakers “are expected to be aggressive on the trade market” and would be willing to trade all three of their tradable first-round picks (2024, 2029, 2031) in an effort to form a Big 3 alongside James and Davis.
In an article published on May 30, Buha wrote that the Lakers have four specific targets — Young, Murray, Donovan Mitchell and Darius Garland. While most hypothetical scenarios have suggested the idea of Lakers including Reaves in a package for any of those stars, Buha wrote that the Lakers would prefer to keep Reaves.
“The Lakers would also prefer to keep Austin Reaves, according to team and league sources,” Buha wrote on May 30. “They refrained from including him in trade talks for Murray at the 2024 trade deadline and Kyrie Irving at the 2023 trade deadline. Reaves’ playoff performances in 2023 and 2024 have affirmed his fit around James and Davis.”
Buha’s report aligned with ESPN’s Dave McMenamin from earlier in 2024.
“The Lakers have discussed internally the possibility of packaging three picks along with players they already have on their books to pursue a bona fide star such as Donovan Mitchell of the Cleveland Cavaliers or Trae Young of the Atlanta Hawks, team sources told ESPN,” McMenamin wrote January 20.
A lot of the Lakers’ offseason moves could be determined by the decisions of their impending free agents LeBron James and D’Angelo Russell, both of whom have Player Options they must exercise by June 29.