**LA LAKERS THREAD** Sitting on 17! 2023-2024 offseason begins

[pmatic]

Funny video title given his perception:

 

[MVP]

Tank watch update:

T'Wolves (14)

Sixers, Suns, Mavs (12) 

The teams are starting to come back to us. 

 

[Lizakers]

Tanking is virtually impossible for us this year. We'll win 25-27 games . Trying to lose aka "tank" will just give Philly a better pick. I just don't see tanking as a possibility.

 

[MVP]

Tanking is virtually impossible for us this year. We'll win 25-27 games . Trying to lose aka "tank" will just give Philly a better pick. I just don't see tanking as a possibility.

Not impossible at all, Philly and Minny are playing better now. We're about to hit another rough patch in our schedule. We've lost to Dallas 12 straight times and have 2 more games vs them. Miami and Brooklyn are the only teams that will definitely be bad the rest of the season. 25-27 games will likely be enough to get that 3rd or very worst that 4th worst record. 

 

[essential1]

Brooklyn, Dallas & Miami are 3 teams that will be worse than us guaranteed.

Suns are playing poorly, and look to continue to do so...

Sixers playing better led to a 5-5 over the last 10. We were 4-6. Same goes for Minny.

You also have teams like Denver who could blow it up. Pelicans who are a Jrue or AD minor injury from going to the bottom of the west.

And teams that could or already have nose dived: Kings, Magic, Pistons, Knicks.


But we could also nose dive as well. But best a tanker could hope for is 4th worst record, maybe 5th.

 

[MVP]

Brooklyn, Dallas & Miami are 3 teams that will be worse than us guaranteed.

Suns are playing poorly, and look to continue to do so...

Sixers playing better led to a 5-5 over the last 10. We were 4-6. Same goes for Minny.

You also have teams like Denver who could blow it up. Pelicans who are a Jrue or AD minor injury from going to the bottom of the west.

And teams that could or already have nose dived: Kings, Magic, Pistons, Knicks.


But we could also nose dive as well. But best a tanker could hope for is 4th worst record, maybe 5th.

Dallas still plays Brooklyn, Miami, Philly and us twice. That's likely 6 wins right there at worst. Only team I'm worried about is PHX, they can't seem to get on track. Most projections have us at 28 or 27 wins right now good for 4th just ahead of Phoenix at 26 or 27, but we still play the Suns twice and Philly once that's it as far as the other bottom feeders. 

 

[tupac003]

Just hoping for the Orlando Magic treatment.

 

[BIG LEEMELONE]

Karl Malone Dropped $20K To Have Luke Walton as His ‘Personal Rookie’

Back in 2003, on the Lakers’ team plane heading to training camp in Hawaii, Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe Bryant, Karl Malone and Gary Payton decided to bid for the right to have Luke Walton as their “personal rookie.”

Upset with commentary from Luke’s father, Hall of Famer and broadcaster Bill Walton, “they said they were going to make my life hell,” Luke recalls.

Malone won with a bid of $20,000, and promised to make the 23-year-old’s life miserable—in a carry-my-bags, get-donuts type of way.

Walton and Malone, however, quickly became close friends. More from Bleacher Report:

“They all hated my dad for one reason or another. I’m sure he had said something about all of them. They said they were going to make my life hell.”



“They had an auction to see whose rookie I’d be,” Walton said. “Karl Malone played $20,000 in the pot, so I was his personal rookie. Anything he wanted I was going to have to do.”



But it didn’t last. Malone eased up when he saw how unselfish Luke was on the court. “We got along so well. I did everything he asked,” Luke says. “He was like, ‘Look, we’re not going to take out our feelings of your dad on you.'”

Read more at http://www.slamonline.com/nba/karl-malone-20k-luke-walton-personal-rookie/#BfrIETQZuzgZm7QX.99

 

[tupac003]

As much as Jerry Buss revered West, hiring him to consult would have been thorny, knowing how uncomfortable it would have made Jim.

Jeanie has done it her father’s way to this point but looks open to a change.

It didn’t seem coincidental when she told Southern California News Group’s Bill Oram, “Jerry West was the single biggest influence on me from when my dad bought the team ... a teacher and a mentor and somebody who is Laker standards.”

• The fit could hardly be better with West exercising outsized influence with a minimal title in what still prides itself in being a family organization.

With his unmatched cachet, West would shake things up, bringing a note of daring without littering the stage with bodies as in a Shakespeare play.

As I’ve noted before, West raised the Lakers’ key people. Kupchak was his No. 2 man. Personnel director Ryan West is his son.

• Nobody knows how West would respond – probably including Jerry – but he looks like he would like to be asked back.

I asked West about it recently. He said, “It’s awkward to talk about,” so that’s as far as we got on the record.

But as opposed to being turned off at the prospect, he brightened at it.

Given how valuable he would be in even so limited a role, the Lakers have nothing to lose and everything to gain by asking.

Letting him get away was not the Laker Way. Letting him stay away is worse.

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/lakers-740471-west-jim.html

I'll take Jerry West back in ANY capacity. He never should have left this franchise.

 

[tupac003]

Quote From Lou Will about the last game

Lakers practice ran short Friday, as the team had a long, productive film session going over their mistakes from Thursday's 134-94 loss to the Spurs. Lou Williams said his biggest takeaway was disappointment in the team's lack of competitiveness regardless of the scoreboard: "You're going to get your [expletive] kicked every once in awhile. That's just the reality of it. The effort has to be there. Mentally, we just have to compete every night. Even if we had played really well last night, we probably wouldn't have won that game just based on how well the Spurs were playing and the caliber of team they are. But we want to show we compete every night, and I don't think competitively we matched up."

Let's see if we see some fire today.

 

[essential1]

3:30 eastern start throwing off my entire Saturday.

 

[whiplashtw03]

Luol Deng out today. Ingram bound to have a career high type game. Would like to see B.I. explode against the Clippers, who doesn't have a SF that can guard him

 

[lovehateself]

Luol Deng out today. Ingram bound to have a career high type game. Would like to see B.I. explode against the Clippers, who doesn't have a SF that can guard him

Don't we all man

As far as tank talk goes, philly could put together a lot more wins
Not sure if Simmons will make it back in Feb as I've read but that can only make them better...right

 

[whiplashtw03]

The tank picture will have more clarity after the trade deadline. Veterans on bad teams can be moved to help a contender.

Suns could end up trading Chandler and Knight.

Philly may still trade Noel or Okafor, and it's a high likelihood they do so especially with Simmons returning. At that point, who knows if they get better or worse.

Nuggets are so bad everyone on their roster is on the trade block

And I'm sure Cuban will make sure his Mavs tank

It's not so farfetched for the Lakers to be in tank mode come March, especially if LA trades a Lou Williams, a Luol Deng, or a Nick Young in exchange for a player with no business being on this roster.

 

[moonman818]

Will be in attendance this afternoon.

Wanna see D LO drop 30 on CP head

 

[pmatic]

Damn it, the Cavs used their Varejao Trade Exception in the Korver trade. Guess we can officially eliminate the Cavs from the list of teams that can get Lou Williams.

 

[MVP]

Lou starting?

 

[pmatic]

DUNK CITY.

 

[pmatic]

Lou starting?

Matching up with the Clippers small backcourt and additional playmaking.

 

[essential1]

Jesus Lou has been terrible so far.

 

[tupac003]

Damn....

 

[pmatic]

 

[whiplashtw03]

Will be in attendance this afternoon.

Wanna see D LO drop 30 on CP head

Not gonna happen with sore knees 

 

[MVP]

Welp

 

[moonman818]

Ouch