The Los Angeles Lakers suffered yet another disappointing loss on Christmas Day, this time to the Dallas Mavericks to start their road trip.
The Lakers played a solid first half and went into the locker room leading by 11. The third quarter was an absolute disaster though as they gave up 51 points, which is the most in the NBA in a quarter this season. L.A. went into the fourth quarter trailing by 19 with the game out of reach, resulting in their fourth straight loss.
Whatever progress the Lakers seemed to be making in recent weeks all came crashing down when Anthony Davis was lost to a foot injury. After this recent string of losses, L.A. sits in 13th place in the Western Conference at 13-20.
As the trade deadline approaches, the Lakers have to ask themselves if this season is even salvageable or if they’re better off standing pat and saving their 2027 and 2029 draft picks for future deals. It appears that they are leaning towards the latter as according to Jovan Buha of The Athletic, Rob Pelinka and the Lakers front office do not want to compound their previous mistakes with more moves:
Reinforcements via trade would obviously help, and the Lakers are still evaluating their options on a dormant trade market. At the same time, it becomes increasingly challenging to justify trading a first-round pick if the group continues to struggle. The front office doesn’t want to compound its previous mistakes with more win-now moves.
The NBA trade deadline isn’t until Feb. 9 so Pelinka still has plenty of time before needing to make a decision. It’s looking like the Lakers will need to turn things around for deals to be made though, and they aren’t showing any signs of doing that, at least without Davis in the lineup.
What makes this season so disappointing is that Davis and LeBron James have played at such a high level. If they can stay healthy, which admittedly is an issue, then they can still compete for a championship with an adequate supporting cast around them.
The first half of the season has shown that the Lakers don’t have that though. They resisted trading their draft picks along with Russell Westbrook in the offseason to make roster upgrades and then again early this season hoping they can make the point guard work in a bench role.
Westbrook has played well at times, but his $47 million salary, which the Lakers chose to trade for, has not allowed them to build a roster with a supporting cast capable of competing.
While things can change in the coming weeks, it’s looking more and more like the Lakers are choosing to lay in the bed they made instead of making more moves to fix things.
Lakers could still make smaller moves
Even if the Lakers don’t want to make a big move involving their 2027 and 2029 first-round picks, they could still make smaller moves around the edges to improve the roster and that is reportedly a more likely scenario after Davis went down.
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