As the new-look Los Angeles Lakers get ready for their 2016 campaign, there were many questions surrounding how the team would go about filling out the rest of their roster. Head coach Luke Walton has surrounded his young core with some savvy veterans, and apparently Jason Terry made a pitch to join the roster as well.
Terry recently signed a one-year deal with the Milwaukee Bucks, but the 17-year vet revealed that he pitched himself to a few teams he was interested in joining.
Aside from your usual contenders, the former Sixth Man of the Year expressed his interest in joining Walton and this young Lakers squad during an interview on SiriusXM NBA Radio.
“I called my good friend Luke [Walton],” Terry said. “I told him if he needed any help- veteran leadership, in that capacity, with an ability to coach at the end of my deal, then that was something I would be looking forward to. He utterly declined, and I respect him for that.”
While it is nice to see someone who is willing to sacrifice his last years to help groom these young stars on the Lakers, Terry’s skill set would be pretty superfluous on the Lakers roster as the team already possesses a high-volume scorer off the bench in Lou Williams.
Terry likely went to Walton as the two are both Arizona alumni, though they missed playing together by one year. Unfortunately for Terry, their Wildcat connection wasn’t enough to convince Walton and the Lakers to bring him in, but Terry found himself a new home in Milwaukee.
Regardless of Terry’s dip in production in recent years, he’s still very capable bench scorer that has shot 37 percent for his career from three-point land.