Trade & FA 2023-24: Stein-Ingram Trade Inevitable| LAL Want Lebron Back On Any Terms

[mvossman]

Another note on LM (in case this gets any louder).  He's another of those guys who probably won't extend even under the new 140% rule.  An extension off of an $18mm salary is only in the $25mm range.  Utah is well under the cap next summer and can do what Sacramento did with Sabonis (renegotiate and extend).  Problem solved.

If for some reason they don't do that, then it is either risk UFA the next summer or cash him in at the best possible time.  It is certainly possible to see why Utah might cash him in.  He's not exactly an iron man and while he is a 25/9 guy on efficient shooting, is he really a max or super-max guy?  Is he the star to build your franchise around or the guy you want to play alongside your star?  How about his timeline compared to a longer term rebuild.  He, Lively and Luka would be an interesting Big-3 once Kyrie starts to fade.

We are coming up on Nico's 20 game evaluation period.  I find it interesting that Holmes is finally getting some run (or is he getting some evaluation time).  I've questioned whether (for the current season) the bigger need is to replace Powell/Holmes behind Lively or to replace one of Green/DJJ/GWill in the top 8.  I get that if you want to add a third star that he's probably a big wing (I've long said this team will be trouble if we have someone who pushes GWill to the bench).  But for this season's playoff run and given the assets we have, I still like putting a better big behind Lively.

Note also the move of Green to the starting lineup just ahead of the 20 game mark.  It looked good against Houston.  When is the last time we got out to a 9 point lead in the first 7 minutes.  Among the things I like about this is DJJ off the bench with THJ and one of our stars gives us more length/size than Green with THJ and one of our stars (Powell, THJ, Green and Kyrie lineups are a bad idea).  Don't know if people heard Kidd talking about Green in a recent post game.  Kidd doesn't place much, if any, value on Green scoring.  In fact, he said Green's best game was probably the Washington game.  If you don't recall, that was zero points and 4 boards on 0/4 shooting.  But, he was +12 and active in a 13 point win.  He's in the lineup to defend and disrupt and move the ball and keep defenders honest.  I think him starting and how well (or not) Holmes plays the next week plus will be interesting to watch.

Agree on the lineup changes.  Right now I see a 9 man rotation:

Starters:  Lively/Williams/Luka/Green/Kyrie
2nd Unit:  Holmes/DJJ/Timmy/Exum

One of Luka/Kyrie plays with the second unit and Timmy replaces the other.  

This would allow you to keep 3 "defenders" on the court at all times as Iztok described in his latest article.  The exception being that you would have to consider Holmes a "defender".  Hopefully Kidd gives him an extended tryout as the primary backup and we see if he can handle it.  There is also the Maxi wildcard.  With some combination of Holmes being decent and Maxi coming back healthy and showing that he is not completely washed, then I think this team will probably stand pat at the TDL unless some great move materializes.  

LM would clearly be an offseason discussion as we don't have the assets for that right now.  I fall under the camp that you would be paying too much for his offense when what you really need is defense.  Our focus should be on an elite defender who does something on offense, rather than another elite offensive player that is ok defensively.