2014-15 Official Lakers Season Thread, Vol: We Love Each Other

How Many Wins This Season?

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Why is it hard to be worse or just as bad as last year? Kobe is a year older and our roster will be all new, possibly all cheap. Our lottery pick might sit till Feb. Y'all need to stop that destination entitlement talk. Last time someone big wanted to come to LA was... a washed up Nash a couple years ago? Before that... Kobe in '96 on draft day?

Bottom line, a lottery pick next year >>>>>>>> praying some big name wants to come next summer.
This has to be CP 
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It's possible. But if the building blocks they're gonna get are 10-year vets like Deng, Ariza, and Gortat, all approaching their 30's, then no. They're gonna need that Top 5 pick if that's the building blocks they can get.

Personally I'm not gonna have a set opinion on tanking next year till I see what they get in free agency this summer.

There is a widespread obsession with youth that I can't understand. Teams that go deepest in the playoffs are usually the oldest. Even if you stockpile young guys eventually you need to flip them for vets if you're serious about winning. The average age of your team being 30 is not a deterrent from winning a chip
 
1.) In this case it's not even an obsession with youth, it's the fear of age. Why get 10-year vets now, when you need to wait for Kobe's contract to expire and they could very well be over the hill by then?

2.) View media item 1049581
 
What part of anything Mitch has said over the past few months triggered you to think that the Lakers aren't going to make moves in FA to better this team?
What makes you think that Kobe(Who takes losing about as bad as anyone i've ever seen in sports) was going to sign that contract in order to waist his last two years on a team purposely not trying to improve?
Why do you think the Lakers, A franchise that's missed the playoffs maybe 5 times max in the past 30 years, is going to lay down and not even attempt to make plays towards getting better?

Your making an assumption that LA is fine with throwing away the season based off nothing, nothing from the star player, the GM, or the Owners has been stated to make you believe that this is their choice of action. So that's why they can't be worse because the Lakers went out and filled their team with D-league players, Had injuries to every player on the roster, Didn't have Kobe AT ALL.... and still ended up with the 6th pick... with a team set up to fail. The Lakers aren't going into the season with that mindset this year.

And personally who gives a goddamn if the suns get the pick they have been getting Lottery Picks for years and failing miserably at it... They have way too many young players already. This draft already isn't particularly good, and it isn't worth another season setting them up to fail just to keep them away from the pick.
 
For the record I don't think anyone in here has said anything about getting old, taking on salary, or getting 10 year old vets.

Some are just against tanking for a top 5 pick that you stay may not get even if you do lose to get young.

People read "young, low salary, etc." and don't even know why you need to do it. So stupid.
 
What part of anything Mitch has said over the past few months triggered you to think that the Lakers aren't going to make moves in FA to better this team?
What makes you think that Kobe(Who takes losing about as bad as anyone i've ever seen in sports) was going to sign that contract in order to waist his last two years on a team purposely not trying to improve?
Why do you think the Lakers, A franchise that's missed the playoffs maybe 5 times max in the past 30 years, is going to lay down and not even attempt to make plays towards getting better?

Your making an assumption that LA is fine with throwing away the season based off nothing, nothing from the star player, the GM, or the Owners has been stated to make you believe that this is their choice of action. So that's why they can't be worse because the Lakers went out and filled their team with D-league players, Had injuries to every player on the roster, Didn't have Kobe AT ALL.... and still ended up with the 6th pick... with a team set up to fail. The Lakers aren't going into the season with that mindset this year.

And personally who gives a goddamn if the suns get the pick they have been getting Lottery Picks for years and failing miserably at it... They have way too many young players already. This draft already isn't particularly good, and it isn't worth another season setting them up to fail just to keep them away from the pick.
Folks are in the mindset that we aren't gonna win a championship anyway, so what's the point. Midas well tank.
 
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Clarkson has a nice first step and somewhat explosive on his feet. He's also long for the position. Decent skillset to learn how defend the PG in the league but I digress...

I'm more concerned about Patric Young right now than the vet FAs... I needs Mitch to get in contact with the boy. Strength, rebounding, rim protection, and intelligence is hard to come by in the middle. We needs that man. Especially considering the price tag on homie
 
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For the record I don't think anyone in here has said anything about getting old, taking on salary, or getting 10 year old vets.

From 2 pages ago:

Guys like deng/ariza/gortat would be significant upgrades tho laugh.gif

I just don't understand the certainty that we will suck that bad next year, team hasn't even been built yet. It's like everybody's expecting 12 ppg from kobe and no fa signings. If anything I would expect them to be more aggressive in fa this summer since apparently they are no longer concerned about love. You will find better centers in 15 free agency, the focus this year should be the 1,2,3 positions. Our bench was right behind the spurs in terms of ppg, some basic tweaks to the starting lineup and a bottom 5 record is completely out the question.

People read "young, low salary, etc." and don't even know why you need to do it. So stupid.

The reasoning's been explained. Dozens of times.
 
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We’ve all gone round after round on the idea of tanking. Clearly, the ones who aren’t bothered by it are fine doing it to ensure getting our pick back from a division rival.

Obviously, the ones who hated tanking last year, hate tanking this year. No one is going to change.

The point remain the same however. We took it in the shorts with this Nash deal. On top of having to pay him 9.7 million to rot on our bench this year, not compete for a title, now we turn around as a rebuilding team, and hand over a potentially valuable pick on top of that? And people seem to be ok with that. :lol

It would be one thing if Nash was out the door already this year, and no cap issue with the 9.7 At that point, if you want to hand over an extra draft pick to a team in the division (and mind you, we are ALREADY well behind the Warriors and Clippers, now we want to help the Suns get better?????) But if Nash’s deal was gone, and you wanted to hand the pick over, that’s fine. Or another scenario, if Kobe had taken 10 million, instead of 23.5, again, we could get even more depth/assets, and you could be ok giving away the pick as you could potentially only turn over the…….20thish pick or higher.

Many of us, do not agree. A lot of the problems we’ve run into are the result of selling off picks and not keeping the back end of the roster full.

Make no mistake, we are a rebuilding team. The fact remains, Kobe took the 23.5, Nash is still in house with another 9.7, that limits the amount of damage we could do. Instead of having 50+ million, we have 30. Still a good amount, but 2 pieces alone could take 90% of that. With 50+ you could get Monroe, Lance, Bledsoe, Isaiah, Gortat and still fill out the roster with backend vets like Henry, Young, Farmar, Marshall, etc. That would be a team ready to move forward, after Kobe leaves.

You either go all in, for titles, or shut it down to max out assets. No middle ground. You guys wanting to get the 8 seed and turn over the 15th pick in division aren’t doing a damn bit of good, at all. That’s the Charlotte Bobcats, or Atlanta Hawks you’re talkin about. Good enough to get annihilated by the #1 seed, but not bad enough to pull a top college player that could alter your future.

Keeping the pick (either by tanking so hard we lock in a top 5 spot, or with a miracle, hail mary, Silver wink wink Cav like come up) gives us another top end player at 19-20, 3.5 mil a year or so, we’d have 2 kids at say 6 million per in Kobe’s final season. Once his contract leaves our franchise, we have 2 kids to build around, sort of Steph/Klay like, or Love/Rubio, or Griffin/Gordon. Duo’s worth building around. (I used those examples for all coverage’s. Note, Gordon was used to pull in CP3. Love is likely to be flipped after failing to build around him (taking Rubio instead of Steph :{ ) and the Steph/Klay duo are alive and strong in our division, and could be nice together for several more years.)

We absolutely can screw up and try to “make a run” this year, which we all know will fail, we won’t win a title, but at least we burn Nash’s deal at the end of the year, and only have one horrible year left of Kobe’s albatross. It’s a start at least.

But going thru the year at 38-44, missing the playoffs, and then giving the pick away to the Suns, (who just had 3 first round picks, would then have 2 more next year), is better than being 20-62, getting the 5th pick in the draft, and taking someone to play beside Randle the next 7-8 years minimum? Those extra 18 regular season wins mean something to you guys?

I ask, honestly, no joke, what the **** for? What the blue **** do those 18 regular season wins mean so much to you guys rather than a chance at adding another top 5 pick for 3.5 million dollars (give or take)

An idea? A source of pride? “We don’t tank”?

Sorry, those 18 wins don’t mean a thing to me compared to getting a nice, cheap, young, asset that can help get us online for 2016 thru 2024 or however long they last.

So we all agree, some want to build one way, others want to build another way. No harm, no foul. Same as last year. We all want the Lakers to be better, we just want to get there in different manners.
 
1.) In this case it's not even an obsession with youth, it's the fear of age. Why get 10-year vets now, when you need to wait for Kobe's contract to expire and they could very well be over the hill by then?

2.) View media item 1049581

Lakers are trying to contend with kobe not wait until he expires. That's straight from mitch. I'm guessing they are trying to build a supporting cast that can act as a bridge from kobe's contract to whoever the next max guy will be. In that case you will need a guy like randle (check), young cheap bench guys (check), and then a handful of guys that have about a 3 year window before they need to be replaced. So when kobe's contract is up you can have a core that's been to the playoffs two years and knows what it needs to go further. Just a matter of plugging in pieces
 
From 2 pages ago:

The reasoning's been explained. Dozens of times.

Deng/ariza/Gortat was clearly sarcasm to the affect that they would be upgrades to our roster cuz we have no one. Nice try tho

And I know why a team needs to go young with not taking up space. I don't need that explained. It just seems to me that most people in here see people like you and CP talk about tanking, getting as many high draft picks as possible, getting low salary contracts and go right along with it without really knowing why ...not formulating own opinions.

You go young with low salary to flush & rebuild to get old and win. Period.
 
CP, honestly. I was about to go back into hiatus.

But, that was an awesome post.
Serious. Extremely objective, logical, and said without a demeaning tone.

If you'd post your thoughts like that more often it would be hard to ever disagree with you.

Everything you said makes sense, you've always been smart to me, but you usually don't post your thoughts so kindly and objectively :lol

Objective in the sense that you don't crap on people in between the lines while you speak about the opposite views in the thread.

I agree with most of what you said. It's just so hard to go into another season dealing with being horrible.

It's going to be hard to root against Kobe in his last 2 years, logical or not. We're obviously stuck with him with that stupid contract, so my heart says root for W's and hopefully Kobe goes out on top (even though that's extremely unrealistic). But my head says nah CP is right we gotta tank it and load up, we have no chance.

So it's tough.

But I'll say this, I've taken a step towards you and P's beliefs. I see the light at the end of the tunnel. I'm not the stubborn guy I was a year ago (and it's nice to see you're not either, you've definitely shown me some growth with that post). So I know what needs to be done.

It's just going to be up to my heart to see which way I lean on a game to game basis. I'll want us to win, but will be happy to lose... If that makes sense.

I appreciate your post though real talk.
You just gave me hope that I can stay in the thread and see more level headed discussions instead of going back on hiatus and trying to avoid the stubborn non sense.

As long as we're all able to see and acknowledge each other's views even if we disagree, in an understanding manner, this thread will head in a more peaceful direction.

Good stuff.

Hi guys.
 
I would have taken LaVine at 13, yes.

Hood is a shooter only tho, LaVine "maybe" develop into more than just a shooter, and that's the gamble. Look how far Hood dropped down, he's a one trick guy. LaVine could grow into more, up to your team to teach him, and him to work for it now.

Give him a little time, he could jump in 2-3 years.

You got Julius Randle at No. 7, and Minnesota got Zach LaVine at No. 13. Just think about that.

It's never as easy as most say, but they could have traded down. It's not about liking a guy, it's about getting value. Hood shot 42 percent from 3 at Julius Randle's height - compare that to Baylor's sniper the past three years, Brady Heslip, who shot 47 percent.

Every time ... take a one-trick pony over a no-trick mule.
 
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And I know why a team needs to go young with not taking up space. I don't need that explained. It just seems to me that most people in here see people like you and CP talk about tanking, getting as many high draft picks as possible, getting low salary contracts and go right along with it without really knowing why ...not formulating own opinions.

Yes. I clearly said on the last page that I have no opinion on tanking again until I see what they actually get in free agency.

Nice try tho.
 
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Lakers are trying to contend with kobe not wait until he expires. That's straight from mitch. I'm guessing they are trying to build a supporting cast that can act as a bridge from kobe's contract to whoever the next max guy will be. In that case you will need a guy like randle (check), young cheap bench guys (check), and then a handful of guys that have about a 3 year window before they need to be replaced. So when kobe's contract is up you can have a core that's been to the playoffs two years and knows what it needs to go further. Just a matter of plugging in pieces

If they can get those pieces to plug in via free agency, then yeah. I just think those options are always gonna be limited.

Names like Ariza, Gortat or Deng might be better than what the Lakers have, but being better is not saying much and isn't enough. They need to be good for a sustained period of time. Even 3 years is a lot to ask for guys of their age and mileage.

It's far from a given a team built through free agency will be making the playoffs and getting experienced for the next 2 years, though. Possible, but not given.
 
I completely see why some would want to tank.... the point i'm making is that despite what ya'll want, Management, Players & ownership doesn't want to do that so why continue advocating for it.

We've had this discussion in the past and you were advocating for signings of Bledsoe/Monroe/Stephenson and i didn't think it was wise to sign all of those guys and take ALL of our cap space... I much rather have as much cap as possible in 2016.

With that said i also didn't want to go into 2016 With Julius Randle and some random *** rookie as what's luring FA here because just as theirs a chance for them to flourish their is a huge chance for Them to fail at the pro level also, and then we have no real reason for people to be here besides money.

I rather the middle ground and say we pick up one of those guys this year... Fill the roster with medium contracts for two years, then next year nash comes off we have money for another AS Caliber player... By the 2016 come & Kobe comes off we have Randle, 1 of the young guys in Stevenson/Bledsoe/Monroe & possibly a K.Love or any other young stud picked up in 2015 FA. And we can make our pitch to whoever is on FA 2016 or Any young superstar who is displeased with their current situation.

But this idea of Not adding any pieces in the short term to lose and rely purely on rookies sets very serious risk to 2016. Long Story short the way the lottery has gone the past few years your getting alot more Corey Brewer Than KD, and it's not worth passing over young proven players for hope in the draft.

The one thing we can agree with is that L.A needs to stay away from anybody above 30 who isn't a Superstar (Melo/Bron) or isn't willing to take no more than a 2 year deal. Like them signing a guy like Deng to a 3-4 year deal would make me want to bash my skull in. But giving 12 Mill to a Bledsoe i'm fine with because he's a good piece for the future and I KNOW he can play at a high level already.
 
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We’ve all gone round after round on the idea of tanking. Clearly, the ones who aren’t bothered by it are fine doing it to ensure getting our pick back from a division rival.

Obviously, the ones who hated tanking last year, hate tanking this year. No one is going to change.

The point remain the same however. We took it in the shorts with this Nash deal. On top of having to pay him 9.7 million to rot on our bench this year, not compete for a title, now we turn around as a rebuilding team, and hand over a potentially valuable pick on top of that? And people seem to be ok with that. :lol

It would be one thing if Nash was out the door already this year, and no cap issue with the 9.7 At that point, if you want to hand over an extra draft pick to a team in the division (and mind you, we are ALREADY well behind the Warriors and Clippers, now we want to help the Suns get better?????) But if Nash’s deal was gone, and you wanted to hand the pick over, that’s fine. Or another scenario, if Kobe had taken 10 million, instead of 23.5, again, we could get even more depth/assets, and you could be ok giving away the pick as you could potentially only turn over the…….20thish pick or higher.

Many of us, do not agree. A lot of the problems we’ve run into are the result of selling off picks and not keeping the back end of the roster full.

Make no mistake, we are a rebuilding team. The fact remains, Kobe took the 23.5, Nash is still in house with another 9.7, that limits the amount of damage we could do. Instead of having 50+ million, we have 30. Still a good amount, but 2 pieces alone could take 90% of that. With 50+ you could get Monroe, Lance, Bledsoe, Isaiah, Gortat and still fill out the roster with backend vets like Henry, Young, Farmar, Marshall, etc. That would be a team ready to move forward, after Kobe leaves.

You either go all in, for titles, or shut it down to max out assets. No middle ground. You guys wanting to get the 8 seed and turn over the 15th pick in division aren’t doing a damn bit of good, at all. That’s the Charlotte Bobcats, or Atlanta Hawks you’re talkin about. Good enough to get annihilated by the #1 seed, but not bad enough to pull a top college player that could alter your future.

Keeping the pick (either by tanking so hard we lock in a top 5 spot, or with a miracle, hail mary, Silver wink wink Cav like come up) gives us another top end player at 19-20, 3.5 mil a year or so, we’d have 2 kids at say 6 million per in Kobe’s final season. Once his contract leaves our franchise, we have 2 kids to build around, sort of Steph/Klay like, or Love/Rubio, or Griffin/Gordon. Duo’s worth building around. (I used those examples for all coverage’s. Note, Gordon was used to pull in CP3. Love is likely to be flipped after failing to build around him (taking Rubio instead of Steph :{ ) and the Steph/Klay duo are alive and strong in our division, and could be nice together for several more years.)

We absolutely can screw up and try to “make a run” this year, which we all know will fail, we won’t win a title, but at least we burn Nash’s deal at the end of the year, and only have one horrible year left of Kobe’s albatross. It’s a start at least.

But going thru the year at 38-44, missing the playoffs, and then giving the pick away to the Suns, (who just had 3 first round picks, would then have 2 more next year), is better than being 20-62, getting the 5th pick in the draft, and taking someone to play beside Randle the next 7-8 years minimum? Those extra 18 regular season wins mean something to you guys?

I ask, honestly, no joke, what the **** for? What the blue **** do those 18 regular season wins mean so much to you guys rather than a chance at adding another top 5 pick for 3.5 million dollars (give or take)

An idea? A source of pride? “We don’t tank”?

Sorry, those 18 wins don’t mean a thing to me compared to getting a nice, cheap, young, asset that can help get us online for 2016 thru 2024 or however long they last.

So we all agree, some want to build one way, others want to build another way. No harm, no foul. Same as last year. We all want the Lakers to be better, we just want to get there in different manners.

I agree with a lot of your points and the reasoning behind it. But you are forgetting one thing. The pick isn't ours. It's the Suns. We traded it away. Good idea in theory but it obviously blew up in our faces once Nash got hurt and D12 stayed to his dbag ways.

But CP you shouldn't be concerned about a "division rival" a pick that's "value" is unmeasured. The Suns can stockpile as many assets as they want to. Wake me up when they can flip those in a transaction to a superstar.

All these teams that stockpile high draft picks/assets are still in the same boat year after year.
I can understand doing it in years we have to. I'm not totally opposed to it next year if that's who we are. But not going out of our way to do it. No reason to. Too many unknowns.
This year Nash is gone. Year after that Kobe is gone. There goes the age & money argument. No reason to have a roster with nothing but 19 yr olds. By the time they mature and ready for a title run we will all be in wheelchairs lol.

Think more Spurs and less Suns.
We need a perfect mixture of veteran leadership & talented youth. Once that talented youth grows to veteran leadership infuse the team with new youth.
But we can't just keep going into draft lottery year after year.
 
Deng/ariza/Gortat was clearly sarcasm to the affect that they would be upgrades to our roster cuz we have no one. Nice try tho

Exactly. When I said more aggressive in fa I meant throw more money at guys like lance and bledsoe. A core of say bledsoe/lance/randle with complimentary pieces like farmar/kelly/sacre can transition you from a kobe to a durant without a complete overhaul of the roster, just plugging in mid level guys and vets
 
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