Lakers Shouldn’t Mortgage Their Future for Role Players Amid Latest NBA Trade Rumors | News, Scores, Highlights, Stats, and Rumors

The Los Angeles Lakers sound like they’ll be active during this iteration of NBA trade season.

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It just might not be the level of activity needed to actually change this team.

That’s fine for those who think the Lakers are championship contenders as currently constructed. It’s less inviting for those who can’t imagine a title run coming together for a group that has gone a solid-but-not-at-all-spectacular 14-12 so far while posting below-average efficiency marks on offense (16th) and defense (24th), per NBA.com.

L.A., it would seem, must make substantial changes if it’s going to crack the championship chase. And yet, as NBA insider Jake Fischer relayed, the Lakers are expected to prioritize “adding depth as opposed to pursuing star-level additions.”

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To be fair, it’s worth noting that we don’t know the reason behind this approach.

It’s possible the Lakers think they’re only a depth piece away from a major breakthrough. As ESPN’s Tim Bontemps reported, there is a belief that they are looking “to find both a point guard and a big man to fill out their roster.”

Those are positions of need. The center spot has been a mess outside of Anthony Davis, and the options at point guard all underwhelm. The ideal point guard would bring more playmaking than Austin Reaves, more defense than D’Angelo Russell and more offense than Gabe Vincent.

Finding a lead guard who checks all of those boxes won’t be easy—or cheap. And one wonders whether L.A.’s focus on depth is less an endorsement of this roster than it is a reluctance to part with long-term assets.

The Lakers, you may have heard a time or 20, are able to trade away their first-round picks in 2029 and 2031. However, that’s kind of all they have in terms of appealing assets, especially if Reaves is off-limits.

Maybe they can turn a few second-rounders into a serviceable backup big, but it feels unlikely they have enough to find a point guard and a center if they aren’t including their premium trade assets. And, to be clear, they absolutely should not put their best trade chips on the table for depth pieces.

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So, what if there is more at stake than the surface-level interest in support players? What if the Lakers are less enamored with the top players on the market and don’t see the kind of star player they need becoming available? Or what if they don’t envision anyone coming in and transforming this team into a title contender?

That would be a reasonable stance. Sure, it always feels like L.A. deserves some benefit of the doubt for having Davis and LeBron James together, but that pair was healthy as ever last season and this club never remotely resembled a top-shelf contender. Maybe the Lakers feel they’re too far away to trade their way into a title.

If that’s the case, though, then what is the objective for this current bunch? Because when you put Davis and James on the same roster, you are at least externally signaling that it’s championship-or-bust time. Because if it isn’t, you’re sort of stuck in a holding pattern and waiting for what’s next.

It’s forgivable for the Lakers to feel hesitant about parting with future picks when so much of their long-term outlook remains unsettled. It’s less forgivable to ask Davis and James to bring their all every night without the front office doing everything it can to upgrade the roster around them.

The Lakers need more than depth pieces to really rise up the ranks. Given the appeal of those two future firsts, they can afford to aim higher in trades.

They’ll only do that, though, if they see a championship parade as a realistic outcome for this club. It’s more than fair to wonder whether everyone within the organization shares that vision, because if the goal is a championship, the trade season focus can’t be on role players.