Rob Pelinkav deserves praise for holding onto Russell Westbrook’s contract

Russell Westbrook, a former All-Star point guard for the Los Angeles Lakers, is the player that receives the highest salary and is the one that the franchise is most eager to deal with.

The team’s front office, led by team vice president of basketball operations Rob Pelinka, deserves praise for holding onto Russell Westbrook’s expiring $47.1 million contract and the team’s two highly sought-after tradable future first-round draft picks in 2027. they discussed it in a recent episode of The Bill Simmons Podcast by Bill Simmons, Joe House, and Ryen Russillo.

 

In other parts of the podcast, Simmons says he expects Los Angeles power forward/center Anthony Davis to have a bounce-back season. Davis missed 42 games in the previous season due to various ailments, and as a result, he became one of the NBA’s worst jump shooters. The trio questions which of the 13 non-All-Star players on the squad merits third place. Patrick Beverley, who has historically excelled on both sides of the ball and is currently 34 years old, is the guy this author believes to be the answer.

 

 

Russillo and House agreed with Simmons’ hypothesis that the Lakers decided to wait for other teams to try desperately to offload assets to be as bad as possible in order to enter the Victor Wembanyama 2023 draft lottery because they believed they could possibly get even more of a return than the current best offer, Indiana Pacers veterans Myles Turner and Buddy Hield.

 

The owner of The Ringer even went so far as to say that LeBron James only agreed to a two-year contract extension with Los Angeles because the team promised to try to trade their future draft equity (as well as the Westbrook contract) to him in order to strengthen the team that would be playing around him and Anthony Davis.

 

“I think they have an agreement with LeBron to spend those two draft selections on talent, and I don’t think they like the arrangement yet. I think we will see unprecedented tank deals in December, January, and February, and you’ll have eight or nine bidders, maybe, for those two picks with the Westbrook contract. The worst-case scenario is Myles Turner and Buddy Hield [as the return], but it might even be better in the best-case scenario!”

 

Before training camp, the Lakers considered trading for Westbrook in return for the Hield/Turner combination. Both players might benefit Los Angeles and would be a significant improvement over the surrounding talent of James and Anthony Davis. They could compete for the right to host games in the postseason. Simmons wonders if, for example, the Portland Trail Blazers, who recently extended All-NBA point guard Damian Lillard, would be open to trading him if the club had a bad start, which seems likely considering their subpar preseason play. We know that Lillard, James, and Davis discussed a union last summer.

 

Rob Pelinkav deserves praise for holding onto Russell Westbrook’s contract

Russell Westbrook, a former All-Star point guard for the Los Angeles Lakers, is the player that receives the highest salary and is the one that the franchise is most eager to deal with.

The team’s front office, led by team vice president of basketball operations Rob Pelinka, deserves praise for holding onto Russell Westbrook’s expiring $47.1 million contract and the team’s two highly sought-after tradable future first-round draft picks in 2027. they discussed it in a recent episode of The Bill Simmons Podcast by Bill Simmons, Joe House, and Ryen Russillo.

 

In other parts of the podcast, Simmons says he expects Los Angeles power forward/center Anthony Davis to have a bounce-back season. Davis missed 42 games in the previous season due to various ailments, and as a result, he became one of the NBA’s worst jump shooters. The trio questions which of the 13 non-All-Star players on the squad merits third place. Patrick Beverley, who has historically excelled on both sides of the ball and is currently 34 years old, is the guy this author believes to be the answer.

 

 

Russillo and House agreed with Simmons’ hypothesis that the Lakers decided to wait for other teams to try desperately to offload assets to be as bad as possible in order to enter the Victor Wembanyama 2023 draft lottery because they believed they could possibly get even more of a return than the current best offer, Indiana Pacers veterans Myles Turner and Buddy Hield.

 

The owner of The Ringer even went so far as to say that LeBron James only agreed to a two-year contract extension with Los Angeles because the team promised to try to trade their future draft equity (as well as the Westbrook contract) to him in order to strengthen the team that would be playing around him and Anthony Davis.

 

“I think they have an agreement with LeBron to spend those two draft selections on talent, and I don’t think they like the arrangement yet. I think we will see unprecedented tank deals in December, January, and February, and you’ll have eight or nine bidders, maybe, for those two picks with the Westbrook contract. The worst-case scenario is Myles Turner and Buddy Hield [as the return], but it might even be better in the best-case scenario!”

 

Before training camp, the Lakers considered trading for Westbrook in return for the Hield/Turner combination. Both players might benefit Los Angeles and would be a significant improvement over the surrounding talent of James and Anthony Davis. They could compete for the right to host games in the postseason. Simmons wonders if, for example, the Portland Trail Blazers, who recently extended All-NBA point guard Damian Lillard, would be open to trading him if the club had a bad start, which seems likely considering their subpar preseason play. We know that Lillard, James, and Davis discussed a union last summer.