Los Angeles Lakers Season Review

24/25 Record: 51-31

 

Season Highlight:
The Lakers made a drastic change to their roster with moves that seemingly made them deeper and stacked with talent. The highlight for the Lakers was seeing a fully healthy squad lead in a late season surge into the playoffs, which is a rare occurrence with the stars in LA being the oft injured Kawhi Leonard and Zion Williamson.

 

Season Lowlight:
Eliminated in the 2^nd round. Only a year since a finals appearance they were defeated 4-2 to the “less talented” San Antonio Spurs. A learning experience for the still learning GM that 2k is not all about stacking talent and that fit and chemistry still play a huge role in the NSL.

 

Best Trade:

Lakers send: Kevin Durant
Lakers received: Amen Thompson, Kyrie Irving

While they sent out the greatest scorer on the planet in the trade, they landed a crafty young 2-way wing in Amen Thompson and Kyrie Irving as the main featured piece.

 

Worst Trade:

Lakers send: Kyrie Irving
Lakers received: Zion Williamson, Walker Kessler

Walker Kessler is an obviously great trade piece to land however trading for Zion who has shown he cannot stay healthy and has very little trade value around the league was a puzzling move when the roster was already so stacked and they had no need for Zion over one of the best scoring guards in the NSL.

 

Other notable trades:

Lakers send: Stephen Curry, Andrew Nembhard
Lakers received: Chet Holmgren, Kawhi Leonard

Another huge risk/reward trade from the Lakers who put a lot of faith in the always injured Kawhi.

 

Lakers send: Talen Horton Tucker, 2 2^nd round picks

Lakers received: Tyus Jones

Thought this was a great trade, Tyus is one of the best backup PGs in the NBA however does lack a little polish in 2k.

 

Free agency:

The Lakers made trades post flip and have very little to do in free agency. The one player that could walk is Tyus Jones who is on more money than the taxpayer MLE. However, LA can return him as they hold onto his rights. I think it would make sense for them to bring him back, but they could also go the way of saving some money and letting him walk.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Star
Cade Cunningham

Cade finally took that leap and entered the All NSL team conversations for the first time in his NSL career. Despite being surrounded by more veteran stars he took the reins and averaged 28ppg, 4rpg, 4apg on 48/34/83 splits for the Lakers. Cade made his first All-Star appearance and NSL All League appearance being selected to the 3^rd team.

 

Flop
Chet Holmgren
While his numbers were still good in a lesser role, he did have a significant drop off to his numbers compared to his rookie year. With averages of 13ppg, 11rpg and 2.7bpg while that doesn’t sound like a flop, this was a loaded squad and compared to Chet's rookie year averages of 20ppg, 10rpg, 4bpg there was no other major outlier to choose here.

 

Draft Grades: N/A

The Lakers are in full win now mode and did not make any selections in this year's draft as they were traded for win now pieces with the Lakers 1^st going to the Boston Celtics who selected Walter Clayton Jr.

 

The Future:
The Lakers are in a great spot for the future with young players like Amen Thompson who look like a young Shawn Marion without the shooting. Toumani Camara, who looks like an elite 3&D wing and holding onto Zion Williamson who they hope can get healthy and stay healthy to realise his potential. They have a balanced approach of veterans and young studs to potentially take them to their first title.

 

C: Victor Wembanyama / Jusuf Nurkic
PF: Zion Williamson / Toumani Camara
SF: Amen Thompson / Derrick Jones Jr
SG: Kawhi Leonard / Donte Divincenzo
PG: Chris Paul / Tyrese Martin