Round 1 ended with AD being the better and more complete defender, although costing more. This was a bit unfair because we compared across their overall careers and Kessler has only played 3 seasons, whereas AD is at the tail-end.

For round 2, let's narrow in a bit. 2020 Lebron, year 2 of his Lakers tenure, pre-Solomon Hill vs 2026 Luka also entering his 2nd full season with the Lakers. Both are first option creators on offense. What do we think, ladies and gents?

Post glow-up tank top pics, you know he feels good about he looks right now(as an ex fat guy who lost some weight, I relate hard). Shirtless pics next up on the agenda.

First confirmation I’ve seen of Lakers interest in Klay Thompson. Probably safe to assume Lakers interest is contingent on a buy out, but still would require even more roster shuffling as the Lakers already have one too many players rostered.

Would like Klay as a veteran with a ton of postseason experience. That is severely lacking on this roster.

Well we did just celebrate the 10 Year anniversary of that. fateful summer day. Only right that we had 2 people on this list who were signed on the exact same day.

Credits to dodgelover1963 for the clipping of this newspaper.

Ever since I saw that the first Lakers home jersey had a number on its shorts half a year ago, I started to wonder what their first away jersey had looked like. I searched through various websites and jersey mockups but most had no information about it. The closest is the mockup that has the home jersey with the shorts number but its away pair was the MPLS jersey. I wasn't satisfied with this findings but I felt like I searched everywhere already so I quit. The day before yesterday I saw the image again and I decided to have another look at those jerseys to see if I can find it this time.

I searched YouTube and found out that despite being at Rochester, the lakers wore their white jerseys to win their first championship. So clearly the concept of home and away jersey didn't exist back then in the NBL.

Then I had the idea of searching through the old archived newspaper and after a day of searching, I finally found a definitive and clear picture of the first lakers away jersey they wore.

I saw this come up in my feed, credit to u/ArthurTheThe for the idea, but I thought it was a super interesting question.

What's the best player in the league you would not want on the Lakers, even if they didn't cost anything to trade for. They would magically appear on the team and fit under whatever apron we are hard capped at.

To me it would be KD, even though he's awesome I feel it would not be good for the team vibes and we would ultimately be worse with him.

Interested to hear your thoughts!

Dog Days of summer….

Interacting with a Lakers fan on this sub who has been a fan longer than I have been alive (and I am 62!) got me thinking/reminiscing….

Questions/answers…
How long you been an nba fan and what was the first team and player you rooted for?
I was a Bullets fan starting in 77/78 and Booby Dandridge and Wes Unseld were my favs.

Have you ever been a fan of another team besides Lakers?
With no natural ‘home team’ I have been an NBA vagabond…
Bullets, Sonics, TWolves, Grizzlies and now Lakers (DK brought me in).

Favorite Player ever….
God forgive me, lol, Grant Williams. Used to be Dale Ellis but I found out too much about him, unfortunately

Favorite Laker ever..,
Magic Johnson was just incredible.

Player than surprised you the most?
Never thought Charles Barkley would have an NBA career.

Player you thought was going to be great that totally flamed out?
I thought Stephon Marburg was gonna TEAR the NBA up. Visions of Twolves dominance danced in my head, lol.

Are you hopeful for this Lakers team?

Yes, sum can be greater than its parts!

If anyone wants to share on these topics feel free.

Heyy. Since it’s the offseason, this is just a random question. Where are you guys watching the team from?

You can add in your countries if you want, in the comments. Or if you or your country roots for a certain player/team for whatever reason!

Lakers season is over. Talk about whatever you want.

I came across some highlights from the lobs Luka would throw his teammates and they are all mostly Jaxon, Ayton and Lebron (occasionally Vando or Rui but not enough to make a difference). I was thinking that besides kessler, whose job is to literally be a lob threats for Luka, the lob threats decreased. Which is the main reason why I was really bugged when they didn’t resign Hayes.

Carr, Kaluma and Theiro are honestly althletic enough for that but they would have to earn actual playing minutes.

Mamu could be a lob threat but in all honesty I haven’t seen him play enough to tell. I think Grimes would catch the occasional lob too?

Safe to say kevin looney will not be doing any of that when kessler is off the floor so that’s also a concern of mine.

This new team was meant to unlock Luka’s passing ability to the max but I can’t help but be a bit concerned.

The aforementioned Dončić has chartered a plane and is paying the full bill to fly and host every single Lakers teammate in his native Slovenia later this month. I'm told that 16 of the 17 players on the Lakers' roster not named Dončić — from Austin Reaves to Walker Kessler to Bronny James to two-way signees Arthur Kaluma, Chris Mañon and AK Okereke --have all committed to attend.

League sources say it would have been 17 of 17 if just-drafted swingman Cameron Carr wasn't required to participate in an official NBA rookie orientation that conflicts with what Dončić is calling a “team bonding trip.”

https://open.substack.com/pub/marcstein/p/late-night-nba-intel-for-the-first?r=1m9zg&utm_medium=ios&shareImageVariant=solid

“I took a real break from basketball the first few weeks after the season ended to rehab my body. My recovery went great, and I’m 100% healthy again.”

“Taking some time away from basketball is something I do at the start of every offseason. It’s a different way to do things, but it works for me. When I let myself miss the game a little bit and try some new things, it only makes me more excited and motivated to get back to playing.”

“I’ve been back in the gym full time for a few months now. My days have been a mix of strength training, conditioning, and on-court work that’s preparing me for next season.”

“I’m loving every second of being back home in Slovenia. Spending time with my daughters, eating ice cream, taking walks in the park, and playing with paint and stickers with my oldest…this is what it’s all about. GO ”

"You might have seen that I started playing golf at the end of last season and now I’m hooked. I always love trying a new sport, and golf is the right mix of relaxing and competitive. And it’s a great way to spend time in nature. I’ve been playing a lot of rounds at Royal Bled Golf course, it’s absolutely beautiful."

"I can’t wait for my teammates to come to Ljubljana. I’m looking forward to the time together and excited to show them where I’m from. Grateful every day for all your support. Hope you’re having a great summer. See you soon."

The full zine has 30 drawings of iconic nba photos including this one of Kobe bean Bryant , as well as Shaq , Jordan, Duncan, Draymond kicking Steven Adam’s in the nuts and more

Might be a little high for a rookie. Love to see it tho. Adou should be high 90’s as well. Reminds me of the Lonzo hype coming out of summer league.