Episode Details

Thursday's NBA trade deadline is fast approaching, and the Lakers are in a tough spot as they look to build around Luka Dončić.

The pressure for them to act is significant, but their assets are limited. The League might be active... but teams might collectively wait for the Giannis Sweepstakes to end before making their next moves. There aren't that many appealing players out there, anyway, and the best ones probably can't be had by the Lakers, anyway. 

So maybe it's better to wait until this summer, right? 

Well, that has its own set of problems for Rob Pelinka. First, while the Lakers might have a pretty good amount of cap space, the bigger that number rises, the more players they'll likely need to replace as they use it. They have a lot of expiring contracts. LeBron James might go. All of that opens up room, but that's a lot of players to get, and money goes fast. They could also swing trades and bring people into their cap space that way, but in that will face stiff competition from about 10 teams around the NBA that could have a good amount of space to work with themselves, many of whom are equipped with more stuff to put on the table. 

So what should Pelinka do? 

HOSTS: Andy and Brian Kamenetzky 

SEGMENT 1: The deadline is coming fast! 

SEGMENT 2: Why the summer is tricky, too. 

SEGMENT 3: What the Lakers need is coherence, not flash. 

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