9. Signing Dwight Howard and trading for Steve Nash in 2012
In hindsight, this was an awful all-in move for two aging superstars that flopped. However, at the time, this got every Lakers fan excited to see what a Kobe Bryant, Steve Nash, and Dwight Howard big three could produce and how many titles they might win. The answer was zero, but at least the Lakers proved once again that they were willing to go all in to win championships.
Signing Dwight Howard as a free agent did not pan out and he ultimately turned down their offer to re-sign him and instead went to go play with James Harden in Houston. He bounced around the league until their strange reunion this season, when he signed back with the Lakers and they have helped revive his career.
The trade for Steve Nash somehow ended up being worse than the signing of Dwight Howard because of how many first-round picks they ended up offering for him. The Lakers were lucky enough to keep all but one of their protected picks, that ended up being Mikal Bridges, who was drafted by the Philadelphia 76ers in 2018 after they traded the Suns for the Lakers pick.
These deals could easily be on the list of the worst Lakers moments of the decade but in a decade as bad as the 2010’s it makes the list for at least giving the Lakers hope. When these deals happened, there were posts all over social media saying how this was the next team to three-peat, little did they know it would only last a season before it fell apart.