Goran Dragic was officially bought out by the San Antonio Spurs on Tuesday morning and he should be signing with his new team in the near future. That new team could be the Los Angeles Lakers, who are rumored to be one of the frontrunners for the former Miami Heat guard.
While Dragic seems like an unrealistic signing for the Lakers, stranger things have happened and the Lakers could shock us and end up with the veteran point guard. If they do, it appears as if they landed the best buyout player on the market.
However, that might not actually be the case. In a previous article, I wrote that Dragic was a better point guard than Dennis Schroder, which upon reflection, might not be the case — at least when it comes to the Lakers specifically.
Dennis Schroder would be better for the Lakers than Goran Dragic.
Schroder has not been bought out by the Houston Rockets yet and actually played a game in Houston after being traded by Boston. You cannot blame the Lakers for jumping on whoever they can get, though, and if Dragic is ready to sign with LA then the team might not wait for Schroder.
But if both become available and the Lakers have their choice that choice might just be Schroder. I know, it sounds ludicrous with how much Laker fans have bashed Schroder and how bad he has looked at times, but we might be overvaluing Dragic here.
Dragic, at his best, is far better than Schroder. However, Dragic is also 35 years old and has only played five games this season. That is far too small of a sample size to completely dissect but his numbers last year were not all that impressive, either.
His shooting percentages were around the same and he still averaged 13.4 points per game but he was not all that efficient on offense. More importantly, he was not good at the defensive end. Dragic is someone who was never anything special defensively and that has not aged well in his career.
At this point in their careers, Schroder and Dragic are probably on a level playing field with Schroder having the higher potential ceiling as he still has the big game that he breaks out every here and there.
But the most important thing to consider is the workload that these guys would be taking on. The Lakers’ best-case scenario is getting a guard who can play big minutes so they can tell Russell Westbrook to simply go home. Schroder is much better suited to do that at this point in his career than Dragic.
With the capability of playing a bigger role in the rotation, as well as being familiar with the team itself, the Lakers would be wise to favor Dennis Schroder over Goran Dragic.