2. The Los Angeles Lakers are not going to be a contender next season either
Perhaps Malik Monk could talk himself into one more one-year contract with the Los Angeles Lakers to try and win a championship and raise his value even more in the process. There is nothing better a role player can do than win a championship and play a role on that team. If the Lakers won the title and Monk averaged 14 a game in the finals his value suddenly shoots up to $12 million a season.
The problem is that the Lakers are not going to be contenders next season either. Unless Monk just has blind faith in the Lakers for no reason, it is hard to see him talking himself into another one-year deal if the hope is to win a title.
The same issues that are going to keep the Lakers from paying Monk are the same issues that are going to keep the team uncompetitive next season. There are no outs for the Lakers and next season is likely going to be a rinse and repeat year for LA.
Even worse, LeBron and AD are only going to get older. LeBron is going to eventually start regressing with age and it is impossible to expect AD to finally be able to play 70 games in a season without getting injured.
Westbrook will still be there and the team will probably cycle out the existing veteran minimum players for other veteran minimum players. It won’t be fun next season, and quite frankly, it might not be fun in the immediate future, either.