Giving Russell Westbrook a bench role does nothing for Lakers

The Los Angeles Lakers have struggled this season in large part due to the Russell Westbrook trade from last summer and all of the dominoes that have fallen as a result. LA was unable to build a deep rotation with Westbrook’s salary on the books and Westbrook himself is a horrible fit next to LeBron James and Anthony Davis.

It did not take long for Laker fans to turn on Russell Westbrook and the same can be said about the front office. The team was already trying to trade Westbrook at the deadline but to no avail.

Now, the front office is reportedly pressuring Rob Pelinka to give Westbrook a bench role the rest of the season; Vogel has pushed back on this pressure.

This might be frustrating to some fans who want to Westbrook play less and go to the bench. Heck, we even broke down the reasons for the Lakers to permanently bench Westbrook this season.

That is different from what the front office is pushing, though. What the front office is pushing is not going to accomplish much in the grand scheme of things.

Giving Russell Westbrook a bench role does nothing for the Lakers.

Simply sitting Westbrook at the start of games and taking him out in crunch time is not going to result in much change for the Lakers. He is still going to be playing 25+ minutes per game and those minutes are going to continue to be inefficient.

The options to replace him also are not great, especially with Anthony Davis out. If Davis was healthy then the Lakers should absolutely be trying closing lineups that have LeBron, AD and no Westbrook. Without AD, the Lakers have to either go really small, play Dwight Howard in crunch time, or turn to D.J. Augustin, who is not good.

What the Lakers need to do is permanently bench Westbrook. If the team is going to commit to moving him to the bench then they need to outright tell him that he is not going to play anymore for the rest of the season.

The team is not going to get much worse if they play Westbrook zero minutes and the hope is that they upset the competitor in him enough for him to leave this offseason. Tell him that if he accepts his player option for next season he won’t play a single minute all year and the team won’t buy him out.

Try and leverage yourself out of the contract by outright eliminating him from the rotation. Simply benching him and cutting his minutes by 6-8 minutes per game is not going to suddenly make the Los Angeles Lakers a much better basketball team. It accomplishes nothing.