The Los Angeles Lakers are looking to improve the team in any way possible this offseason and the biggest improvement the team could make would be flipping Russell Westbrook in some kind of trade for Kyrie Irving. Talks between Irving and the Nets are growing acrimonious and the Lakers seem like the most logical fit.
The free-agent market is still an area the Lakers can utilize to improve the team, although the options are limited as Rob Pelinka can only bring in minimum contracts and one Taxpayer MLE worth $6.4 million.
To be fair, the market is somewhat deep in talented minimum options and the team could be getting another possible free-agent candidate to sign. According to NBA Insider Marc Stein, John Wall and the Houston Rockets are expected to begin talks around a buyout before the 2022-23 season.
This makes sense for both sides as Houston was paying Wall to not play last season and that is not going to change next season. The Rockets can save some money on the cap and Wall can sign with a team that will actually play him.
Marc Stein names the Los Angeles Lakers as a team potentially interested in John Wall.
Stein also reported that the Lakers, Clippers and Heat are three teams that could be interested in signing Wall if he is bought out. With Russell Westbrook in LA, the Lakers might be the least logical of the three teams as Wall could get a bigger bench role on both the Clippers and Heat.
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However, there are moving parts to this just like there are with every NBA move. If the Lakers do manage to trade Westbrook then it could make things easier for Wall to come to the Lakers. Granted, he would still have an all-star point guard playing ahead of him but the style would not be as redundant as it would be with Wall and Westbrook.
Second of all, and more importantly, Wall is a Klutch Sports client. That obviously is going to have an influence on where he signs and with him being a minimum option, it is not like he is passing up more money to play for the Lakers.
All of the options present equal pay and the Lakers might be the best contender of the bunch with Irving on the roster. For that reason, it seems far more likely that Wall would sign with the Lakers.
This is not the first time that the Lakers have been tied to Wall as the team was trying to work out a Russell Westbrook-John Wall swap during the trade deadline. That ultimately fell through with Houston wanting a future pick swap to do the Lakers a favor. This opens the door for Wall to finally come to LA to provide decent point guard depth.
The John Wall buyout situation is something to monitor as there is a really good chance that he would join up with LeBron James and Anthony Davis if he does end up working something out.