The Los Angeles Lakers somehow have a lot of roster turnover from last season but it still feels like the front office did not do much in the offseason. Rob Pelinka and co. swapped out minimum-contract role players for other minimum-contract role players and that was really about it.
A Russell Westbrook trade loomed over the franchise all summer and nothing ultimately happened despite all of the speculation. Now LA has a player that already fits poorly and now openly knows the team will trade him the second it gets an offer it likes.
Los Angeles did make one trade, though. The team traded Talen Horton-Tucker and Stanley Johnson for Patrick Beverley in a move that seemed genius at the time. While getting Beverley was probably the best thing the team could do at the time, there was a pretty avoidable mistake that was made in that trade.
That mistake was including Stanley Johnson. Los Angeles needed to include someone to make the trade work financially, but choosing Johnson was ill-advised. The roster seriously lacked wing players so what did Rob Pelinka do? Traded one of the true wings on the roster.
Making matters worse is the fact that Utah seemingly didn’t even want Johnson! At the time we could give the Lakers the benefit of the doubt and assume that the Jazz demanded for Johnson to be included. However, Johnson didn’t even make the Jazz roster, showing that LA could have done this deal with someone else included.
Stanley Johnson was told shortly after tonight's game that he was not going to be kept on the roster and was understandably upset. But he's already proven he's a legit NBA player and will be defensively helpful. I wouldn't think he'll be teamless for very long at all.
— Sarah Todd (@NBASarah) October 15, 2022
The Los Angeles Lakers absolutely could have kept Stanley Johnson.
Rob Pelinka essentially had three choices to package with THT in this trade for Beverley: Johnson, Wenyen Gabriel, or Max Christie. And quite frankly, Johnson was probably the last player of those three that should have been included in the trade.
As promising as Gabriel has looked at times in the preseason, his place on the roster is hard to justify. He is a small-ball five who cannot shoot and is not going to log many minutes with two traditional centers ahead of him as well as Anthony Davis.
Christie is young so it is easier to justify not trading him but he is not going to have any sort of impact on the Lakers. The team drafted a 19-year-old in the second round. Just like THT, he is not going to be ready to contribute and is just going to take up a roster spot.
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Would Stanley Johnson have been the difference between a deep playoff run and falling short? No. But it is yet another example of Rob Pelinka’s inability to understand roster dynamics and his own strengths and weaknesses.