1. Damion Lee
The Phoenix Suns nailed the signing of Damion Lee last summer and it was a sad reminder that Lee should have been on the Lakers the entire time. Granted, hindsight is always 20/20 but the Lakers took a flier on the wrong Warriors free agent by signing Toscano-Anderson instead of Lee.
Lee was one of the best three-point shooters in the entire sport last season. While his game is not much deeper than his ability to make shots, that skill is still extremely beneficial to a team that lacked a three-point shot last season.
The 30-year-old guard shot 44.5% on 3.3 attempts per game last season. Only Al Horford and Luke Kennard shot it better from beyond the arc last season. Unfortunately for Lee and the Suns, it did not translate well to the playoffs as Lee could not get in a rhythm with only 11.1 minutes per game.
Damion Lee is exactly the kind of sharpshooter the Lakers need.
While the Lakers did get swept by the Denver Nuggets, the Western Conference Finals was a lot closer than many think. Several of those games could have gone the Lakers way with one extra basket or one stop in a key moment. Denver was simply better at executing.
The biggest gap between the two teams was the Nuggets’ ability to hit threes and the Lakers’ inability to do the same thing. The Lakers made 9.3 threes a game at 34.9% while the Nuggets made 14.5 threes per game at 40.3%. A difference of five three-pointers a game is big, especially considering three of the four losses were within six points.
Lee might not be an all-around role player but he is elite at what he can do. That makes him a bigger surefire hit than either Bazley or Warren as a free-agent signing.