Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Does LeBron-to-Cleveland Become a Bigger Possibility after Cavs are Swept?

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

While the Lakers are still probably the most likely landing spot for LeBron James this summer, there are other franchises that certainly make sense as a destination, even if the fit isn't perfect. Golden State to play with Steph and Draymond, and have that experience. New York, because he's LeBron and it's New York, a basketball institution he's always admired. The Clippers, if he wanted a change but didn't want to leave his family. Miami, for one more run with Spo.  But of all the alternatives, the one people look most to is Cleveland, for pretty obvious reasons.  And now that the Cavs were unceremoniously swept out of the Eastern Conference Finals by the Knicks, that chatter is going to grow louder. From a culture standpoint, you can certainly argue the way that the Cavs responded to Game 4 (compared to, say, the Lakers, who had an even more hopeless task in front of them) revealed some cracks. Would LeBron help build championship habits, even if he's not there long enough to actually win a title?  How would it happen? Is there a trade the Lakers would consider? One that would work for Cleveland?  It's a reminder of how the landscape is always shifting across the NBA in ways that could ultimately impact the Lakers. Frankly, it's something Rob Pelinka is counting on.   HOSTS: Andy and Brian Kamenetzky    Everydayer ClubIf you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans. Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonpodcasts.com/everydayerclub   Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! 5-Hour ENERGY Get candy-flavored chaos with Fruity Rainbow 5-hour ENERGY®️ Shots - available online at https://5hourENERGY.com or Amazon   KALSHI For a limited time, download the Kalshi app and use code LOCKEDON to get ten dollars when you trade ten. Kalshi. Trade on anything.   DoorDashFrom tipoff to overtime, stay in your bag and order on DoorDash.Get snacks, drinks, gear — whatever gets you through the season — delivered right to your door.DoorDash. In your bag all season long. RugietGet 15% off your treatment → https://rugiet.com/lockedonnhlRugiet. Performance medicine for men.   Indeed Listeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast Gametime Today's episode is brought to you by Gametime. Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDON for $20 off your first purchase. Terms and conditions apply. FanDuel Today's episode is brought to you by FanDuel.Right now new customers can bet just five dollars and get two-hundred and fifty dollars in bonus bets if your first bet wins.Visit https://FANDUEL.COMto get started — Play Your Game.   FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The Knicks swept the calves out of the Eastern Conference finals. Does that open the door a little wider for a potential return of LeBron James to his hometown? That's next. You are Locked on Lakers. Your daily Los Angeles Lakers podcast, part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. Thanks to everybody for stopping by Locked on Lakers, Brian Kaminetsky, Andy Kamenetsky. Andy, we're running out of a playoff team.

The Lakers, of course, were eliminated in the second round by the Thunder in four games, a spirited four games. Dare I say more spirited than what the Cavs put up against the Knicks, they were trounced in game four on their home floor. Didn't exactly put up a great fight to extend that series. This was the moment where I really realized seriously the cabs have given up. In the third quarter, Landry Shamet had a driving baseline, totally unbothered dunk. Landry Shamet, over the last three seasons combined, has 14 dunks in the regular season. He is not exactly a high flying vertical threat. You don't have to account for Landry Shamet attacking the rim.

It's the opposite of like Jackson Hayes or a deutero where like 80% of their 90% of their baskets are dung. When I saw that, I was like, yeah, Cleveland's done. I mean, I could see that they were done by about six minutes into the first quarter. But this was really the moment. I was like, they are so checked out. Other than Donovan Mitchell, nobody looked even remotely ready to play. like James Harden had yet another game with more turnovers than made field goals. Like an astonishingly long record of that.

He's a highly paid person here who's considered to be, you know, an elite, I guess, still offensive player or something like that. That's why they brought him in in the first place. The James Harden playoff thing continues. I, and I find this relative. Josh Hart had more threes made in this series than James Harder. Josh Hart, who was pulled from games because of his lack of three-point action. Josh Hart, who the series began with the Cavaliers totally ignoring and daring him to take threes.

He had more made threes than James Hardin, who many people credit with inventing the Stepback three. We're certainly popularizing it, you know, mainstreaming it, if not inventing it. I look at this, and I think it's interesting because like the Harden part of this, beyond just making fun of James Harden, which is a totally fun thing for NBA fans do, and I have no problem with it. You mentioned the way they played, and the Lakers,

the Lakers were not going to win their series against Oklahoma City. They knew they were not going to win that series. They knew there was a 0% chance. They were going to win four straight games against that team with no prospect of Luca Donch, it's returning. It was not going to happen. and yet they went out and played arguably their best game of the series. I mean, I think they, you know, they were pretty good and they held in tight for three quarters

and most of these games, whatever. The game for, they left everything out of the floor. That was the only close game in terms of final score. In terms of final score. And also, the Lakers did not have Luca Donchich, their best player. The Cavaliers were at full strength. Yes. against the lesser team.

And so I mentioned this because... Lesser than the Thunder, you mean. Correct. Literally not lesser than the Knicks. New. Although James Hardin still believes they were the better team. He said that. I'm not making this up.

He actually said after... He still fully believes that despite losing all four games in a sweep by double digits and the final one by 37, they were the better team. They deceptively controlled this series. We got them right where they want them. Well, you got to look beyond convention, like, you know, score and who went home. We have this situation where the Lakers, in contrast, put up a really honorable fight. Like, I think Lakers fans, as cheesy as this sounds, I think Lakers fans were legitimately proud of the effort that the Lakers put forth in the series as a whole.

but particularly in game four, when again, everybody knows it's over. And you have a choice of like, do we really want to get on an airplane and do this for two more days just to get, to likely get smoked in game five in Oklahoma City? Do we really want to do this? The answer was apparently yes. The answer to the question for the, for the calves, do we're probably not going to be the first team. 0 and 162 now after the Lakers down 3-0. We're probably not going to be the first team to come back,

win four straight. But do we want to at least extend this thing? Get on a plane, fly to New York, do this again for two days, to likely or certainly very possibly lose game five at Madison Square Garden. Clearly they didn't want to. And that is a difference in culture.

And I don't blame Donovan Mitchell. I don't know enough about, you know, day in and day out, what goes on the caps. I think Donovan Mitchell's a great player. And I think he works really hard. I think he's, you know, says the right stuff, does the right stuff. I don't think he's quite in the elite tier of the elite players.

But he's doing his level best. I don't think that about James Harden. Certainly not anymore. But they have a, those, these are culture questions. And it leads to, and we can talk more about it next, but it leads to that question of,

does LeBron James make more sense now in Cleveland than he did before, not just because the calves lost, but because of how they lost. Does it leave the door open for, as you put it in the rail, for they return 2.0, or 3.0, I should say. That is an interesting question on a few levels, which we'll get into next. Locked on Lakers is brought to you by five-hour energy drink. If you've got a sweet tooth, you know it can be really hard to find a perfect treat

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Makes playoff basketball that much more engaging from start to finish. So head to fandwell.com to get started. Again, fanduel.com to get started, Fandwell play your game. So, well, I mean, Cleveland has always been one of the teams that if LeBron doesn't stay with the Lakers, and I both agree at this point, I'd still put. if I'd pick one team where LeBron's going to play next year, I'd pick the Lakers. But among the teams that aren't L.A., Cavs make sense for obvious reasons, maybe a return to the heat, the Knicks because he's constantly linked there, the Warriors, because, you know, always wanted to play with Steph,

as close to his, you know, his family as you can be San Francisco to L.A., super easy flight to go back and forth on days off, whatever it might be you hear. occasionally, you know, sleeper teams or something like that. But, you know, the calves are right up there. Yeah. You could certainly make an argument that LeBron could come in and do some work for like one year to help really, truly instill a championship culture there. It would be, it would be a lot on him, like as far as doing that in one year, because the,

Yet the true evidence of that comes with winning a championship in one year. Because depending on what happens after that one year, it can become difficult to directly link that back to LeBron for reasons that are of no fault of LeBron's. It's just too much time passes. But regardless, the Cavs getting swept, and this was something that I was actually keeping an eye on and thinking about after roughly around Game 2 when it became pretty. clear to me, A, the cabs are not going to win this series. B, I think there's a non-zero percent chance they're going to get swept. I think it makes it easier for LeBron if he wants to leave the Lakers and he's going to be thinking about the optics of whatever team he joins. Like I am thinking about it from a, you know, narrative, storytelling, all of that sort of stuff. Like, LeBron is very

hyper aware of this stuff. And I don't think that's a problem. A lot of, of superstar athletes are very aware of their, again, finger quotes narrative, particularly at a time when a lot of these guys are involved with media and sort of telling their own stories. But if LeBron rejoin the Cavs beyond the whole full circle piece of it and the closing the loop, ending presumably where it began, he avoids any appearance of frontrunnerism

and like what happened with Kevin Durant and the Warriors, He would be joining a team that is still trying to get over the hump rather than, like in the case of the warriors, residing well over that hump. And look, LeBron may decide that they're still too far away in the Eastern Conference. Like there's too many problems with that team. And that's fine. I'm just saying in terms of how it would look for him to join that team, I don't think anybody would rightly criticize him for that.

I mean, I don't think anybody should criticize him, period. He should do whatever he wants. But I'm just saying it does not in any way mirror what went on with Katie and the Warriors. It's also to the Cavaliers that the only non-Lakers team that LeBron's been, I think, seriously connected to that doesn't have a, it's player X's team. Like the Warriors are clearly Steph's team and Stephs.

culture. The Knicks are at this point, clearly Jalen Brunson's team and his culture. He's the guy that gave up a bleep ton of money to allow the Knicks to sign all these other players beyond being the best player on that team. The Nuggets have been brought up as a sleeper team, and I don't think it's particularly viable. But if LeBron was interested, that is clearly Nikoliyokic's culture. Cavaliers don't belong to anybody, I think, in terms of stature. Like James Harbara, just got there. Evan Mobley, I think, is a really good young player, but he's still very young. He has not taken, I think, the full leap and, like, the reins of the team as hoped internally. Donovan Mitchell is an excellent player, like we were talking about before, but not only has he not

guided the, guided the Cavaliers to the finals, he's never been to the finals himself. And the only player on the on the Cavs currently on the roster that has ever been to the finals was James Harden almost 15 years ago. And he was right. So in that sense, LeBron would not be entering truly somebody else's terrain, which I think matters, not just for whatever you think about LeBron's ego, like that piece of it. But it also, I think, becomes simpler for him to do it. There feels like there is less toe stepping with that. So I think that matters. Yeah, and I think it's important to distinguish between the best,

who's the best player and then like who is, who's, who is the culture center? Because I think, you know, LeBron wouldn't be, Donovan Mitchell still be the best player on that team. He would be the number one score. He would be the go-to guy like, and I'll be honest with it, I don't think the, I heard, and I apologize, and I'm not even sure I'd want to do.

dignify this concept by naming the person because it would sound like I'm trying to like mock them. But it was suggested by someone I think in Cleveland that, you know, maybe like they could envision of LeBron for James Harden sign and trade. I can assure you. That's hilarious. Not on the new assistant GM's watch. I'll tell you that much.

Oh, no, no, no, Brian. It's not just bringing in James Harden and all of the, all of the, all of the, the redundancy issues that the Lakers just figured out with Luca and Austin and LeBron, except nobody who actually could take on LeBron's role as the finisher playing in the post. It's James Hardin looking for an extension. Yeah. No. I mean, can you think of a worse fit with Luca Dantritch than James Harden?

I mean, there may be some somewhere, but in terms of like front line players where you look at it because like I've looked we've talked about like yonis and different guys it's like that's an awkward fit but you can kind of feel like okay yonis makes a little adjustment here they like i can see and he's just really good and like i can see how you could and he does things that he does things that luka doesn't do like yes at the very least he brings many things to the table that lucca doesn't in a way that in a perfect world at least in my purview that's how you look to build teams is where your best players do certain things, whether positionally or skill set,

that the others don't do. Definition, James Hardin may be the worst fit up there. As a like a playoff ball with Luca ever. And so that's not a thing. And I'll be honest with it, I think actually the presence of Hardin on the cabs, I don't will not go so because this is me purely. speculate and will not go so far as to suggest that it is something that would dissuade

LeBron from playing with Cleveland. But I can't imagine he sees it as a positive, particularly given like, I don't know. This is one of the things I think is interesting about LeBron, and it applies to whether or not he'd stay at the Lakers, too. Is it where can I go where I think I have the best chance to win a championship? And to be perfectly honest, if the, you know, if the answer isn't Oklahoma City or San Antonio, the answer is probably doesn't matter. I could, you can make an argument at the very least in the Eastern Conference.

I got the best chance to get to the finals. You know, a team like Cleveland adds me, okay, you know, they got a chance. But I wonder if he looks at as more like less as which team gives me the best chance versus which team gives me a reasonable chance to be playing meaningful basketball. You know, you can make that argument about the Warriors. You can make that argument about the Lakers. You can make that argument about the Caves, about the Knicks, whatever. And then you put him in order.

Here's the thing. I don't think he's going to the Knicks. Now that the Knicks are in the finals, A, I don't know if the Knicks would be looking to make that type of seismic move because bringing in LeBron. Seismic, yes. Yeah, that is a, that is a dramatic change to your locker room and to your culture. I don't even mean that as a bad or good thing. I'm just saying it's dramatic.

I agree. I don't. And also from LeBron's perspective, I think that's where you start flirting with frontrunnerism, that sort of thing. I also, I can't speculate exactly how LeBron feels about any of this stuff. and I certainly don't know him well enough to really have a beat on it. I would think that the Knicks in that situation, on top of everybody speculating whether or not I'm going to be retiring all of those questions in that particular media environment,

that's a little too hot. I could be wrong, but that feels like a lot, I would imagine from what I agree. And so, you know, and so, you know, we talk about these things in, part because they add context to the decision that's coming up in the off season. Like, okay, you take the Knicks off the table. Okay, maybe the Cavs seem like a little bit more viable in the sense of like, what can we do that doesn't fundamentally reshape everything? We're not sending out tons of like, you know, with the Lakers, they're not going to sign

and trade James Hardin for, you know, the Lakers wouldn't take Hardin. they probably take Jared Allen, but the calves aren't going to give up Jared Allen for a year or two, I think, Max, of LeBron. I would be surprised at least. Unless they have been debating, breaking this up, and Jared Allen's one of the pieces that they were looking to break up anyway. So kind of like what went on years ago with the Raptors, when they traded for Kauai, they were taking a big swing with bringing in Kauai knowing that it could very well end up a one-year rental. but also they recognized we've gone as far as we can with Lowry and DeRosen. We're going to have to break this thing up anyway. So we might as well do it in a way where we take a big swing.

Because one way or another, this is getting dismantled. So if they feel that way about Jared Allen, then maybe they would. Right. And, you know, Alan is priced at a pretty reasonable contract. There's about 18% of your cap a little less than that. And all that. So I mean, the biggest thing, it's like, they could probably get more than, you know, LeBron for that just in terms of like future pieces and stuff like that.

So you start to, you know, do this calculus of like where, what makes sense, what doesn't make sense? Where could he go? Where won't he go? And I have a feeling. If the money mattered to LeBron. It's the money matters. If the money mattered to LeBron that much. I just, I have a feeling that by the time we get to a point, you know, into June, into July, you know, when free agency really starts.

I know we did the show last week about the timeline that sort of LeBron laid out. I think we have a pretty good idea as free agency is opening what the very least what they think LeBron wants to do in relation to the Lakers. I have a feeling by the time we get to whatever that is six weeks from now, it's going to look very much like LeBron's most reasonable landing spot is the Lakers. And so we'll see. But the Cleveland just, it's a great example of how who wins and who loses. I had not thought about the Knicks thing. Like, you're right. It is less likely that LeBron would go to the Knicks for the optics that you talked about.

It's less likely the Knicks would bring him in for, you know, everything that you mentioned. You're spot on. It's a great observation. But like it's just another example of how these results, who gets hurt, who doesn't, Who ends up being traded from team A to team B or something like that? It all impacts these questions. So lock and Lakers on YouTube is where we can go hang out with over 38,000 subscribers. We'll see everyone next time.