Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - How Luka Dončić's Extension Timeline Affects Lakers Offseason Plans.

Episode Date: June 4, 2025

Basically every Lakers fan knows that Luka Dončić is eligible for a contract extension this offseason. Everyone knows that the Lakers will give Luka whatever it is he wants, whether talking dollars, years, player options and whatever. What people may not know is just how long Luka has to make this decision. most of the good parts of the NBA offseason will be past by the time his date of eligibility rolls around. That's August 2nd. But Luka doesn't have to sign that day, or the day after, or the day after that. 8.2 is just the first day Luka can sign. The last day? June 30... of 2026. So what does all this mean for the Lakers? They need very much to display competence between now and August. That doesn't mean massive, roster reshaping moves that completely revamp LA's roster. (Though by all means, if great opportunities present themselves, go for it.) It means smart choices, well-reasoned and thought out, where each decision is made with the idea of how these players will fit together as a group, not just an assembly of talent. They have to display good communication skills, and basically appear to have their **** in order. Luka doesn't appear to have any desire to go anywhere. He doesn't want to move again, after gaining some comfort in LA. So don't give him a reason. PLUS... the bottom feeders in the West are making decisions about their futures, and all of it will impact the Lakers this summer.  HOSTS: Andy and Brian KamenetzkySEGMENT 1: Luka has a LONG timeline.  SEGMENT 2: What does it mean for LA?  SEGMENT 3: The cellar dwellers in the West are makin' plans. Why that matters for the Lakers.  Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!OpenPhoneStreamline and scale your customer communications with OpenPhone. Get 20% off your first 6 months at www.openphone.com/lockedonnba BetterhelpThis episode is sponsored by Betterhelp. Your well-being is worth it. Visit BetterHelp.com/lockedonnba today to get 10% off your first month. Monarch MoneyTake control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code LOCKEDONNBA at monarchmoney.com for 50% off your first yearFanDuelRight now, new customers can get TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in BONUS BETS when your first FIVE DOLLAR BET WINS! Download the app or head to FANDUEL.COM to get started. Bet with FanDuel—Official Partner of the NBA.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.

Hey, everyone, welcome to Locked on Lakers for Wednesday. Brian Komenetsky, Andy Kaminetsky, what are Luca Donchich's contract options this offseason? And can the offseason plans of some Western Conference also rands screw up what the Lakers are trying to do? That's next. You are Locked on Lakers. Your daily Los Angeles Lakers podcast, part of the Locked on Podcasts Network, your team every day. Thanks to everybody for making Lockdown Lakers.

First listen to every day. through Friday, no matter how where you get your podcast. This one's always free and never behind paywall. Locked on Lakers on YouTube is where you can go hang out. Over 35,000 plus subscribers to the channel. And all of them, Andy, are trying to just figure out the incredible variety,

dizzying level of options that Luca Donchich has this summer. One of many players across the NBA facing decisions about contract extensions, including Austin Reeves, but AR, Andy, it's a little more cut and dry. He's expected to turn down his option and enter free agency next to your week. And he can make just scads more money than he can with an extension. Now, nobody expects Austin to sign. Everybody expects Luca to sign.

But it's going to take a minute and Luca's got time. Like time, time. It's funny. Way too much time for my liking. We've talked before about how if one of the extensions at least that Luca could sign the max allowed for a guy that was traded and is not getting his extension off his original team, that would be four years, 229 million. Bobby Marks over at ESPN did a breakdown of a bunch of different free agents. this offseason and their potential extension options. There's an option of three years 160 for Luca.

That could be signed right after the NBA finals to conclude. But because he was traded February 2nd, they would have to wait until August 2nd if they were going to give him the max four years 229, which obviously they will of Luca wants it. It's whatever Luca wants. And there's a school of thought that Luca could be better off signing the shorter one, re-entering free agency at his 10-year service mark. And that would, without getting to the weeds of the cap math and cap money,

give him a better opportunity to make up some of the money that he lost because he was no longer super max eligible. He was eligible for a $345 million contract extension from Dallas. And as you say, Lakers can only offer him 229. But like you laugh, he's still eligible for $2,000, it's like $110,000, $20 million that initially he is not eligible to get. Right. And ultimately, I don't know exactly how this stuff works out, but if Luca is not able to make up that lost money right down to the penny, he certainly has an opportunity to make just sick, obscene amounts of money, which to be clear, he is more. than entitled and worthy you make. To get $229 million,

you used to have to have like a podcast or something. Like, you know, like, but now anybody, they'll let anybody make that kind of money. It's really irritating. Podcast or a degree. But this is the, though, the detail Bobby Marks threw in there that I,

I guess I wasn't even thinking about the deadline for any of this because everyone is thinking about August 2nd, the day that is seen as the earliest Luca can sign at least both extension offers a day as possible. I did not realize that the deadline for Luca to sign this extension was June 30th. And when I saw that from Bobby Marks, I was like, wait a minute, that doesn't make sense. Like, he can't sign one of the extensions until August 2nd, but the deadline is June 30th. like that would be going backwards in time. And then I realized, no, what they mean is the deadline to sign it is June 30th, 2026, meaning,

and I don't think slash really hope, this is not the case. I don't expect this thing to drag out for an entire calendar year. Right. I don't expect this to carry over until basically the new NBA season begins. I just was not aware that it could. I mean, it is, the fact that the deadline stretches out that long for what Luca can choose to do. It does reinforce the other big aspect of this, which we've been talking about as, because the extension, the initial extension deadline is delayed longer, so a bunch of guys can sign in July.

Some of them can sign even sooner than that. like there's a calendar like you said based on different forms of transactions and this and that whatever and it's super arcane but um the lakers you know big stuff that the lakers will have done in free agency and all that other kinds of stuff it will be ought to be done by then i mean like you know um the draft comes long that's obviously a big moment where that free agency opens that's obviously a big moment where team building happens and then you know, it slows down and teams start picking off players. By the time you get to August, like generally speaking, your team is, is pretty well formed.

There might be a couple free agents out there that are, you know, were left without a chair when the music stopped and all that kind of stuff, but you pretty much know what you're going to get. And so, you know, their, Luca will have the opportunity. And I don't mean this so much in the are you all in kind of thing. because like, you know, that conversation can conjure up, you know, got to make big swings. So you always get you. I think what Luca and his team are looking for, and by all accounts, he is planning to stay in L.A. What they are, I suspect if they're looking for anything to use this time, Andy, while they have to wait anyway, is they want to see competence.

They want to see a plan. They want to see something executed to that plan. they probably, if they ask, would like to understand what and why people are being signed or why they're going after certain players. I think they would certainly expect Luca to have not veto power and not out there making negotiations, but some input on the kind of player that he would like to have around him. And I think, you know, the Lakers have to show all of those attributes in the time between now August 2nd. We've talked about this before. In a perfect and as you said, competent world,

the Lakers are working very closely with Luca this whole time. So the idea of we need to dazzle Luca in order to get him to sign that extension on August 2nd, that's coming through hard work and communication as opposed to, well, we're going to talk to you on August 2nd. And until then, we hope you like what we did because at that point you're just trying to read Lucas mind and that would be a really dangerous haphazard way to go about doing this because you know we had talked before there there is a school of thought and I'm sure we'll get more into you know deeper discussions about this as we get closer to free agency but the idea that this free agency crop in 2025, the offseason, is not a great free agent class. The Lakers don't have a ton of trade assets.

They don't have a draft pick at all. They don't have a ton of maneuverability. And you could make an argument that the Lakers would be better off waiting until 2026 that off season to really make their big, more permanent moves, unless there's a 2025 free agent that they just really like and that's someone they would want to commit to anyway. But in 2026, theoretically, they could have LeBron off the books, they could have Austin off the books, they could have Rui, Gabe Vincent, or some combination of them, which would give them more cap space, more maneuverability, more just optionality in how they do that. And I know there are people who feel like you can't do that simply because you're trying

to secure Lucas extension. And my argument would be you can do that if you are communicating with Luca and Luca agrees that would be the best thing to do. If he doesn't, don't do it. But I'm saying you can't. If Luca actually agrees that that's the best approach, then I think it is something you can do. I think there's a scenario in which that may be the thing and you're touching on some of it. But after the break, I'll explain why, where I think the danger in that sort of approach comes. So we'll do that next.

Locked on Lakers is brought to you by BetterHelp. The show is sponsored by BetterHelp. And we should talk about something that doesn't get talked about enough, men's mental health. There's a pressure to keep it together for men to perform, to provide, to never show weakness. But the truth is, real strength comes from opening up. and taking care of your mental well-being. Every year, six million men in the U.S. experienced depression, and many go undiagnosed, but talking to someone, a friend, a loved one, or a professional therapist.

It can make a huge difference. I can personally attest to how much therapy has helped me in the past, also with my family, individually, group sessions during a really difficult period. But it's important to remember. Therapy's not just for crisis moments. It's great for learning how to set boundaries, how to create healthy coping tools, and just be the best version of yourself. And with over 35,000 licensed therapists and flexible setups, BetterHelp makes it easy to find a therapist who understands you.

As the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise. Talk it out with BetterHelp. Our listeners get 10% off their first month at BetterHelp.com slash locked on MBA. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash locked-on. NBA. The scenario you're getting into is fine. I agree. You start looking at the list. So this is one of the reasons why I think LeBron is unlikely to look to take the $20 million haircut because the free agency class is so weak. Looking at that going like, who is, who is we spending the money on? Who are we going to take my discount on?

That's going to make the sort of difference to do it. And so I think that's part of it. And then I think it's the principle of it. But it is an undeniably underwhelming class. I think. Particularly in terms of free agents that the Lakers could realistically get, even if LeBron did take that discount. And in positions that they need.

So it's like it doesn't do you any. I mean, that's not true. It does do you good to sign a good player, but if that player doesn't really feel a need that you have, it mitigates at least some of the gain that you're making. But I look at this stuff, and I am always concerned that you, when you make, and this isn't exactly the scenario that you were talking about,

but it's a scenario that has captured the Lakers and Rob Polinka in the past, when you decide, ooh, let's keep our sheet clean. Once you do that, it becomes limiting. You put yourself in this box of like, well, we can't do that because then our sheet won't be clean anymore. We can't make this move because then our sheet won't be clean anymore. And it keeps you from doing things that would be beneficial to the team because sometimes having players is good. Like, you need to, you know, having players on two or three or four-year contracts can be good if the players are good. And they are signed to smart contracts and whatever.

Sometimes you have more maneuverability when you have a roster full of diverse contracts. This is what we thought the Lakers kind of had a couple years ago. It didn't quite turn out the way that everybody had hoped. But when you have like a little roster of diverse contracts that you can use, sometimes that's actually more valuable than just cap space because you can't, it's hard to trade things into cap space. We don't know anything to trade. That can be a problem.

And then free agency, I maintain, particularly now, unless you're going after a Max guy or whatever, different story. But generally speaking, it's not a great way to build a team. You are almost always overspending. You are almost always buying into the wrong part of a player's contract. and relative to his prime and all that, you're almost always overpaying for way more risk than you would want. So I just, if the Lakers do that, it has to come with a plan.

And I think it also has to be with the idea that other options, you know, we're willing to go get guys. But like, we just don't have anything good in front of us. So what we don't want to do is make a trade for the sake of making a trade. Well, like I said before, first of all, they would only do this if Luka was on board with it. The idea being if you want us to go after these guys this off season, we will. We're going to do the thing that you want us to do. Or at least, you know, if it's if it's a play if we like them too. I mean, you obviously, you know, you don't want to present Luca with

the the shopping list and say, you know, okay, well, this is what we're going to get, you know, and and and and and or Luca presents them with the shopping list. I mean, look, you're not going to repeat Russ 2.0, but I'm saying within reason, if Luca see if Luca, for example, really likes the idea of Nick Claxton, then the Lakers should make a sincere effort to try to trade with the Nets to get Nick Claxton. I'm just saying if this is something Luca agrees upon, I'm not saying that it would necessarily work. I'm not necessarily saying it's the best route.

What I am saying is you can do that without the fear of losing Luca. That's all I'm talking about. The idea that Luca is going to bolt if you don't. dazzle him with your moves this off season. I'm saying that's not necessarily a thing if Luca is on board with the approach. The only other thing too, and again, this is not my recommendation necessarily to do it. I really have to give more thought to what I think is the best approach for the Lakers. You know, I've been giving it some. I came up with that one trade scenario and stuff like that. But, you know, I think you can make arguments either way. But when you were talking about the

cap space trap, I don't. disagree that it can be one and that it can be limiting and that the lakers god knows they have fallen into that many times the only difference is what i'm presenting is one year of it as opposed to kicking the can down the road kicking the can down the road kicking the can down the road this is a we are doing it specifically as a one year gap for next off season because we just gain so much more comparative optionality than this coming season. But I've heard right.

And like the problem with that is I can look, but look at all the list of free agents are going to be available in 26. Look at me, this is, and this is just specific to the Lakers, this is an NBA thing. Like, you know,

everybody plans for this. Then all of a sudden two or three guys that you thought weren't going to be there aren't. Sure. And then a couple guys here or somebody gets heard. There's no foolproof way to do it. I'm just, so my,

the point I have that I'm making about this, It's like to it's one thing to say, like, you know, the Lakers with the trade deadline, we're keeping our powder rackers. This off season is going to be, we're going to, you know, there's going to be so much going on at the off season, whatever. And what do you do? You end up with, you know, literally doing nothing. Like, and it's not because Rob Polinka two deadlines ago didn't think the Lakers were going

to be active. I'm sure he did. This wasn't like a scheme to try to fool Lakers fans. But the landscape changed. his roster changed. All this stuff happened. And so you, when, when you make plans like that where you say, we're going to hold off doing things like, you know,

maybe these things are a good idea. You know, this could get us a little bit better next year, but like it's going to rob us of this grand opportunity in, in two off seasons. I think most of the. the time when NBA teams do this, the grand opportunity never materializes. Again, I'm not recommending they do it. All I'm saying is you can do it without losing Luca. I'm talking to 35,000 plus subscribers on YouTube, Andy, and Rob Polinka. The goal every year, I'm more and more every year

started. It's just make your team for this year as good as you can. Sure, but you can do. I mean, you can potentially do that. But you just. I'm not saying, run back the same team. I know. Again, I'm talking about the sort of broadly because what your, the scenario you're talking about as sort of the the cap trap or whatever you want to call it is something that is is out there. And when people talk about, you know, the gap year, so to speak, a lot of times it's in that context. And what all I'm saying is it is a, it's a really, it says that you are not a creative front office. It says that you don't have confidence. confidence in the ability to have players on your roster, judge them well, judge well which guys

you think you can are good players to go get. And it also says that you don't think that you have the ability, assuming you do step one correctly, sign or trade for good players to trade them again or sign other players and do things to make your roster better next off season. It also mean that you think the players that you currently have are better than the ones that you could require. But that goes without saying. Don't do stupid things. I said that before.

Don't do dumb things. Don't do desperate things. But don't limit yourself because of this magical opportunity that's coming in a season or two seasons. Season two becomes season three. It just it's a bad point. My larger point is just communicate with Luca and then you don't have to fear him not signing anything. That's my point. Just communicate with the guy.

I don't think anybody is objecting to that. What are the also-rans in the Western Conference doing this offseason? And how will it affect the Lakers? It's next. On Lakers is brought to you by Open Phone. If you're running a business, you know that every missed call, that's money left on the table. Think about when's the last time you had a service emergency and the first person, first company you called that didn't answer and you just sat around and waited for them to call you back.

That doesn't happen. And that's why you need open phone. Open phone is the number one business phone system designed to streamline and scale your customer communications all through an app on your phone or your computer. And I love that you don't even have to carry two phones. With open phone, you can manage business calls and text from one app, whether you're at your desk or on the go, there's a shared inbox so your team can jump into any conversation without missing a beat.

And the AI agent that Open Phone features handles after hours calls, answers common questions, captures leads, so you never miss a customer. Open phone is offering our listeners 20% off your first six months at OpenFone. With openphone.com slash locked on MBA. That's O-P-E-N-P-H-O-N-E. dot com slash Lockdown MBA. And if you're switching from another service, Open phone will port your existing numbers at no extra charge.

Open phone, no miss calls, no miss customers. One of the things we talked about a little bit and kind of at least reference on I think it was Monday show. It might have been Tuesday. Sort of the butterfly effect that you get around the NBA when teams make certainly big decisions but even sometimes small decisions

and stuff like that. And then there's stuff like a team like Utah. They hire Austin Aange as whatever was a basketball operations. He basically has Rob Polinkas job. But the jazz now say that they are in it to win it. They are here to compete. They're done tanking. They're going to try to build a good roster.

They've got some draft picks to do it. They've certainly got some young talent, guys like Walker Kessler and things like that. But the jazz not trying to lose anymore changes the way that the offseason is going to work in the NBA. The Pelicans apparently are putting everyone on the block. Or they're at least willing to listen to calls for everyone. And that's what I was going to say. I don't really think everybody, like if you want Troy Murphy, for example, you're going to have.

Troy Murphy, Troy Murphy comes cheap. No, he's probably very getable. That's true. Very getable. Just ask the Lakers about their season with Troy Murphy. Can you imagine? I know last off season was slow, but guys, we got a free agent for you. Trey Murphy, you're going to have to make a massive offer.

Guy made a huge leap last year is on a wonderfully team-friendly contract. So I don't think he's really available. I don't really think like Herb Jones is super duper available, but everything they say. And so depending on what New Orleans does, how Utah does these things have a major impact on the amount of players that are or are not on the market and available to move around. And obviously volume when you're a team like the Lakers without a lot of stuff to work with,

the more trades the better. You can kind of interject yourselves in creative ways. Absolutely. Yeah, and this stuff could have a big effect. Yeah, Rob Polinkas said during his exit interview with JJ Redick that, and this I thought was interesting just because Rob was going more in a route of, nothing else potentially overselling and under delivering, but he said he expects it to be an extremely busy offseason

and he expects the Lakers to be in the middle. But for what it's worth, you're hearing increasingly more NBA media, whether you're talking about shams, whether you're talking about Win Horse, like a lot of people now are starting to anticipate it being a very, very active offseason. But with Utah, for example,

from Tony Jones, who covers the team for the athletic. Quote, it can go one of two ways, talking about the direction Utah could take the roster and their moves. One is to build around Ford, Lori Markinen with a veteran-laden core. In that case, expect the Jazz to hit the market and attempt to secure a veteran help to bolster the roster.

The other way is to double down on the Jazz's many young players on their roster, Keante George, Isaiah Collier, Walker, like down the line, along with last year's lottery pick, Cody Williams, going the youth route at least puts Markinen, along with players like Colin Sexton, John Collins, Jordan Clarkson on the table. And down the line, again, the different options. I actually think Markinen could be one of those interesting sweet spot guys, depending on either how ready they think some of their young players that they may have

been holding back a bit in hopes of landing Cooper flag, like how ready some of them might be to compete or how many of them you could keep while maybe adding just another veteran alongside Markinen. But the thing that jumped out at me in thinking about this was Laker fans and a lot of Lakers media have connected the team with Walker Kessler. And for quite a while, you and I have both been tempering those expectations of, in part because it never made sense to either one of us, why the jazz, whether they were rebuilding or whether they were looking to compete,

would look to move a very young, very productive defensive center unless they really just don't like him, in which case, I want to know why. Like, I'm very curious. But in talking about the Lakers need for a big, and we hear from people all the time in the YouTube comments section, as always leave those.

We try to use them in the show whenever possible. It gets us thinking about different, items to talk about. There's always been these scenarios involving trading Austin for Walker Kessler, which before, when it felt like if they ever traded Kessler, it would be part of some massive tear down. I was like, okay, no, Austin makes no sense for that. He's already 27. But unless you fast track this thing, he's going to be like 30 or so by the time it really gets going. Plus, Austin in a walk year, I don't picture him wanting to start. for a rebuild anyway so the guy may leave. But if you were looking to theoretically compete,

then all of a sudden, Austin could make sense for Utah. Like if say you were keeping Markinen and adding Austin to Markinen and other players, at least in theory, that makes sense, which again, I don't know why they wouldn't keep Kessler as part of that. But, right, it makes move that piece of it. The but being, not for Walker. It being all of a sudden, Austin makes sense for Utah, a team that now may be active in more ways than any of us anticipated. So that in and of itself, I thought, was interesting. Yeah, I mean, it makes sense, not for Walker Kessler, but it makes sense that, you know, at least Austin would be in play for them.

But then if New Orleans, let's say New Orleans decides, you know, too many injuries, we can't use Zion. And I can't, you know, I'm not, there's virtually no realistic tradeoff where you could put on the table for Zion that I'd go near. Just the risk is too high. I can't handle food and conditioning watch with both him and Zion. I can't do it. I can't, I mean, I don't think it's a great fit, great core to begin with. Like you want to talk about some of the concerns you have with defensive redundancy and weakness with Austin and Luca. Zion and Luca

I mean Zion's a great player He's a great player Too much And Ashley says It's different A lot of what Zion Makes Zion special He wouldn't be able to do with the Lakers

I can't I can't deal with a world Where we are monitoring that with both those I just can't do it No But he's not You know the assists The ball movement

The some of the stuff that he does That is really quite impressive At his size He needs the ball Right It just doesn't work as well with with Luca. He is not aligned offensively. But, you know, he's not that.

And so, like, you, are they going to try to restock that team and make it, you know, maybe you find players who are more? So, like, again, like, are players that the Lakers have available, a Gabe Vincent where, you know, you package him or something, or Vanderbilt as part of a package or something like that are some of the parts the Lakers have and then the big chip being Reeves, slightly lesser chip being connect,

they still have the draft pick. Like what it means when teams say everyone is on the block, the actual definition of like why and what is our intent, every team, the difference between we want to contend versus we're willing to start over, both those things could result in a lot of movement by that team. But like you point out with the Utah example, what kind of movement we're talking about here and which players are both available and which players are acceptable in return or what the draft

package needs to look like or whatever totally change based on the answer to that question. Yeah, Kevin O'Connor for Yahoo, I believe in a, in a podcast said, quote, there are no untouchables in New Orleans. League sources said the Pelicans are gauging the market for everyone on their roster. They very well could end up keeping their core pieces. Side note, I have no idea what the F qualifies as core pieces from the Pelicans.

Murphy and Jones, I think. Maybe. I mean, they're weird core pieces without a bona fide star attached to them. You know what I mean? Like, depending on the setup, They're more guys that you would add to a team to push them over the top. Yeah, because even if people don't remember, you know, B.I. is gone.

Yeah. And so Brandon Ingram is up in Toronto now. They made that deal. And they did not get foundational pieces in return as part of that trade. So expirings. You know, it's there, they're another one of these teams in a weird spot. But like, unloading C.J. McCollum, who's still a good player, but like makes a lot of Like, is that an easy thing to do in this league?

Probably not. I also don't see what use he necessary. I mean, we're talking about the Lakers. I don't think he really does. Certainly not, yeah. Again, even if they could unload him something, this butterfly effect that you're talking about. So it's going to be,

the other thing, you know, and maybe we'll carry this into tomorrow, I think this offseason, while there could be a lot of movement, It's also going to be kind of recalibrating some of the things we're talking about and how people behave with this new CBA. And one of the things that I think this is going to impact is when players get extension, which players get extension, who accepts them and when and why and all that kind of stuff.

And one of the impacts of that could be free agency just isn't as robust as it used to be. So that impacts the decision to hold on to cap space. but that's something we can carry into tomorrow. Locked on Lakers on YouTube is where you can hang out with over 35,000 plus subscribers to the channel. We will see everyone tomorrow.