Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - How the Kevin Durant Trade Makes Life Harder for the Lakers in the Western Conference

Episode Date: June 23, 2025

Life didn't get any easier for the Lakers on Sunday. First, the Oklahoma City Thunder won an NBA title, after winning 68 games in the regular season. While they caught a break with Indiana guard Tyrese Haliburton's horrific injury in the first half of Game 7, making it easier to pull ahead in the second half to gain and maintain a lead, it's also very likely that the Thunder are not done improving. That knocking them off will be harder next season, given their assets and a young core that should keep ascending (especially players like Chet Holmgren and Jaylen Williams). And now that Kevin Durant has been sent to Houston in exchange for... nothing that should make the Rockets notably worse, even getting to the Thunder is going to be harder. Houston, a two-seed this year, solved their greatest playoff weakness (scoring) by acquiring Durant and sending out Jalen Green while keeping all of the young players they covet (Amen Thompson, Alperin Segun, Tari Eason, Jabari Smith, Reed Sheppard) and their most valuable draft assets, as well. Meaning they have plenty of stuff available to continue getting better. The day was a reminder that nobody can punt away a season, because opportunities that seem enduring can be fleeting. Just as Boston and now Indiana, both of whom will enter next season with severely dampened championship hopes based on injuries to their stars. On the other hand, a calm and realistic understanding of where you are as a franchise is key, because "all in" moves for a team that's not good enough to make that investment? That can bury a franchise. It's why Miami ultimately never made a credible offer for Durant. So the Lakers remain in a tricky position. Clearly a quality team in a stacked Western Conference, but just as clearly with a gap between them and the best teams in the conference. They have plenty of incentives to improve, but few assets to make it happen. So what's the risk/reward equation? And did the way the Finals squads were coached reinforce the playoff mistakes of JJ Redick?  HOSTS: Andy and Brian Kamenetzky SEGMENT 1: KD to Houston. Life gets harder for the Lakers. SEGMENT 2: Context is key with trades in the NBA. SEGMENT 3: What did we learn?  Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!OLIPOPGet a free can of OLIPOP! Just buy any two cans in store and they’ll reimburse you for one. Head to drinkolipop.com/LOCKEDONNBA to claim your free can and find OLIPOP near you. SKIMSShop SKIMS Mens at SKIMS.com/lockedonnba. Let them know we sent you! After you place your order, select "podcast" in the survey and select our show in the dropdown menu that follows. OpenPhoneStreamline and scale your customer communications with OpenPhone. Get 20% off your first 6 months at www.openphone.com/lockedonnbaWayFairGive your home the refresh it needs with Wayfair. Head to Wayfair.com right now. Wayfair. Every style. Every home.Monarch MoneyTake control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code LOCKEDONNBA at monarchmoney.com/lockedonnba for 50% off your first yearGametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNBA for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime.FanDuelRight now, new customers can get ONE HUNDRED FIFTY 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, everybody, welcome to Lockdown Lakers for Monday, Brian Komenetsky, Andy Kaminzki, another blockbuster in the NBA. Kevin Durant is on his, is leaving Phoenix. How does that impact the Lakers? 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 Locked on Lakers. First listen to every day Monday through Friday, no matter how it gets your podcast. This one's always free and never behind paywall. Locked on, Lakers on YouTube's where I can hang out with over 35,000 subscribers to the channel, Andy, all of whom are wondering how exactly the blockbuster deal, the second of the summer,

that sends Kevin Durant from Phoenix to Houston, impacts the Lakers. We will break that down. We will also talk about the NBA finals. We have a champion, the Oklahoma City Thunder, some horrible stuff happening with Tyrese Halliburton and his Achilles, but a series that presents a lot of lessons, not just to the Lakers,

but the entire NBA. So we'll get to that before it's all said and done. I want to let everybody know today's episode, is brought to you by Monarch Money. Take control of your finances. With Monarch Money, use code locked in NBA at monarchmoney.com for 50% off your first year. that was probably not the news. The NBA wanted the trade of Kevin Durant happening the morning, really, of game seven.

But alas, here we are. He leaves Phoenix. He's going to Houston. Not a terribly surprising destination for Kevin Durant, Andy, but one that has a ton of impact up and down the Western Conference. Well, to begin, And the league had already had the finals completely overshadowed by the Lakers getting sold, which is one of the biggest stories in NBA history, much less this offseason.

So at that point, you might as well go whole hog, whole ham, and just have Kevin Durant get traded on the day of game seven, because you've already gone this far. It's also a lesson, too, that the draft is coming up on Wednesday, and I imagine a big impetus for Phoenix. was wanting to get this deal done before the draft. So if you don't want these type of transactions potentially happening right before or during your finals, you might want to consider moving the draft back, moving back some of this other stuff. So teams actually legitimately have time to space out some of these things.

Because in fairness to the suns, like, bro, we're on a clock, man. Yeah, and do this. And there's no, you know, once you have a deal in place, you've got to do it. You can't do this. Okay, well, I'll just quietly wait until Monday before we announce something. Yeah, it's not official. And overshadow everything. Right.

It's, to be clear, and this matters, it's not official until July 6th. And if for no other reason, that's important because I would not be surprised in the slightest. if this deal expands to, you know, third team, maybe even a fourth team, because as we will get into, Phoenix's roster is a big old cluster of what the F right now. Like, it makes no sense at all. So probably some things the Sons would like to work out. But yeah, these are some of the byproducts of having everything so bunched up. So the deal is, at least as it stands, now is Kevin Durant going to Houston in exchange for Jalen Green, Dylan Brooks, the 10th pick in the draft, the upcoming draft, and then five second round picks.

So the general consensus seems to be, and we'll get to the Phoenix end of this in a second, that the Sons didn't do as well as. as perhaps you would hope in trying to trade Kevin Durant, although I think it is, it is, it reflects certain realities of the market that are very relevant to the Lakers. But from Houston's perspective, they pick up KD in exchange for a problematic, we'll call it, a young star in the sense that just he had a terrible first round of the playoffs, not a terribly efficient shooter,

a guy who's kind of a tweener, I think, at a lot of people's minds between clearly doesn't suck. I mean, Jalen Green is not a bad player, but also not quite the guy you want to be making the centerpiece of your offensive attack. They trade him, they trade Dylan Brooks,

and they keep everybody else, you know, Jabari Smith, Shengoon, Eason, Thompson, Benjamin Shepard, you know, every, Even Cam Whitmore. Right.

Just and all of the most prime picks that they had available, including, by the way, half of Phoenix's drive capital that Houston actually owns, they just, they did. And so they didn't give any of that up. And Houston now essentially replaces the inefficiency of Jalen Green with the still remarkable efficiency of, Kevin Durant, who will be 37 when the season starts, Andy, but it's coming off an excellent, particularly offensive season. The Sons were terrible last year. Kevin Durant was not. The Rockets did as well in this trade, I think, as they could possibly have imagined. Like, yes, they gave up a top 10 pick, but they have so many young players and they have other draft capital

that at the end of the day they can afford to do that. I do think there will be time. where they miss Dylan Brooks's defense and, you know, the edge and the mentality that I think he did help create in that locker room. And on his best nights, he can be a very good three-indee player. But he's not who you're going to hold up this tradeover, especially when you take into account everybody that they kept. They got off Jalen Green's money, which is very important. He's owed, I think about a hundred three or 105 mil over the next five million year for the next three years. Right.

they got off that. That in and of itself. Let's say Kevin Durant didn't sign an extension, which I think is improbable, but let's just say for the sake of argument, it happened. They still win this trade because they got off Green's money and it's going to give them more flexibility and more resources to make sure you lock up guys like Jabari Smith Jr. and Tari Isson, who I believe are both extension eligible this offseason. Amman Thompson's going to be coming up soon before you realize it. Reed Shepard's going to be up. And they love Reed Shepard.

And Brooks being traded opens up time on the floor for him. Like that. They're actually further away from the second apron after this deal than they were before it. That in and of itself makes this a win. But then if you take a look at the defensive structure that the rockets are going to have around Kevin, Durant, who provides the efficiency and the ability to get a basket in crunch time when things break down, which was the one thing the Rockets really lacked for this team that is clearly moving in the right direction and can be an absolutely suffocating defense, very switchable defense,

very disruptive. But Shangoon is a talented scorer. Green at his best can be. Amen Thompson is moving in that direction, but none of those guys are reliable in crunch time. KD is. Yep. This is a, you know, I mean, we may talk about this.

Like, I think this is a very pivotal and important trade for Kevin Durant in terms of the way you look at his career. Right. I mean, the legacy is for KD and the implications for KD. But that's different than Houston. Right. That does, it's irrelevant, you know, in terms of like they, They did really well in this trade.

And a West that was already a bleep just got bleepier. And that's the starting place for, I think for the most immediate impact of this trade for the Lakers is that you take, it's not the only impact, but the most immediate impact for the Lakers is you take a team in the Rockets who were a, everybody forgets the Rockets were a two seed last year. They were outstanding. What they were, though, was a really bad offensive team, particularly in the playoffs. You needed, they were too easy to figure out, and a lot of that had to do with Jalen Green. You now take that team and turn a two seed that was in the context of a playoff series shaky and now turn them into a legitimate contender in the Western Conference. So, you know, Oklahoma City, they win a title on Sunday night.

They will be favored to win another title next season. As well, they should be. As well, they should. But as we saw throughout the year, stuff happens. Things change. And Houston will be right there. So more on the fallout of the KD trade, what it means for the Western Conference, how this translates for the Lakers, do all that next.

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Head to DrinkOllipop.com slash Locked On NBA to claim your free can and find an Olipop near you. That's drinkolypop.com slash locked on NBA. So obviously now you look at Houston and they are much more a legitimate playoff threat with Kevin Durant than they were with Jalen Green. So many, you know, Al-Pi Shengun should be a better player with Kevin Durant as the sort of heart of that offense as opposed to. Jalen Green. So Durant's

presence is going to make Schengun better. You know, Amen Thompson is ascending and Shepard, they believe, is ascending, and Tarie Eason is a really good player and so on and so on and so on. They are going to be outstanding and have the capacity to keep getting better because they

save most of their capacity to do so. Team like Memphis was a high seat. They trade Desmond Bain. They're not folding the tents up. They still should be a pretty competitive squad. It's not going to get any easier when you factor in teams like San Antonio and all these other things. So obviously the pressure is going to be on the Lakers and the teams like the Lakers competing

and the team that is giving up to rant here is not, was already out of the playoffs last year. So it's not like Phoenix, you know, oh, well, Houston is ascending, but Phoenix, you know, they went from a four seed to now they're going to be out of the playoffs. Well, they already were out of the playoffs last year. They didn't get any better in this deal. And it's not one of these addition-by-s abstraction things. They're just going to be subtracting. The conference is really brutal.

Small piece of possible shakeout here that might impact the free agent marketing. Andy, among the players that might need to go for Houston kind of balance their books and all that stuff, balance out their roster. They have an option on center, Jock Lawndale, that they might not pick up now. Is he a great player? He is not. Could he be available for a minimum?

He certainly could be. Certainly not for more. He's not a terrible player either. And any player that adds to, rather than subtracts from, the available pool of centers, helps the Lakers because they need at least two. And it is better to have more of those guys on the market than fewer.

So that could impact things a little bit there. But the other thing that stuck out to me, for anybody who looks at this, I see a lot of parallels with just how a market works. Like, is Kevin Durant still really awesome? He sure is. but Phoenix didn't recoup Kevin Durant value and I'm using air quotes for people listening on

you know listening in audio not seeing the YouTube because of context and context would apply if the Lakers tried to trade LeBron for some reason that became something that became possible. They can't just so people we get that a lot.

People saying the Lakers should just trade LeBron. They can't trade LeBron unless the wrong wants to be. Right, but let's say LeBron said sure. Sure. I just people should know that because we get that comment at least 30 times per show. You cannot trade LeBron unless

LeBron wants to be traded because he has a no trade clause. And even if the, even if his no trade clause disappeared in his next contract, um, the context would make it very hard to get a large return for

LeBron for the same reasons that Kevin Durant, still an all-NBA caliber player, didn't get near what Phoenix paid to get him out of Brooklyn. Or, you know, there is context with an Austin Reeves potential trade or anybody. Like, you know, that you can't put Desmond Bain and Kevin Durant's side by side to each other and be like, you know, Bain got this and, you know, why didn't. Durant get five picks or something like that because Kevin Durant, certainly at least offensively, he's still a better player than Desmond Bayne. So like, context rules everything in the NBA and the Lakers in terms of the context of

their trade pieces are not dealing from a position of strength. Just as a refresher, the Suns over two-ish years, traded Mikhail Bridges, Cam Johnson four firsts for Jalen Green, Dylan Brooks, one first, five second round picks. That is essentially the Kevin Durant experience for Phoenix. And by the way, it should be noted. This was during the period where new owner slash loon Matt Ishpia was supposedly being a hands-off owner letting the eggheads in the front office handle things that supposed at experts, but now he has no choice but to get involved.

Good luck, Sons fans. Enjoy that experience. Yeah. I mean, look, I mean, I, I think the Sons didn't do great here. I had a long tech conversation with one of a, you know, sort of our basketball friends, you know, a guy I played fantasy basketball with and like this most absurdly competitive fantasy basketball league you will ever find and all these other things. and he was sort of railing on how poorly the sons did for KD.

And yeah, it ain't great. Like I don't know who they asked for. I don't know who they value. I don't know any of that stuff. But they didn't get back any of the great things that you would think that you would be able to get in a trade for Kevin Durant. They did not get any of that stuff back from Houston. even like a guy like Cam Whitmore who isn't really in their rotation even but still is pretty well regarded as a young prospect. Even he's staying in Houston.

They didn't get any of the stuff. But the flip side is, you know, Durant essentially cut off his own market because he made a clear, for example, a team like Minnesota. Great friends with Anthony Edwards. They're super tight. He wasn't going to sign an extension there. So Minnesota, reportedly I was reading Mark Stein stuff and a few other people were saying like Minnesota has been out for a while. Miami, and this I think is something that is highly relevant when you think about both this trade and lessons from the finals. Miami fairly lowballed to say the least in terms of what they were willing to give the rockets,

basically saying like look we're we don't think I think this is the logic we do not think we are a Kevin Durant away from being able to win the Eastern Conference and so we're not going to kind of give away we're not where are they they're not they that is the correct assessment right and so like Cal L Ware was the big piece that Houston would I'm sorry the Phoenix won it back they're like no we're not trading him you can have some but not all of, you know, Jaime Hakez and, you know, guys like that. You can have our 20th pick this year and all that. Miami doesn't have a lot of stuff that they can trade.

They're not a great team. They weren't going to get that much better. And so if Houston basically wanted to gift them Kevin Durant, great, but they weren't going to be able. There wasn't an active market for KD. San Antonio didn't, you know, I didn't, I agree with them. Durant kind of doesn't really fit the timeline. They didn't really feel like trying to accelerate things in a super competitive Western Conference and sort of short circuit the process they're on.

No, Houston is much more ready for a move like this. They were two feet last year. But like as far as we can get into this coming up next and more details, like where the Lakers go from here. It just reinforces the idea that if they are going to look to, you know, they're obviously in win now mode. They just got Luca Donchich in his prime, and they were trying to win now last season. They have been trying, if somewhat stuck in their efforts to win now. And, you know, we've talked about this a zillion times. The Russell Westbrook trade really put the Lakers very, very, very.

behind the eight ball in terms of making steady progress. It is the original sin for which they are still being punished. Yeah, I mean, look, as much as Rob Polinka, other than the deal I wanted him to do trade for Miles Turner, he unwound that deal about as well as you could realistically expect, but they were still playing catch up. And also, Rob doesn't deserve full credit for unwinding one of the most avoidable mistakes in probably the last decade in the NBA. But like, they're going to happen.

You don't congratulate the arsonist when he becomes a fireman. Especially if he becomes a fireman, like he applied to put out specifically a fire that he started. He starts a fire. Then he goes next door to the firehouse and fills out an application. Like at that point, no, he doesn't get credit. But like, we'll get into this coming up next. Like the Lakers are going to have to be really resourceful. really clever and really creative because they're working with a roster that is not bad.

They were a three seed last year, and they managed to be a three seed despite all these different changes over the course of the year, you know, basically working with three different rosters and some injuries and no continuity. And, you know, Luke at less than 100%, LeBron at less than 100%, Austin, like down the line. They're definitely not working with a terrible foundation. The real question is how equipped are they to improve it? So we can get into that coming up next. Lockdown Lakers is brought to you by Monarch Money.

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apps. You can use Monarch to check your finances, track spending, plan long-term goals, managing your partner, managing money with your partner, I guess some respects managing your partner depending on the spending. It's smoother than ever. You can track shared and personal accounts, Set goals. Get on the same page. Take control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use the code locked on NBA at monarchmoney.com for 50% off your first year. That's monarchmoney.com code locked on NBA for half off your first year. Okay. Low key best moment of the finals was watching Isaiah Hartenstein's little toddler baby

sleep through the ceremony there. Just dead to the world. absolutely just didn't even have the earphones on like the headphones on they didn't do the whole you know he was just out there and then little you know like half the team trying to be like hey man

pick up that little little guy's head so that was wholesome and great to watch it was a phenomenal finals and the lessons that come from it are to me kind of fascinating because the Halliburton injury, and if you missed it,

Tyrese Halliburton, it's an Achilles injury. He was playing with a strained calf, which same thing happened, Damien Lillard. Like, his calf injuries can make you more susceptible to Achilles injuries. Side note, too. This is, I think, why Luca Donchich has been so cautious about coming back from his calf injuries.

And I think also so aggravated reportedly by the Mavericks getting rid of so many of the training staff members that he trusted, like his people, you know, playing with an injury like that is no joke. And as much as, you know, we've talked about the importance of Lucas conditioning and weight and stuff like that, just in terms of where on your body, stress on your body and, you know, for your lower body that that can pay a toll as well. And these can be connected things and they matter. There's also the care. And this. And this. This is why, as I know the Mavericks as an organization, sometimes Mavericks fans would get frustrated by the recurrence of these calf strains and then Lucas absences. But we saw tonight, I mean, I get it.

It's game seven of the finals. Of course, Halliburton's going to try to play. But like, this is why you don't screw around with it, man. Like these things can get out of hand really, really fast. And so to me, when you combine, when you combine. When you combine the Halliburton injury, because Indiana went from, and I think the game kind of played out how I sort of thought it would before Halliburton got hurt where I figured at home, Oklahoma City would at, there would be a moment in this game when Oklahoma City would have a push that would be too hard for Indiana even as resilient as they are to come back. I think that might have happened that way, even with Halliburton. The difference was without Halliburton, Indiana really just couldn't withstand it.

They didn't have the quite enough to overcome it. But what it, Indiana went from game seven of the finals. We were one game away from a title. At worst, we took a 68 win team, I believe the Thunder were this year. Yes, they were. two game seven in the finals as close as you can get to winning a title without winning it. They went from that to our chances of winning the conference again next year aren't zero because Indiana is still a very good team, but are severely diminished because Halliburton's

not going to be able to play from if at all. You and I were texting and you and I were texting and I was saying like honestly from Indiana's perspective, if they weren't going to win them. this thing anyway, they would have been so much better off just losing in game six. And you don't know, obviously, no, you don't know that at the time, but like, this is the worst, worst case scenario. You don't win the championship and you lose your star. Right. And so they went from, okay, well, we have a chance to be back here. Because remember this is the second straight conference finals that Indiana made. They won it this year. Maybe they lose in the final six.

They've obviously shown themselves to be a very good playoff team. Extraordinary. well coached with the kind of roster that just suits playoff basketball really well. Now, a lot of that goes out the window because Halliburton is hurt. The Celtics went from being a team that was set to repeat to a team that was probably going to lose in the second round, and now is looking potentially at a gap year because Jason Tatum may not be able to play for most of next year as well with his version of the injury. And I don't worry about these guys recovering in the same way that we used to 15, 20, 25, 30 years ago within Achilles injury. The medicine has advanced.

Look at Kevin Durant. I think most people forget that he tore his Achilles. But when you combine it with the Durant trade and things like Miami, making the evaluation that, you know what, we're not giving up the farm for Kevin Durant. even though it's a splashy trade, put him without a bio and whatever. You have to be both incredibly opportunistic because things change in a heartbeat and what makes you what you look like, okay, we're not quite good enough. All of a sudden a door opens and you're like, oh, maybe we have a chance here. You can go from like those opportunities can pop up at any time.

But the flip side is you also have to be really, I have a really good understanding of how good you are before you make changes. And that's where the Lakers are. They're in like that tricky position that you noted, kind of going into the break. They're really good. They were a three seed,

but they've got some big obvious flaws. So how aggressively do you try to fix them? And all that, because you don't want to punt away a season, but you also don't want to do anything stupid. Well, before I get to that, I mean, long or the short, there's only so aggressive the Lakers may be able to get because they're dealing with so few assets to begin with.

But I wanted to make sure to get to one lesson I think should be there from these playoffs. And it was funny. Over the weekend, I don't remember who I thought I was responding to somebody as part of a Twitter comment threat. and somebody had brought up the idea of the pacer's and the thunder going deeper into their bench. And I thought that I was responding to this person or the people, I believe our friend Dom and Rungula was part of the conversation as well.

And I tweeted, JJ cut off in agreement, JJ cut off way too many options as the playoffs progressed, can't severely shrink a bench and deem Hayes on. playable and predetermined connect as a no-go, particularly in a series where Luca was sick, Austin's hurt, LeBron is 40, DFS's ankle, 36 hours between game three and game four. It's too limiting. I accidentally sent this out as a standalone tweet, which made me look like a lunatic because this was apparently just like a thought that I was sending out at like 1130 in the

morning on a random day. But the fact that it kind of blew up, it got like about 30,000 views. like 500 likes. Apparently there were a lot of people agreeing with me. I have no idea where the original conversation went. But one of the players that makes me really think about this in this series was Tony Bradley for the Pacers. He was a very little used big man over the course of this season.

He didn't join the Pacers until March on a series of 10-day contracts. And Tony Bradley has bounced around the league. He was out of the league for most of this. I think actually he was out of the league for the entirety of this season until Indiana picked him up on these 10 days. He averaged about eight minutes a game or something. But Rick Carlyle was willing to give Tony Bradley alternate shots throughout these playoffs. He sort of slowly took the minutes that Thomas Bryant was.

Right. Right. But that is something that JJ Redick would not have done. I feel very confident saying that, that he would not have done something like that. And you cannot convince me that Tony Bradley, who again was not in the NBA for the majority of this season, is automatically a better option, not just than all the ones JJ turned down, but then essentially limiting yourself to like five guys. at some point you have to be willing to play more of your imperfect options because doing it as extreme as JJ did is simply impractical. Like you can't do it that way.

I think. Like to the extreme that he did that. I think this is definitely a situation where multiple things can be true at once. I think it is unquestionable JJ got a little tight in that series. I don't think anybody, I think JJ. And I believe in JJ big picture. I think JJ's going to be a good coach. But if you looked and if you asked JJ, he got too tight in that series.

And this isn't a Monday morning quarterbacking either. I said this a lot during this area. Right. You know, JJ said as much in, you know, after the season that he got, you know, he didn't coach that playoff series well. But I do think it is easy to look at Carlyle. and easy to look at Dagnow and how they use their rosters and look, this guy played and this guy hadn't played. And Tony Bradley, you say, because again, go back to where we started.

Context. We can carry this conversation in tomorrow's show. You can swap out Tony Bradley for Thomas Bryant when you, in a couple ways. First of all, you have to have those options. You have to have more than one center that you can turn to. The Lakers, the only other guy they had on the roster that they could play. If you don't think Jackson Hayes is playing well or that they're being successful with Hayes on the court, and very few people believe that they were.

The only other guy they had they could turn to in that situation was Alex Lenn. And Alex Lenn sucked. So, you know, there was no Tony Bradley on the Lakers roster for them to turn to. moreover. But I don't think if there was, he would have done it anyway. I don't think he would have in any way. I don't know because the roster was limited. And even the guys that were playing, the starters,

you can plug in players who hadn't played as much. You can go deeper into your roster when you have five guys who are part of your core rotation, who are excellent two-way players who are versatile. You know, when you have Niece Smiths, when you have Nemhart, when you have all these sight of Seacom, when you have guys who can go and fill a lot of holes and play in a lot of ways.

And so I think, and we'll pick this up tomorrow. So I think it's a really interesting conversation. How do you construct a roster that where your most important players allow for you to get more out of? of the back end of your rotation. Sure. The Lakers had a very limited roster in that sense and very mismatched. And so that's something they need to fix.

And we can carry that into tomorrow. Lockdown Lakers on YouTube's ready to hang out. With over 35,000 subscribers to the channel, we will see everyone tomorrow.