Kent Bewley's News Story Collection

During this past week, the Los Angeles Lakers have made some franchise-altering moves such as letting LeBron James explore free agency, trading for Walker Kessler with plenty of lucrative draft capital being acquired by the Utah Jazz and signing a batch of new role players to replace departed role players. Another significant move made by the Lakers was trading away DeAndre Ayton to the Washington Wizards on Fri, Jul 3 in exchange for two second round picks in the future draft years of 2031 and 2032 along with guard Jaden Hardy. Now in pursuit of a new big man, the Purple & Gold have signed Kevon Looney to a one year, $3.9 million deal to serve as the backup center behind Kessler. According to ESPN’s Shams Charania, the Lakers are also trying to pursue Jonathan Kuminga, who was teammates with Looney on the Golden State Warriors and was traded to the Atlanta Hawks before the trade deadline last season. Kuminga opted to decline his player option in his contract acquired by Atlanta and is a free agent currently.

In Looney, the Lakers have a 30-year old experienced veteran who played the first ten seasons of his career with the Warriors and he won three NBA titles on those dynasty teams with Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Kevin Durant and Draymond Green among others. Looney was a reserve center for some of those Warriors teams and his best season came in the 2022-23 season when he averaged 7 points and 9 rebounds per game while shooting 63 percent from the floor and playing 24 minutes per game. Looney played this past season with the New Orleans Pelicans and only appeared in 21 games. Looney was drafted out of UCLA in the 2015 NBA draft and he is a good defensive rebounder, something that the Lakers sorely need. Looney will be in the backup center role again behind Kessler, who is set to be the main big man with Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves as the main cornerstones of the offense for the Lakers.

As for Kuminga, the Purple & Gold need additional depth in the forward position after seeing the departures of LeBron, Rui Hachimura and Marcus Smart. The current forward room contains Jake LaRavia, Sandro Mamukelashvilli, Quentin Grimes, Jarred Vanderbilt and Dalton Knecht. With very limited salary cap space remaining and only one roster spot left, the Lakers might not be able to acquire Kuminga without offloading some dead weight contracts such as Vanderbilt and Knecht in the forward group. A potential sign-and-trade could also happen with the Hawks in acquiring Kuminga, who is also being pursued by other teams like the Cleveland Cavaliers. The possibility of the Lakers getting Kuminga could depend on whether James decides to return to his hometown team or not. If LeBron opts to sign elsewhere other than Cleveland, then Kuminga could be signed by a Cavs team seeking an extra star player to help lift them back into the NBA Finals after losing in the Eastern Conference Finals to the now-champion New York Knicks. So, the Kuminga sweepstakes could depend on how the final-ever LeBron sweepstakes play out.

The Purple & Gold are trying to build a winning roster around Doncic and Reaves while also looking to defy the trend of teams that have had LeBron James on their roster struggling to stay relevantly competitive after the King walks out of the door. But the Lakers have a desire to win and will seek to improve their play with better defense, efficient offense and hopefully no debilitating injuries to any of their key players.