The Los Angeles Lakers made a bold decision. In spite of their inconsistent season and LeBron James’ desire to get more pieces at the trade deadline, they chose to keep their core intact.
Rob Pelinka knows how drastically things can change in the NBA and decided to pursue a championship with the same players he won in the In-Season Tournament and perhaps brace the team for the post-LeBron era.
James claimed that he didn’t know whether he would pick up his player option for next season. Nonetheless, former NBA star Gary Payton believes he’s not going anywhere.
Gary Payton Says LeBron Won’t Leave The Lakers
“LeBron did what he wanted — [what] he was supposed to. He said, ‘I’m staying where I’m at,’” Payton told Yahoo Sports. “He’s been traveling too many times, been to Cleveland, you know. He been to Miami, went back to Cleveland. This is his last stop, man.”
LeBron James of the Los Angeles Lakers
James and his camp reportedly turned down a trade offer by the Golden State Warriors, so he must be happy in Los Angeles. Also, Payton thinks the Warriors would’ve had to give up most of their core to get him, so they wouldn’t have had a competitive team in the first place:
“Golden State would have to give up everybody. So you only would have been playing with [LeBron] and probably Curry,” Payton said. “They’d have to give up their whole team. They would have been only LeBron and Curry. And then [Golden State] would have to bring in somebody else. They would’ve had to throw people in. So I don’t think that would have happened.”
see also
Warriors almost paired LeBron James with Stephen Curry
Staying in Los Angeles makes the most sense for James. Then again, if another team takes his firstborn son Bronny in the NBA Draft, everything could change in the blink of an eye.
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