KI4MVP
formerly LJ4MVP
- Joined
- Jun 30, 2005
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You raise very solid points and argue your case well, but i wouldn't count on it. It's the Lakers.... They are (almost) always pretty good, adept at rebuilding on the fly and never seem to have a problem swinging a decisive trade or especially attracting FAs.
The chances of that pick being in th etop 10 are minuscule, imho. I know they have recently missed the payoffs, not saying it wouldn't ever happen, just that it's less likely than your well lined-up arguments would suggest.
However, you have to hand it to the FO again... same as with the positioning of the Miami picks. The chances are that those won't be great either, but in both cases, they managed to get the picks that are likely to be as favorable as ever from those teams.
They haven't had much luck attracting free agents lately and only have the MLE to offer them at least until Kobe's contract is off the books. This is why they were so desperate at the trade deadline. Had they just included the picks when they tried to trade for CP3 that they ended up moving at the traded deadline, they may have got that trade to go through. But they got got greedy and tried to save enough to get Howard too.
As for collapsing, Kobe is the key there. He has been injury prone, but plays through injuries that would sideline any other player in the league. This year he's playing a condensed season, presumably another extended playoff run, another trip to the olympics and then right back at it with another full season next year where he'll be 34. Eventually his game will start to decline and/or he'll miss some games with an injury he can't play through. In the west it doesn't take many extra losses to fall from a top playoff seed to a low playoff seed, thus drop from a high 20s pick to a low 20s/high teens pick. And not many more from there to fall out of the playoffs all together, thus 14 or better. ANd what do the lakers do when Sessions opts out and looks for more money? Are they going to pay him $9 million+, which really costs them $18 million+? They traded away both of their picks, so they can't improve there. I could easily see the lakers 2013 pick being considerably better than the heat 2013 pick.