According to ESPN’s Marc Stein, who was the first to report the news, the Los Angeles Lakers will be acquiring the services of Roy Hibbert from the Indiana Pacers.
ESPN sources say that the Lakers and Pacers are actively discussing a trade where L.A. would take Roy Hibbert into salary-cap space
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) July 4, 2015
Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times reported on what the Lakers would be giving up:
Lakers' price to acquire Indiana center Roy Hibbert: A future second-round draft pick, year undisclosed.
— Mike Bresnahan (@Mike_Bresnahan) July 5, 2015
If this deal goes through as expected, the Lakers will have themselves a starting center for this upcoming season. However, this move still seems a little weird. I know the Lakers want to just take on a salary dump so they can free up more space for the next offseason, but this move doesn’t seem so conducive for their draft hope next offseason.
The Lakers’ first round pick in the 2016 draft is going to be handed over to the 76ers if it falls outside of the top-3. So, now that they have added Hibbert, and they also have an improving Jordan Clarkson with D’Angelo Russell, Kobe, and Julius Randle it seems like they’ll be winning some more games to stay out of the worst three teams in the league. Sure, there’s always a chance that the ping pong balls bounce their way, but that’s a big risk as everyone has seen with the Knicks falling down to the fourth pick in the 2015 draft.
Secondly, the Lakers saw a lot of free agents turn them down in favor of winning teams. They may have a lot of money to offer free agents next season, but if they’re not winning then they could see a lot more free agents turn them down for the same reason as this offseason. It just seems like LA is in some sort of limbo right now that could mean more losing than the fan base is used to.
