Lakers News: Insider Thinks LA Will Replace D'Angelo Russell With An All-Star

D-Lo had an uneven second stint in LA.

Your Los Angeles Lakers suffered a disappointing end to their 2022-23 NBA season on Monday, falling in four games to the Denver Nuggets in the Western Conference Finals. Now, several key roster decisions confront the club, which only has five guaranteed contracts on its books next season, plus two team options it seems unlikely to pick up.

On his excellent new podcast with Marc Stein, #thisleague UNCUT, Chris Haynes of Bleacher Report (who's fairly connected with the Lakers), revealed that he believes unrestricted Dallas Mavericks All-Star free agent Kyrie Irving is more likely to land in LA in 2023-24 than two-time Atlanta Hawks All-Star Trae Young, who would need to be acquired via trade.

Whatever happens with the point guard position, one thing is fairly certain to Haynes: D'Angelo Russell has played his last game in a Lakers uniform. 

LA traded for its own former lottery pick just ahead of the deadline in February as part of a three-team deal with the Utah Jazz and Minnesota Timberwolves. He averaged a solid 17.4 points on .484/.414/.735 shooting splits, 6.1 assists, 2.9 rebounds and 0.6 steals a night across 17 regular season contests. In the playoffs, however, his output dropped, until his production was so brutal in Western Conference Finals (6.3 points on a .323/.133/.750 slash line, 3.5 assists and two rebounds) that he had to be removed from the starting lineup.

“I don’t think we’ll see D’Angelo Russell back with the Lakers, LeBron wants to fade more into the role as a secondary scorer and playmaker,” Haynes said.

Russell is solid as a secondary playmaker and a release valve on offense who can spread the floor (at least during the regular season), but was terrible in LA's four-game Western Conference Finals sweep against the Denver Nuggets.

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