Should Lakers Keep D'Angelo Russell In Free Agency Despite Inefficient Postseason Play?

LA's starting point guard has had a rough go of it.

For your Los Angeles Lakers there's a glass-half-full way to look at yet another underwhelming D'Angelo Russell playoff performance this year, and a glass-half-empty way to approach it. 

The "optimistic" view one could take is that D-Lo, an unrestricted free agent this summer, is knocking millions of dollars off any impending offseason offers with yet another subpar performance on both ends of the hardwood during LA's 3-2 series against the Memphis Grizzlies. 

He can't stay in front of Memphis' explosive guards (who each nabbed 30 or more points, 10 or more rebounds and five or more assists last night in a critical Game 5 win to save their season), and he can't consistently punish them on the other end, either, though he has made some key high-pressure shots.

Through five games in this ongoing best-of-seven series, the Lakers' lead guard is averaging 13.8 points on .368/.324/.889 shooting splits, 6.2 assists (against 2.0 turnovers), 4.0 rebounds, and 0.6 steals a night.

It had been assumed that Russell would earn something in the range of Fred VanVleet's current four-year, $85 million contract, which itself would have represented a bit of a pay cut from Russell's current, too-generous four-year, $117.3 million deal.

Unlike VanVleet, a proven champ who has stepped up in the biggest moments before, Russell is a playoff dog, and sees his stats take a nosedive when the lights shine brightest. To date, he has never once had a field goal shooting playoff game conversion rate of 50% or more (well, 46.7% or more, to be precise), in 16 opportunities.

The glass-half-empty view on this uninspiring Russell run is that, you know, he's not very good when it matters most, and maybe the Lakers should look for an upgrade at the point guard position. 

LeBron James has always been the team's lead ball handler. Things worked out pretty darn well when he was LA's actual starting point guard in 2019/20. He lacks the foot speed to keep up with the Ja Morants of the world defensively, but then again so does D'Angelo Russell. 

So who else is out there for LA? Stay tuned.

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