Lakers News: Controversial Veteran Big Man To Work Out For LA This Week
It sure seems like your Los Angeles Lakers are not quite done making roster moves, even if those moves happen to be centered more around the fringes of their rotation for the time being.
Sources inform Shams Charania of The Athletic that nine-year veteran center Meyers Leonard is going to audition for LA this Friday. Leonard will be the second confirmed center that the Lakers are set to work out tomorrow, as it was also announced earlier today that LA is also taking a look at former four-time All-Star five DeMarcus Cousins.
Unlike Cousins, however, Leonard did not suit up anywhere at all last season. That was more a consequence of off-court issues than it was a reflection of his on-court play, though he dealt with major injury problems during his last NBA season in 2020-21. The seven-footer out of the University of Illinois only played in two games before requiring season-ending surgeries to his shoulder and ankle.
After saying an antisemitic slur during a Twitch live-stream, the seven-footer was fined to the tune of $50,000 by the Miami Heat (the maximum permitted) and suspended by the team. The Heat ultimately gave up a future second-round draft pick just to get off his contract later that season, shipping him out to the Oklahoma City Thunder, who subsequently waived the rest of Leonard's (insanely generous) $9.4 million contract. Leonard quickly apologized for the incident (unlike some other hypothetical future Lakers), and was enrolled in a cultural diversity program by the NBA.
He has spent the last few years continuing to try to grow from his mistake, spending time with Jewish leaders and the larger Jewish community, Charania tweets. It does seem like he is truly remorseful for his offending comment, so kudos to him for putting in the time.
Leonard also invoked controversy when he refused to kneel during the national anthem while on the 2020 Orlando "bubble" campus for Miami's NBA Finals run, despite all of the rest of his Heat teammates and coaches (and their NBA Finals opponents, your Lakers) doing so. The kneeling was done to protest then-recent police violence against George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Jacob Blake that year. Leonard explained that he would not kneel because he felt that it would be construed as opposition to the U.S. military somehow (despite that not at all being the point of the kneeling). The kneeling-during-the-anthem gesture was originated by then-San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick in 2016, who consulted with a Green Beret in determining what the right level of protest would be that could still honor the nation's military.
Controversies aside, adding Leonard is not the kind of personnel decision that will set the world on fire, and it remains to be seen what kind of basketball shape the big man is even in after not having played professionally anywhere in two calendar years.
Through 447 games (93 starts) with the Portland Trail Blazers and Heat, the 30-year-old center holds modest averages of 5.6 points, 3.9 rebounds and 0.9 assists per game in 16 minutes, mostly as a reserve. But his appeal to LA on paper makes sense, given that he is fairly athletic and could help out the team defensively in the paint, but also -- more importantly -- he's a knockdown floor-spacer. Leonard boasts a sparkling 39% three-pointer conversion rate on 1.9 tries a night over the duration of his career. Even when the volume increases dramatically, Leonard can still get the job done, as he proved when he made 37.7% of his 3.7 triple tries for Portland in 2015-16.
