Lakers: Kendrick Perkins Has Fun Conspiracy Theory For Front Office Inaction
Your 2022-23 Los Angeles Lakers have yet to operate like a normal team.
Beyond their befuddling 20-25 record, littered with five-game losing streaks and five-game winning streaks alike, the Lakers continue to buck traditional NBA rumor mill timelines. Prior to the start of the season, all the buzz around town was that LA was exploring a variety of Russell Westbrook trade options.
More recently, it seemed like the team was amenable to just offloading the deals of two other, cheaper veteran guards who've also seen better days on the hardwood: Patrick Beverley and Kendrick Nunn.
As the trade deadline approaches, however, buzz around the Lakers plans for this season seems to be subsiding, with insiders and pundits now proposing a litany of summer offseason deals, including a few trades that involve shipping LA All-Star power forward LeBron James right out of town.
LA has two first-round draft picks (and oodles of second-rounders) that it can include in trades this year, plus the expiring money of Westbrook, Beverley and Nunn. Why does it seem like the team just wants to punt this season and reset next year?
Speaking on ESPN, longtime Boston Celtics center-turned-broadcaster Kendrick Perkins, a one-time teammate of LBJ's, offered up a funny hypothetical: what if team president Rob Pelinka and governor Jeanie Buss are holding off on making a deal because they're still annoyed at having been essentially pressured into trading for Westbrook's terrible contract in the first place?
"It almost feels like, in my opinion, that Rob Pelinka and Jeanie Buss [are] punishing LeBron James for the Russell Westbrook trade," Perkins offered. "[They're essentially saying] 'You played a huge part in getting Russell Westbrook here, and we know we have these two draft picks, and we're not going to trade them because you wanted him 'Bron, so now you have to deal with it. You made your bed, you have to lay in it.'"
"Is it fair?" Perk asked rhetorically. "No. Are we wasting his greatness and wasting his time, as far as him being able to go and win championships? Yes. Do I feel sorry for 'Bron? Yes."
"Rob Pelinka [is] not being aggressive. He's not even traveling on the road, he's nowhere to be found. right now. He, to me, is saying, 'No. You dealt these cards, you're going to play them.'"
This idea, offered up mostly in jest, is just the kind of weird behavior that this very weird organization would be capable of this season.
