Lakers: NBA Insider Provides Update on Stanley Johnson Contract Status
The Lakers swung-and-missed on plenty of player signing last year. Most of the aged veterans they signed failed to have a positive impact on the team. However, due to the NBA allowing teams to hand out COVID hardship allowance contracts, the Lakers got an extended look at former lottery pick Stanley Johnson.
After playing on three-consecutive ten-day contracts, the Lakers signed Johnson, the eighth overall pick in the 2015 draft, for the rest of the year to a NBA contract.
According to Mike Scotto of HoopsHype, league insiders expect the Lakers to pick up Johnson's team option.
"The expectation around the NBA is the Los Angeles Lakers will exercise the $2.35 million team option on forward Stanley Johnson. New Lakers coach Darvin Ham publicly stressed the importance of role players like Johnson."
It's not exactly a surprise considering how few resources the Lakers have this offseason to sign quality NBA players. When a team is holding free agent workouts for fringy-at-best NBA players and actively shopping for a second-round pick, that team needs to retain as many NBA players as possible. Johnson fits the bill.
Johnson wasn't a world-beater last year, but his length, athleticism, and energy was something that the Lakers sorely lacked last season. His finest outing came during the Lakers 101-96 home win over the Jazz. Johnson scored ten points and grabbed four rebounds in the fourth quarter to help LA surge to much needed win.
Purely going off of end-of-the-season production is sometimes dangerous, but in the Lakers last three games, Johnson averaged 14.7 points per game and 7.3 rebounds per game.
The Mater Dei alum finished the season averaging 22.8 minutes per game and his defensive versatility can only help a Lakers team that was looked old and slow on that side of the ball last year.
