Lakers: NBA Pundit Proposes Deal To Send LeBron James Back To Miami Heat
Given his advanced age and mileage, combined with the fact that he's still amazing enough to score 47 points against a good Atlanta Hawks and will his team to victory despite the fact that it can't play defense, 38-year-old Los Angeles Lakers All-Star forward LeBron James is pretty much the definition of a "win-now" player. But his Lakers as currently comprised are in no way ready to compete for championship trophies again.
This Lakers team's front office seems to want it both ways, having inked James to a lucrative multi-year extension this summer, but seeming to be reticent to move off its only real non-All-Star trade assets (two future first-round draft picks, oodles of second-round selections) to improve the team and accommodate the timeline of the future first-ballot Hall of Famer. It's a strange choice that satisfies absolutely no one, as the team continues to struggle to reach a .500 record with Anthony Davis sidelined.
James recently inched closer than ever to hinting at a possible forthcoming trade demand, insinuating that he was dissatisfied with his current teammates in postgame remarks made Wednesday after a 112-98 drubbing at the hands of the Miami Heat, the team he guided to four straight NBA Finals and two titles from from 2010-2014.
Though he couldn't be dealt until the 2023 offseason, would a return to South Beach behoove both LBJ and LA?
Ira Winderman of The South Florida Sun-Sentinel pitches a truly ludicrous offer that there is no way on earth the Lakers front office would be amenable to make, suggesting that the Heat trade their own recently-extended player, 22-year-old shooting guard Tyler Herro, in exchange for a second go-round with King James. Dealing for Herro, who inked a four-year, $130 million extension that also makes him impossible to trade until the 2023 offseason, hardly feels like a fair shake for The Chosen One.
Since being moved into a starting role this season, the 6'5" swingman out of Kentucky is averaging 21.1 points on .450/.396/.917 shooting splits, six rebounds, 4.6 assists and a steal per contest. He's a below-average defender on a mediocre 18-18 Miami club, and seems unlikely to make an All-Star team in the near future.
LeBron James may be old, but he's still an All-Star. Tyler Herro is good (heck, he's the reigning Sixth Man of the Year), but he could very easily never be an All-Star. The Heat do have up to three first-round draft picks they could include in a deal, but Herro is most likely a cut below the upper tier of quality young players LA could receive in return.
There is, however, one very enticing young talent that the Lakers would no doubt be happy to add, along with the aforementioned picks, in exchange for James: All-Star center Bam Adebayo, one of the league's best defensive bigs. Would Miami be willing to surrender the 6'9" frontcourt star, who along with Jimmy Butler is one of the Heat's primary foundational talents, for a reunion with a past-his-prime LeBron James? In an ideal world, Miami would want to hold on to Butler and Adebayo, in the hopes of pairing them with a third All-Star. But LeBron James, even at this stage of his career, is just too darn good an asset to be surrendered for anything less than an All-NBA talent.
Would the Lakers be content with a core of Anthony Davis and Bam Adebayo? Neither can shoot, but both can handle a bit, can score in bunches, and are defensively versatile enough to defend either frontcourt position. It could work. Or the team could also opt to move on from Davis, who has probably rehabilitated a lot of his trade value thanks to his All-NBA play earlier this season.
