Russell Westbrook and the Los Angeles Lakers have been a horrible pairing. One would think that Westbrook could be a good fit alongside LeBron James and Anthony Davis, however, he has been anything but that. The Lakers are aware of this, and at this point, Russ could end up finding himself on the bench.
The Lakers are 0-4 to start the season, and during the three games in which Russ has played, he has put up some horrible shooting numbers. He is 28 percent from the field and eight percent from three. These are awful splits, and if you are a Lakers fan, you can't help but at least be a bit disgusted by what you're seeing.
Of course, the Lakers could always make a trade. They had been talking to the Utah Jazz and the Indiana Pacers prior to the season, but now, they have gone silent. It appeared as though talks had resumed, but according to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, that simply isn't true. Instead, the Lakers are thinking of waiting until the season is already a quarter of the way done.
“The big trades that people want with the Lakers — Westbrook and his $47 million out with those first-round picks the Lakers have in ’27, ’29, all the deals the Lakers didn’t wanna do in the offseason, that’s all that’s there two weeks into the season,” Wojnarowski said. “Teams don’t really get serious about doing deals and maybe pivoting away from trying to be a playoff team or trying to go toward the Lottery in a year where there’s Victor Wembanyama available, they’re not gonna do that until 20 or 30 games into the season. So, all the deals the Lakers didn’t think gave them enough value for trading those picks, they’re all still there — Utah, Indiana, who the Lakers talked with a lot in the offseason, I’m told they’ve not heard from the Lakers yet this season.”
The Lakers have very few prospects right now, and this is only going to make Lakers fans feel worse. At this point, you should just expect another 11th-12th place finish in the Western Conference.