Where does the Los Angeles Lakers' NBA title defense stand after a busy first two days of free agency?
The 2019-20 NBA champions haven't rested on their laurels this offseason, making an aggressive trade for guard Dennis Schroder before the start of free agency and then adding a pair of marquee free agents on Friday: guard Wesley Matthews and center Montrezl Harrell. On Saturday, the Lakers reportedly agreed to re-sign guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope.
Have the Lakers upgraded the roster that brought home the 17th championship in the franchise's history? What does losing Harrell mean for the crosstown rival LA Clippers? Let's update the top of the Western Conference.
Lakers upgrade their bench units
Last season, the Lakers' reserves earned a combined one vote for the Sixth Man Award: a third-place vote for Dwight Howard, who is departing to join the Philadelphia 76ers. In the past week, the Lakers acquired the two leading vote-getters: winner Harrell and runner-up Schroder. Suddenly, L.A.'s second unit looks like a formidable force.
I'm particularly intrigued by how much shot creation the Lakers have added. Last season, Kyle Kuzma was the only regular reserve with a usage rate greater than league average (20%). For the most part, Lakers coach Frank Vogel built his bench lineups with role players around Anthony Davis or LeBron James, at least one of whom was on the court nearly all the time. The Lakers played just 367 minutes in the regular season with neither Davis nor James on the court, per my analysis of lineup data from NBA Advanced Stats.
Now Vogel can base no-star lineups on the abilities of Schroder, Kuzma and Harrell to create their own offense. I do wish Schroder were a little more adept in the pick-and-roll, where he rated below average for a point guard last season. Pick-and-rolls with Schroder handling the ball averaged .92 points per chance, according to Second Spectrum tracking, worse than the leaguewide mark of .95 points per chance.
Playing with Harrell should help. An argument could be made that Harrell was the best roll man in pick-and-roll in the NBA in 2019-20. Nobody in the league screened more often with as much efficiency as Harrell. The Clippers' 1.04 points per chance with Harrell as the screener ranked seventh among players who set at least 500 ball screens, per Second Spectrum data, and Harrell's total screens (1,689) was 11th in the league.
I wonder to what extent the Lakers' moves to add shot creation were a response to the short turnaround before NBA opening night on Dec. 22. Given that James didn't get his usual offseason to rest and recover, it seems reasonable to expect that he'll play fewer games this season after suiting up for 67 of the team's 73 regular-season games in 2019-20. The Lakers also can't count on James and Davis -- who still has to re-sign as an unrestricted free agent, by the way, though that's surely a formality -- to stay as healthy as they did last season.
I'm also curious whether the Lakers' upgrading the second unit makes Kuzma the odd man out. Because Kuzma has struggled to make 3s since his out-of-nowhere shooting as a rookie, much of his value comes from shot creation. If Schroder and Harrell provide that, there's no longer the same need for Kuzma, who's eligible for an extension through Dec. 29 and would otherwise be a restricted free agent next summer. Now might be the time for the Lakers to cash in Kuzma's trade value.
Questions remain about starting, finishing lineup
The downside of using the non-taxpayer midlevel exception to sign Harrell is that it hard-caps the Lakers at the luxury-tax apron, $6.3 million greater than the tax line. Including a max salary for Davis, that gives the Lakers about $18 million to fill out the final five or six spots on the roster. (Note that because the hard cap cannot be exceeded, the $2 million worth of unlikely incentives in Schroder's contract count against it.)
That's where things got a little tricky in terms of re-signing Caldwell-Pope, a starter for the Lakers throughout the postseason. They reportedly were able to bring him back on a three-year, $40 million deal that just about maxes out their available flexibility.
With Caldwell-Pope back, the Lakers will have to keep 14 players on their roster to start the season instead of the maximum 15 -- not counting up to two on two-way contracts -- and can't fill out the roster with any player making more than the veteran's minimum.
By agreeing to sign Matthews for the $3.6 million biannual exception, the Lakers presumably replaced Green in the starting lineup, although Alex Caruso might also bid for a starting spot. Matthews is a similar 3-and-D role player, albeit not as accomplished defensively as Green and a less accurate 3-point shooter historically (38% career beyond the arc to 40% for Green; they were both at 40% last season).
There are also questions about how the Lakers start and finish games at center. JaVale McGee started all 68 games he played during the regular season and the first eight of the playoffs but scarcely saw the court after he was replaced by Howard during the Western Conference finals. McGee did not play at all in the NBA Finals.
Depending on what happens with Markieff Morris, to whom the Lakers can now offer only the veteran's minimum, Vogel might not have as many options to replace McGee in the playoffs next season. The Lakers will probably be counting on Harrell to finish games, something he didn't often do for the Clippers in the 2020 postseason, when he was out of shape after missing all of the seeding games to mourn the death of his grandmother.
All told, I think the Lakers have improved their regular-season roster dramatically. The questions about their starting and finishing lineups make playoff improvement a bit more uncertain.
Did the Clippers get better?
Losing Harrell and backup forward JaMychal Green freed the Clippers to use their own $9.3 million non-taxpayer midlevel exception, and on Saturday night they landed a commitment from former Toronto Raptors center Serge Ibaka. Although Ibaka hasn't been as consistently valuable as Harrell during the regular season, come playoff time he looks like an upgrade for the Clippers.
Last postseason, then-Clippers coach Doc Rivers had to choose between centers who specialized in defense (starter Ivica Zubac), pick-and-roll play (Harrell) and stretching the floor (Green). Ibaka gives the Clippers something of all three traits.
For the most part, Rivers' choice to finish games was "none of the above," as the Clippers closed games without any kind of a center. According to NBA Advanced Stats data, Zubac played five of the team's 20 "clutch" minutes (score within five points in the last five minutes of regulation or in overtime) and Harrell two.
The remaining 13 clutch minutes saw Marcus Morris Sr. slide down to center to allow the Clippers to play five-out lineups. Well, Ibaka's dangerous 3-point shooting (38.5% last season, 36% career) will allow the Clippers to go five-out without having to sacrifice rim protection.
The Clippers' seven-game loss to the Denver Nuggets in the conference semifinals, one win short of a long-anticipated matchup with the Lakers, was about far more than just Harrell's poor performance in that series. Still, the Lakers signing Harrell away might have helped their biggest rivals in the Western Conference improve their playoff rotation.