How the Lakers can maximize their remaining cap space

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How the Lakers can maximize their remaining cap space


How the Lakers can maximize their remaining cap space


The Lakers are set to acquire Anthony Davis from the Pelicans starting on July 6, but most likely it will cost them their maximum cap space. If the deal is executed at the end of the moratorium and Davis demands his trade bonus, $9 million would be deducted from the Lakers cap space total. They’d be left with approximately $23.7 million in cap space, but they could get to $25.4 million if they also trade Mo Wagner and Isaac Bonga.

The popular opinion is for the Lakers to pursue a max free agent but they are unlikely to have adequate cap space for one following the trade. But even if they can get the Pelicans to agree to delay the deal in order to maximize the Lakers cap space, it might not be the best use of their money.

The Lakers are projected to have $32.5 million in cap space before acquiring Davis. Even if they were able to use it on one star, such as Kemba Walker, they would have a very thin roster afterward. They’d only have the room mid-level exception worth $4.8 million (R-MLE) as their highest means to sign a player. After that, they are limited with only signing players to minimum contracts.

Potential Lakers 2019-20 payroll if they get to use maximum cap space on a top free agenct (Kemba Walker), then trade for Anthony Davis.

Potential Lakers 2019-20 payroll if they get to use maximum cap space on a top free agent (Kemba Walker), then trade for Anthony Davis. – Yossi Gozlan (USA TODAY Media Group)

The Lakers have already incurred tremendous risk by having most of their money tied up to LeBron James and Davis. Signing a maximum player would cause the Lakers to heavily depend on all of James, Davis, Kuzma, and that maximum player. They would all have to play heavy minutes every night and probably avoid load management during the regular season just to win enough games to make the playoffs.

With all their eggs in such a small basket, the Lakers season would be derailed if one of them suffered a major injury. Minimum players making up half the roster will not cut it.

Even if the Lakers have maximum cap space, it would be a much more efficient use of their cap space to divide amongst multiple starter-level players that can play 20-30 minutes a game. The Lakers biggest needs are wing players who can provide consistent outside shooting and perimeter defense. They also need a starting point guard who can let James play off-ball a little more.

As mentioned earlier, the Lakers will likely enter the offseason with $23.7 million in cap space. This could be enough for the Lakers to sign two players for starting salaries that would range from $9 million to $12 million. Players that could fit that salary range include Patrick Beverley, Avery Bradley (if waived), Alec Burks, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, DeMarre Carroll, Darren Collison, Danny Green, George Hill, Derrick Rose, Terrence Ross, Iman Shumpert, and Garrett Temple.

Many of these players may not be worth $9 to $12 million, but the market may say otherwise. Wing players who play solid defense and shoot at an acceptable percentage are premiums in today’s NBA. With approximately ten teams loaded with maximum cap space this summer, most will strike out from signing the top free agents. This could lead many of them to overpay wing players on short-term deals.

As an example, players such as Trevor Ariza, Bojan Bogdanovic, and Rudy Gay, may be worth a $9 to $12 million salary but could get as much as $15 million to $18 million on the open market. The players listed earlier arguably may be worth less than $9 million to $12 million annually, but they could still get that much anyways.

With that said, $23.7 million could probably fit two of those wing players mentioned. That would leave them with five rotation players before utilizing the R-MLE and minimum signings.

The Lakers could also hold onto the cap hold of Reggie Bullock in order to retain his bird rights. While they’re at it, they could also retain Alex Caruso’s tiny $1.6 million cap hold so they can re-sign him with his early bird rights. This would allow the Lakers to re-sign both players to their respective market value without any constraints.

Lakers 2019-20 cap sheet if the renounce all free agents except for Reggie Bullock and Alex Caruso.

Lakers 2019-20 cap sheet if the renounce all free agents except for Reggie Bullock and Alex Caruso. – Yossi Gozlan (USA TODAY Media Group)

Doing so would knock down the Lakers cap space to $19.1 million, which isn’t a significant sacrifice as they could still pursue two of the types of players listed earlier. If need be, they could increase that figure to $20.8 million if they trade Wagner and Bonga.

With this cap space maneuvering, the Lakers could sign two of the players listed earlier with their cap space in addition to re-signing Bullock and Caruso. They would also still have the R-MLE left to use before being left with minimum signings. It is possible that they could sign another one the players from the list if the market is down on them. To be safe, they could pursue players such as Seth Curry, Wayne Ellington, Justin Holiday, Rodney Hood, Wesley Matthews, Rodney McGruder, and Austin Rivers with the T-MLE.

One example of how the Lakers can allocate their cap space is with a point guard like Patrick Beverley and a shooting guard like Terrence Ross, then signing Wayne Ellington with their R-MLE to come off the bench. If the Lakers want to invest more in wing players, they could sign a second one like Danny Green instead of Beverley, then try to sign a point guard like George Hill or Darren Collison with the R-MLE.

No matter which combination of players the Lakers choose, they could head into the season with a rotation that includes three high-quality free agents in addition to Anthony Davis, LeBron James, Kyle Kuzma, Reggie Bullock, and Alex Caruso. That is already a very formidable eight-player rotation before signing minimum players.


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