The Los Angeles Lakers have entirely rebuilt their roster around Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves. They’ve added Walker Kessler, Sandro Mamukelashvili, Quentin Grimes, Collin Sexton and more to create a new identity of youth, energy and hustle around their two stars. Their new roster build, though, is polarizing around the league, especially to their closest opponents.
Dillon Brooks is coming off of one of the best years of his career with the Phoenix Suns. He and the Suns hope to build on a campaign that saw them earn a playoff spot when their expectations were extremely low. Brooks, always the agitator, of course had thoughts on the Lakers’ new team.
Dillon Brooks:
"If Luka doesn't average 40 … "TikTok/bleacherreport pic.twitter.com/uMgYr6tZqM
— Luka Updates (@LukaUpdates) August 1, 2026
The insinuation by Brooks, of course, is that the Lakers will need Doncic to be superhuman. Otherwise, the team will fail. However, one could easily argue that the Lakers are deeper than they were last season, when Doncic was injured and they only had around seven playable rotation players.
It could also be argued that every team would sputter out if their best player didn’t play well. Brooks’ Suns went 45-37 on the season — a .549 win percentage — but went 13-14 when Devin Booker either didn’t play or scored 18 or less points.
It remains to be seen what the Lakers will be able to accomplish next season with and without Doncic in the lineup. But this is already bulletin board material for Doncic and company when they face Brooks and the Suns, which is exactly how the latter would like it to be.
While it seemed that Brooks’ main beef was with LeBron James, it appears he still holds distain for the purple and gold even with the 41-year-old leaving in free agency.
Collin Sexton: Lakers want toughness on both sides of the ball
One of the ways that this year’s Lakers team is noticeably better than last year’s is their toughness. Sexton, Kessler, Mamukelashvili, Matisse Thybulle and Ziaire Williams will play massive roles in ensuring that, in ways that last year’s Lakers could not.
Sexton emphasized that when talking about his decision to join L.A. and what type of team they are looking to build.
“Just toughness. I would say the toughness,” Sexton said when asked about the vision the Lakers laid out for him. “They wanna be able to compete in all aspects. On the defensive side, but also the offensive side and just being able to change the pace of the game whenever it’s needed. I feel like sometimes walking the ball up and letting the other team set up their defense is tough, sometimes you gotta be able to change the flow. We talked and it was a really good conversation and they believe in me. I just feel like at the end of the day whenever a coach believes in you, and like you said he’s gonna be hard on me and yell at scream at me so I like that. I think that’s what gets the best from me.”
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