Los Angeles Lakers President of Basketball Operations and General Manager Rob Pelinka has come under a lot of scrutiny over the years for some of the moves he’s made. This season, however, there is little debate that he pulled off multiple deals that greatly improved the Lakers overall.
Obviously the Luka Doncic trade will go down as arguably the biggest and most shocking in NBA history, if not all of American sports. And even though some will argue that the deal just “fell into his lap,” Pelinka still did an excellent job negotiating and acquiring a superstar while maintaining a lot of key assets.
Additionally, he also made the trade for Dorian Finney-Smith prior to that, which was another extremely important move that helped change the Lakers season. Not to mention the hiring of JJ Redick last summer, which was met with a lot of scrutiny considering he had never coached before.
For his efforts, Pelinka did get some recognition in NBA Executive of the Year voting. The league announced that Sam Presti of the Oklahoma City Thunder was the winner, but Pelinka received five votes total, one of which was a first-place vote, and finished sixth overall:
The voting panel for the 2024-25 NBA Basketball Executive of the Year Award consisted of one basketball executive from each NBA team.
The complete voting results
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— NBA Communications (@NBAPR) May 6, 2025
It’s difficult to argue against Presti winning as he has built up the Thunder into an absolute juggernaut this season, while also being one of the most well-positioned teams going forward with an unbelievable amount of draft capital. Signing Isaiah Hartenstein in free agency and trading for former Lakers defensive standout Alex Caruso only strengthened the Thunder and many view them as the favorite to win the championship this season.
Cleveland’s Koby Altman finished second in voting with Detroit’s Trajan Langdon, Houston’s Rafael Stone and the Clippers’ Lawrence Frank rounding out the top-five. Even still, it is great to see Pelinka getting some much-deserved recognition after receiving so much criticism over the past couple of year.
NBA Executive of the Year is the only award that is voted on by peers, so Pelinka received some recognition here from other general managers across the league.
Rob Pelinka focused on upgrading Lakers’ perimeter defense this offseason
Rob Pelinka now has another extremely important offseason ahead of him as he looks to upgrade the Lakers roster in order to avoid another first-round exit and make a deep playoff run next season. Obviously the center position is a top priority, but Pelinka is also focused on improving the Lakers’ defensive core on the perimeter.
“I think just solidifying our defensive core on the wings and just making sure that we have players that can defend the wing position,” he said at his end-of-the-season press conference. “That’s an essential need, we see it playing out in the playoffs. Anytime you can upgrade your defensive core on the perimeter, I think that’s gonna help.”
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