It has been a quiet offseason for the Los Angeles Lakers as they have not made any significant changes to their roster. They currently have 15 players under contract, which is a full roster, and the only difference from the squad they ended last season with is rookies Dalton Knecht and Bronny James have replaced Taurean Prince and Spencer Dinwiddie.
If the Lakers are going to make any changes to their roster, then it will have to be via trade in order to clear up spots. LeBron James took slightly less than his full max on his new contract with L.A. in order to avoid going over the second apron of the CBA.
With that being the case, the Lakers can open up the taxpayer mid-level exception if they clear a roster space and around $5 million. In order to do that, they may need to dump one or multiple of their minimum salary players. Last summer, general manager Rob Pelinka gave player options to Jaxson Hayes, Christian Wood and Cam Reddish and they all picked them up for the 2024-25 season, which means the Lakers are currently stuck with them on the roster.
They may need to attach draft assets to unload one or multiple of them unless they are included in a bigger trade. If the Lakers do go the salary dump route though then their reported preference is to keep Hayes over Wood and Reddish, per Jovan Buha of The Athletic:
“As I’ve also said before on here, I’ve heard Christian Wood and Cam Reddish would be the two most likely guys to be salary dumped. Now, maybe a team pushes to get Jaxson Hayes and when it comes down to it, the Lakers decide that there isn’t much of a difference between Hayes and Wood. But my understanding, the Lakers would prioritize keeping Hayes in comparison with Wood and Reddish.”
This doesn’t come as a huge surprise as Hayes is the only one of those three who finished the 2023-24 season in the rotation. Wood and Reddish both finished the year with injuries, while Hayes really came on in the second half of the year, bringing energy off the bench.
The center position is a real need for the Lakers and Hayes can help address that, even if he doesn’t have the size to guard Nikola Jokic and some of the other notable big men in the league.
Lakers interested in Gary Trent Jr. and Spencer Dinwiddie
The Lakers clearing roster spots would be in order to use their taxpayer mid-level exception worth a little more than $5 million.
If they are able to do so then a pair of notable free agents still on the market that they would have interest in signing are Gary Trent Jr. and Spencer Dinwiddie.
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