Who needs who more?
D'Angelo Russell is coming off perhaps his best year as a professional setting aside his All-Star year in 2019 where he led the Brooklyn Nets to the playoffs at 22 years old. Averaging 18 points and 6.3 assists while shooting a respectable 45% from the field and a really good 41.5% from 3. The playoff woes came back to haunt Russell once again, averaging 14 points on 38% field goal - mainly due to the horrendous 0 point game. Lakers fans seem completely done with Russell after a 2nd year in a row of not performing too well against the Denver Nuggets (just the Nuggets, he did very well against the Grizzlies and Warriors).
So what if I told you...the Lakers actually need D'Angelo Russell more than D'Angelo Russell needs the Lakers? Well to start off, Russell just opted into his Player Option of $18.6 million after making it known he would have total leverage of his destiny this offseason. Yeah, that's not the case anymore. Since Russell opted in, the Lakers have reportedly been searching for any way to trade Russell for an upgrade, according to Jovan Buha and Anthony Irwin.
Let's stop right there for a moment because the narrative around Russell has been extremely unsettling that the Lakers will somehow end up a championship contender if they trade Russell. Let's look at some targets the Lakers have been trying to trade Russell for.
Dejounte Murray - Traded to the Pelicans.
Trae Young - Since Atlanta has traded Murray, it is not likely they will trade Young and if they do - Atlanta has zero interest in Russell as he would not fit the direction the team wants to go.
DeMar DeRozan - Traded to the Kings.
Donovan Mitchell - Signed an extension with the Cavaliers.
Mikal Bridges - Traded to the Knicks
And those are just some of the big names. Then you have names floating around like Bruce Brown, Jerami Grant and Dorian Finney-Smith. Okay, let me spit basketball to some of you who throw these names out there. D'Angelo Russell is a fantastic offensive weapon in any kind of offense because he's a legit flamethrower that is tough to put out when he's hot. That ability alone where he can string off 9-12 points on his own is the reason why teams tend to throw their best perimeter defenders on him. Doing that opens up the likes for LeBron James and Austin Reaves to operate on the perimeter as they are able to attack weaker defenders since a lot of attention is drawn to Russell.
Let's also not forget Russell is one of the best players in the league in pick and roll whether it's finishing himself or finding his roller and what better roller is in the league than Anthony Davis? The Russell/Davis PnR combo was one of the 8 most efficient plays in the league as Russell is very quick with his decisions to hit AD on the role, finish himself by hitting an unexpected pull up mid range or hitting open shooters. Defensive issues are indeed a problem but let's not forget Russell was among the best point guards in plus/minus. Now, you don't get to be one of the best in that category if your defense is hurting the team. It's not to say Russell's defense is good but his defense is not bad enough to where it cripples your team.
This also plays into the Denver series as well - where Russell held his matchup (Kentavious Caldwell-Pope) to below 40% shooting, also in the little possessions he guarded Jamal Murray, he held Murray to 1/5 and forced 3 turnovers. So go ahead and run with the narratives, the numbers don't lie. Now, of course the Lakers ended up losing the series so the numbers also don't matter. The Lakers led the series 75% (I think) of the time and get this: the Lakers led for 88% of the minutes that D'Angelo Russell played. So regardless of his poor shooting woes game to game, his presence still opened up for the team.
Moving on, let's talk about if you were to trade Russell for players like Jerami Grant or Bruce Brown. Trading someone that monumental to your offense while only getting slightly better defensively is not the key. It's like your offensive rating falls from a B+ to a C- while your defense inly jumps from a C to a C+. I know what some of Lakers fans are going to say: "Well Brown and Grant are way better defenders than Russell". Yes that's true. But neither are game changers defensively. Neither of those two make needle moving defensive impact like Jrue Holiday, Derrick White, Marcus Smart or even someone like Jaden McDaniels and Jarred Vanderbilt.
The Lakers offense took a massive hit whenever Russell was out of the lineup. Evident to their 1-5 record without him (1-7 really due to 2 games he went down in). If you don't think the Lakers struggled without Russell, let me some of the players +/- with and without DLo:
LeBron - with: +281, without: -61
AD - with: +191, without: -40
Reaves - with: +16, without: -57
Rui - with: +132, without: -9
Vando - with: +62, without: -18
Vincent - with: +29, without: DNP
Wood - with: -12, without: +15
Max - with: +30, without: -47
Prince - with: -53 (yuck), without: -66 (eww)
Dinwiddie - with: +94, without: 0
Hayes - with: -78 (Good God), without: -29
So yeah, almost all of the Lakers play better with Russell. Let's also remember the Lakers shoot 38.1% from 3 whenever Russell played. That dropped all the way to 32.3% from 3 when he was out. Losing him would be a detriment to the Lakers offense.
Now, the smartest thing for the Lakers to do if they do plan on keeping Russell is to surround him and Austin Reaves with a point of attack defender that way they don't have to spend time guarding the best perimeter offensive player. Which is why Jarred Vanderbilt is extremely important to the Lakers because he is able to use all of his energy making it difficult for any perimeter offensive player, leaving Russell and Reaves to play their strengths on defense - Reaves being a good secondary chaser and Russell being a good off ball roamer particularly on shooters.
So who needs who more? Well, they both need each other. The Lakers do need Russell but Russell also still needs the Lakers. The free agent market was incredibly thin for Russell as it is for many other guards. We seen guys like Tyus Jones, Gary Trent Jr get super small deals. Guys like James Harden having to opt back with the Clippers and someone like Markelle Fultz is still available. The market for guards just isn't there this summer. Next summer is a different story since every team will now have more cap room. This makes Lakers fans annoyed that Russell is still on the team as he can just walk for nothing if Rob Pelinka fails to trade him again. But what if I told you Russell values being a Laker. Finding a home in LA, which was one of the reasons for him opting back in the first place. DLo really enjoys being a Laker and there could be a chance the Lakers may extend him going forward if they are unable to find a trade for him.
