The Lakers had a chance to move on from their Russell Westbrook problem at the NBA trade deadline.
However, Los Angeles opted not trade the former MVP to the Rockets for John Wall.
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Lakers GM Rob Pelinka baulked at adding a 2027 first-round NBA Draft pick and the deal disintegrated from there, according to Yahoo Sports.
Sat, 12 Feb
Saturday February 12th
Westbrook’s fit alongside LeBron James and Anthony Davis is threatening to ruin the season for the 26-30 Lakers.
It it tough to say whether Wall would be a solution.
The oft-injured point guard has not played at all this season for the rebuilding Rockets.
Wall is currently healthy, but the team and player initially agreed to sit him out seemingly to avoid risking injury and eventually trade him.
With that not happening, at least yet, Wall’s future with the Rockets is uncertain.
If Wall were to have moved to the Lakers, it undoubtedly would need to receive the blessings of James and Davis, who were consulted on potential trade details by Pelinka.
But even if the pair were keen on bringing Wall to tinseltown, it wasn’t realistic given the intricacies of the deal that the Lakers would have been forced to give up, and Pelinka believed all three were on the same page as to why the trade was not feasible.
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“You can’t force another team to present yourself with a deal that is going to make your team be better. That’s up to them,” Pelinka said on a video conference call.
“And throughout this process we had different things we looked at and like I’ve done in the past had conversations with LeBron and Anthony about it and I would say there’s alignment here. And that’s all that matters.”
However, ESPN NBA reporter Dave McMenamin reports that the supposed “alignment” between Pelinka, James and Davis was non-existent.
Given the Lakers’ slide down the standings and their unenviable record of six losses in their previous eight, McMenamin claims that James and Davis were not ok with “inaction at the deadline”, as the team’s on-court woes threaten to spill out off it.
“I am told from a source familiar with LeBron and Anthony’s thinking is that is quote ‘totally false,’” McMenamin said on NBA Today.
“There was no conversation between Rob Pelinka, LeBron and Anthony Davis on Thursday.
“There was no go-ahead of an OK to have inaction at the deadline.
“And so where things stand right now, that tells me that there is not just problems with what you’re seeing on the court with the Lakers losing six out of eight, but there’s problems off the court between an alignment as Rob Pelinka termed it and his leaders on this team.”
It’s not just James and Davis who are supposedly becoming more and more exasperated by the day.
Westbrook’s frustration boiled over after Tuesday’s blowout loss to the Bucks when he vented over Lakers coach Frank Vogel’s rotations.
Westbrook has been benched at the end of some tight games, including the entire overtime in Saturday’s win over the Knicks.
“You never know when you’re coming in, you never know when you’re coming out. You never know when you’re playing, you never know … a bunch of things,” Westbrook said.
“And I’m speaking for me personally, so it’s a difficult process to be able to figure out and create some rhythm and some consistency where we can actually see what we’re able to do as a team, but those decisions are made by him and his coaching staff, and you’ve got to live with it and move on.”
The Lakers currently sit at No. 9 seed in the Western Conference, which would force them to go through the play-in games to reach the playoffs.
This article originally appeared on the New York Post and has been republished with permission
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