The Lakers Will Rise Again

I started watching the Lakers religiously in 1987 although I was a fan from afar since 1983. Since then I have watched the Lakers from their late 1980’s run to Magic’s retirement to being not so great in the 90’s to the rebirth of the dynasty starting in 2000 to being down again after Shaq to the Gasol trade and now to this year. In all that time, I have never seen or heard so much trash talk coming from everywhere, TV, radio, so-called Laker fans and Laker haters. I wanted to address some of those haters and revisit, in brief, Laker recent history. This history will point out what the Laker organization needs to do to get back to their winning ways. It won’t be a quick process but it’s not a process that is years away either. I will break up this post into two parts because it would be too long of a post to do it another way. I want to look at the past and present first then part 2 with have the plan for the future. In the last 25 years there have been three franchise altering events and what the much maligned front office did post event whether it was Jerry West and/or Mitch Kupchak. This is what I believe is the winning formula for the Lakers.

The first event was Magic’s retirement in 1991. That year the Lakers still had an older roster that was set to make another run after their loss in the Finals the year before. The Lakers had two pieces that would be key pieces for the rebuild, Vlade Divac and Elden Campbell. After two years of first round playoffs losses and one year of not making the playoffs the Lakers front office accumulated, via the draft, talents like Nick Van Exel,Anthony Peeler, George Lynch, and Eddie Jones. They also picked up Cedric Ceballos via trade. By the 94-95 season the Lakers had a starting lineup Van Exel, Jones, Ceballos, Campbell, and Divac. That team was good enough for the 5th seed in the west that year and defeated the Sonics in the first round of playoffs. Although that team struggled the following year, the accumulation of young talent led to the acquisition of Shaq in 96. There is no way Shaq comes to Los Angeles without championship ready talent on the roster. The Lakers traded away valuable assets to make room for Shaq but they still had their starting line-up minus Divac and they added to additional pieces in the draft of that year in Kobe and Fish. The process between Magic’s retirement and getting to be a player in the Playoffs took three years (1994-95 season).

The second event was Shaq’s trade after the 2004 season. As opposed to the 1991, the Lakers gutted their roster of their veterans that left minimal talent on the roster other than Kobe and Lamar. Again, after three years the Lakers had accumulated young talent via the draft and trades. Players like Sasha, Bynum, Jordan Farmar, Luke Walton, Trevor Ariza, Shannon Brown and the draft rights to Marc Gasol. They flipped Marc, future draft picks and Kwame for Pau and the Lakers were immediately back to championship contention. They also picked up Artest once Ariza left for Houston as a free agent.

After their back to back championships in 2009 and 2010, the Lakers attempted to go for a 3rd with basically the same roster and failed by losing in the 2nd round to the eventual champions, Dallas. The following strike shortened season, the Lakers attempted to reload instead of rebuild by trading for Chris Paul. The cancelled trade was so huge that the Lakers have felt the ramifications still. I have no doubt that Dwight would have stayed if Paul were on the Roster. The following year the Lakers get Steve Nash and Dwight and 99% of Laker fans are overjoyed at the transactions. Since those transactions failed, suddenly the Front office has no idea what they are doing. That is a little unfair to say the least.

So the third event that begins the rebuild as in 1991 and 2004 is Dwight leaving in 2013. I look at last year as year 1 in the rebuild. Similar to 2004, the Lakers don’t have the type of talent to compete but in the second part of my post I will show the path to greatness once again.

My point in this post is that we need to “R-E-L-A-X” by looking at the past. The front office has always shown their ability to create championship teams once given the time. The Lakers aren’t immune to poor seasons and it will happen again but this team and front office has shown that they will rebuild to greatness again. So I just want to reach out to real Laker fans and show them that the trash talking will soon seize and the Lakers will rise again, SOON.

Part 2-The Rebuild If you read my Part 1, I will try to replicate the same formula the Lakers have used in the past to rebuild this team in a three year period. In my opinion, there are 5 pieces on the current roster that will be part of the rebuild: Julius Randle, Jordan Clarkson, Ed Davis, Robert Kelly, and Nick Young. Jordan Hill is a piece I like but he has a team option in his contract next year which makes him tradable this year. My plan, since we are talking about the future, contains “ifs” but the “ifs” are not great leaps your mind has to make. The biggest “if” will be whether or not the Lakers can keep their 1st round pick. That pick is the centerpiece to the rebuild. Based on some research on next year’s draft, the consensus seems to be that the top 5 picks next year will be Mudiay, Okafor, Towns, Oubre and Johnson. It’s still very early in the college basketball season and things can obviously change but let’s say that the top 5 remain the same. The next big “if” is whether we can convince a free agent next year to look at our potential starting lineup next year that will contain two ROY candidates and Kobe’s large expiring contract the following year to come to the Lakers. For these purposes let say we can. Here are some scenarios where the Lakers could be a bottom 4 playoff team and a contending team the following year. Scenario 1: Lakers obtain the #1 Pick Overall With the Number 1 pick the Lakers Draft PG Emmanuel Mudiay. The Lakers also sign free agent C Marc Gasol. The Lakers starting line-up would be PG-Mudiay, SG-Bryant, SF-Johnson, PF-Randle, C-Marc Gasol.....

Holy wall of text.

Nice post and thanks for taking the time to write all that

My only concerns , we don't have Jerry West anymore ... He had that eye for talent. Not sure Mitch does. He's made good picks recently but the past picks/passing on certain guys have been suspect. And then trading all those picks = fail

Got get that top pick and get OKAFOR ... Dude is a Tim Duncan clone ... Get Dragic, dude is a gamer... Get a shooter/slasher with that late first rounder from Houston.

Sorry for the long post but I wanted to be more insightful than the usual "Jim Buss sucks", "Mitch sucks", and the lets trade our garbage players for the other team's star player. Will keep it shorter next time.

As for Mitch not having the same eye for talent as West did, you may be right. All i have to say is that we judge Mitch compared to Jerry West's greatness. Mitch has done an outstanding job since taking over. He brought in Payton and Malone. Traded for Ariza, Shannon Brown, Pau Gasol, Chris Paul, Steve Nash, and Dwight Howard. Those are great moves that I would want my GM to make. His good moves far outweigh his bad. Lets give him a chance to bring the Lakers back like he already did once before.

Nice post lakerzfan- repped! I've also moved it into the blog forum.

Lakerzfan: good post. You have more faith in the FO than I do. Personally I've seen things a little differently. I remember West having his eyes on Ceballos for a while when he was a backup sf with Phoenix. He finally signed him and he paid off when he was paired with Jones and Van Exel. Lakers fans backed that team and it didn't have superstars. It was a young team trying to grow and it did attract Shaq. West made some shrewd moves because he acquired Kobe as well. After West left, he handed the keys to the Ferrari to Kupchak. What I saw from there were free agent signings of players who really weren't going to help much and they didn't. Kuochak always seemed to be caught in between getting guys who Phil wanted like an over the hill Horace Grant or who Mitch wanted, like an over the hill JR Rider. I knew Rider wouldn't fit the triangle. To see the Lakers sign Samaki Walker let me know Kupchak wasn't the GM West was. West didn't always hit home runs but West didn't care for dumb players either. We signed another over the hill vet in Mitch Richmond. If people look at Mitch's body of work, you'll see a GM who likes to sign over the hill big name vets.

IMO that top five pick is crucial to LA's rebuild like you've stated. It would bother me to see all of our Lakers' fans go through another tough season to only see our pick go to Phoenix. I would prefer the Lakers get Mudiay but I'd take Towns in a heartbeat. I have to admit that Okafor really has a nice post game. What bothers me about Okafor is that I don't like to see a seven footer have stats like 23.5 pts per game but averages 6.8 rebounds per game.

The free agency after this season really isn't much to write home about. Maybe the Lakers can go after Dragic but there just isn't much else.

Good post! REPPED.

i wish we would go ahead and sign miller. maybe not turn the lakers around but like to see us try improve the sf position

PG Player Team Age Leandro Barbosa GOS 32 J.J. Barea DAL 31 Steve Blake POR 35 Aaron Brooks CHI 30 Goran Dragic PHX 29 Monta Ellis DAL 29 Jordan Farmar LAC 28 Raymond Felton DAL 31 Kirk Hinrich CHI 34 Shane Larkin NYK 22 Jeremy Lin LAL 26 Kendall Marshall MIL 23 Andre Miller WAS 39 Steve Nash LAL 41 Jameer Nelson DAL 33 Jannero Pargo CHA 35 A.J. Price IND 28 Ronnie Price LAL 32 Austin Rivers NOP 22 Nate Robinson DEN 31 Rajon Rondo BOS 29 Ish Smith OKC 26 Rodney Stuckey IND 29 Sebastian Telfair OKC 30 Jason Terry HOU 37 C.J. Watson IND 31 Lou Williams TOR 28 Mo Williams MIN 32 SG Player Team Age Arron Afflalo DEN 29 Alan Anderson BRK 32 Leandro Barbosa GOS 32 Marco Belinelli SAN 29 Shannon Brown MIA 29 Rasual Butler WAS 36 Jared Cunningham LAC 24 Chris Douglas-Roberts LAC 28 Jared Dudley MIL 29 Mike Dunleavy CHI 34 Wayne Ellington LAL 27 Monta Ellis DAL 29 Jimmer Fredette NOP 26 Francisco Garcia HOU 33 Alonzo Gee DEN 28 Manu Ginobili SAN 37 Eric Gordon NOP 26 Danny Granger MIA 32 Danny Green SAN 28 Gerald Green PHX 29 Willie Green ORL 33 Gerald Henderson CHA 27 Xavier Henry LAL 24 John Jenkins ATL 24 Wesley Johnson LAL 27 Jeremy Lin LAL 26 Wesley Matthews POR 28 Mike Miller CLE 35 Gary Neal CHA 30 Jason Richardson PHL 34 Austin Rivers NOP 22 Brandon Rush GOS 29 John Salmons ....

Great post lakerzfan. I know the Lakers will rise again. History tells us that. I too started watching the Lakers back in the early 80's so I've seen the organization fall and rise again. It took us 12 years from 1988 to rise again. Hopefully that won't be case. I doubt that will be case but hopefully I'm around to see it rise again. One thing's for sure, when we're on top, we stay on top for a while....LOL!!!!....Again, great post.

The Celtics are thinking of trading Rondo because they want to go young. Rondo will be 29 in a couple of months (Feb).

I personally would rather have the Lakers get a big center that can play defense that way we do not have to use our forwards out of position.

Add in the fact Rondo is injury prone