🚨 **BREAKING NBA NEWS**: LeBron James has exercised his $52.6 million player option for the 2025–26 season with the Los Angeles Lakers, marking his 23rd season in the NBA. While this secures his return, ESPN analysts question whether the current roster can contend for a championship.
🏀 In this video, we discuss: • LeBron's decision to opt in and its implications for the Lakers • ESPN's assessment of the Lakers' current roster and its championship potential • The need for the Lakers to make significant moves to bolster their lineup • Potential trade targets and free-agent signings to improve the team • Insights into the Lakers' strategy and future plans
📌 **Comment below**: Do you agree with ESPN's assessment? Can the Lakers build a championship-contending team around LeBron?
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00:00NBA, we go and let's run the floor. Bobby Marks with SGA now locked up long term. Is Oklahoma City in position to keep its big three together this time?
00:10They are. They've got a surplus of potentially four first-round picks next year. They've done a terrific job of staggering the contracts over the next few years here.
00:19Certainly keep an eye on Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren, but yes, they are in control to keep this team together.
00:24All right, Tim Bontemps, the Nuggets added Tim Hardaway Jr. and Jonas Valanciunas to their off-season haul yesterday.
00:31Should Nikola Jokic be happy with Denver's moves?
00:34Yeah, I mean, the Nuggets got some additional depth pieces. They added Cam Johnson to trade with Michael Porter Jr. the other day.
00:41They get Jonas Valanciunas to give them a backup center. They add Tim Hardaway Jr. on a minimum.
00:46These are some veteran depth pieces. We'll see how much it can help, but for a team that had no depth, they at least have some now.
00:51And Brian Windhorst, the Bucs and Miles Turner have agreed to a deal, and Milwaukee's getting rid of Damian Lillard.
00:57Do you like the surprising moves Milwaukee made yesterday?
01:01I mean, I like the audacity. I like the creativity. It's pretty remarkable. I don't think anybody saw this coming.
01:08Miles Turner is an excellent player, but I'm not sure it moves the needle on the balance of power in the Eastern Conference.
01:14And now, instead of a stopgap to replace Damian Lillard, they need a full-time point guard to replace Damian Lillard.
01:21And right now, they don't have it.
01:23So, let's take a little bit of a deeper look at what Milwaukee did.
01:27Obviously, Wendy, right, it's a win-now move, but because of what they did with Lillard,
01:32can you take us through just sort of the impact it has moving forward?
01:35So, they have been contenders for about six or seven years now with Giannis,
01:41and they've had really unfortunate luck with injuries over the last few years.
01:45Giannis has been injured in some playoff series, and then this last year, tragically,
01:50Damian Lillard tore his Achilles in the playoff series.
01:52And they have exhausted all of their resources during that time.
01:56They have traded away all their draft picks.
01:58They have used up all their cap space.
02:00And yet, there was still some concern that Giannis might want to ask out of the franchise.
02:05Their reaction to that was to start borrowing from Peter to pay Paul in 2028, 29, and 30
02:12by putting Damian Lillard on a wave and stretch where they will now pay the remaining $113 million of his salary,
02:20$23 million at a time, over the next three years.
02:24This was never envisioned this way when this provision was put into the collective bargaining agreement.
02:31It was meant to help shorter-term situations.
02:34And now this is going to be like an albatross around their neck.
02:37They don't think it today, but I promise you, in 2030, the Bucs fans are going to have a party
02:42when this is off their books because this is going to end up being a problem for years into the future.
02:47And let me tell you where they had a party yesterday, Dan.
02:49They had a party in Portland because the Portland Trailblazers own the Bucs' first-round draft pick in 28, 29, and 30.
02:58And their long-ago franchise player, Dame Lillard, is going to help pull that team down
03:02and make those picks even better.
03:04A lot of layers to these moves that happened basically right after we went off the air yesterday.
03:08I know all you guys were calling around the league to get reaction.
03:12Bontemps, what kind of stuff were you hearing?
03:14Yeah, I mean, look, I think Brian summed this up pretty well.
03:16In talking to one executive yesterday, they said,
03:18this is the kind of thing you come up with when you're sitting in a boardroom in July
03:21trying to figure out what to do with your team to dig out of the hole you're in,
03:24but that in a couple years, you're going to look back on it and say,
03:27what did we do, right?
03:28And as Brian said, when you have a $22 million dead cap hit on your books for the next five years,
03:33that's not something you can get away from.
03:34You can't trade it.
03:35You can't buy it down later.
03:37That's just stuck there.
03:38So this team is going to be stuck with limited flexibility going into, you know,
03:42all the way through the rest of the decade.
03:43Now, if he keeps Giannis Tenecoupo in Milwaukee for this year and beyond,
03:48then he's the cost of doing business.
03:50He is the greatest player to play in this franchise's history.
03:52The longer you can keep him around, the better.
03:55But if somehow it doesn't keep him around or if it's only a short-term fix,
03:58this is going to be something that's going to linger for a very long time.
04:01And while Miles Turner is a good player and a guy who fits very well with Giannis Tenecoupo
04:06as a rim-protecting center who can also shoot threes, it's a rare commodity,
04:10he also doesn't replace the 24 points a game Damian Lillard scored last year for the Bucs.
04:15That is a hole they still have even after this move.
04:17Yeah, you say short-term fix, Tim McMahon.
04:20Damian Lillard was not supposed to be that, and he ended up only being there two years.
04:24So what did yesterday's moves tell you about the state of the Milwaukee Bucs franchise?
04:31Yeah, this is a desperation move,
04:33and it's an admission that the Damian Lillard trade was a complete disaster.
04:37And obviously there's unfortunate circumstances with Dane tearing his Achilles.
04:41But even before that, you go all in on a superstar like that to keep Giannis happy,
04:47to try to reopen that championship window.
04:50It doesn't produce a single playoff series win.
04:53And look, they haven't paid off the picks on the Drew Holiday trade,
04:57which, by the way, did help deliver a championship.
05:00They flipped Drew Holiday for Damian Lillard.
05:02Now they owe Dane $22.5 million for the next five years.
05:06By the way, that's the point five years from now
05:09when they'll finally pay off the picks from the Dame deal.
05:11So they're out money.
05:13They're out picks.
05:14Miles Turner's a nice fit.
05:16He's a nice player.
05:17He's a moderate upgrade over Brooke Lopez.
05:19But this does not vault the Bucs back into the championship contention picture.
05:24Yeah, and I want to get to that, certainly, Bobby.
05:26But I also want to ask you, you know, as somebody with so much front office experience,
05:31what do these next few years now look like if you're the Milwaukee Bucs front office
05:35as a result of the financial impact of this move yesterday
05:38and the draft pick situation that Tim was just talking about?
05:42Well, usually you look at it in a three-year window.
05:45Dan, I think Milwaukee's looking at it right now in a one-year window here
05:49as far as trying to get Giannis as far as to commit long-term.
05:53And all indications are is that, yes, he is still on board here.
05:56It's kind of like trading future draft picks, but the financial version,
06:00basically by doing this wave and stretch provision.
06:04And there are severe implications similar to trading future picks
06:08when you have a $23 million dead cap hit.
06:11That thing is not going away forever for the next five years.
06:15But for Milwaukee, it's all about the now.
06:18We'll worry about 2029, 2030 later.
06:22So do you think, Bobby, that they've done enough to convince Giannis to stay?
06:27Well, they've been aggressive.
06:29You know, they didn't take the last couple days off here.
06:31They brought back some of the old and some of the new
06:34when you look at how their roster was brought back
06:36with Gary Trent Jr. and Bobby Portis,
06:38and they do this Miles Turner signing and Gary Harris here.
06:42I do think they're in a similar position than they were a year ago here,
06:47kind of in that middle of the Eastern Conference.
06:50The big question, Dan, is who's running point guard?
06:52For me, that's going to be the biggest question moving forward
06:55as far as how did they go out and address the point guard position.
07:00The Bucs currently have the eighth best odds to win the East.
07:03I think that, while the odds aren't always perfect,
07:05I think that sums up where Milwaukee sits.
07:07They have a ton of work to do to just get into contention in the East,
07:11let alone contention to win a title,
07:12which is what Giannis Tenecupo has said.
07:15He wants to win multiple titles in his career.
07:17Even after this move, they are very far away from doing that.
07:19Yeah, McMahon, I know obviously what you said earlier about the moves Milwaukee made
07:23and what the impact is of the Lillard trade and how damaging that is,
07:27but when you look at Milwaukee right now, they're making win-now moves.
07:31Are they?
07:31Do they look to you like a win-now team?
07:33I think they're a playoff team.
07:38I don't think they're a second-round playoff team,
07:40which puts them exactly in for the last couple.
07:44You know, you ask, hey, is this enough to keep Giannis happy?
07:47We've been kind of waiting for Giannis to ask out for you.
07:50I mean, even going back before the Drew Holiday trade, that kept him around.
07:54Then Dame kept him around.
07:56But at this point, I don't think the question is,
08:00is this enough to keep Giannis happy?
08:01I think it's how bleak do things have to be for Giannis to ask out of Milwaukee?
08:06Clearly, he doesn't want to do that.
08:08He wants to be there.
08:09If he was looking for reasons to leave,
08:12he'd have been gone a week after the season.
08:14Say, hey, make something happen.
08:17Get me out of here.
08:17That hasn't happened yet.
08:19So, I don't think they're contenders,
08:22but I also don't think that Giannis is going to go pound on the door
08:25and say, get me out of here.
08:26Generally, in the NBA, it seems if a player wants out, we know about it.
08:30Wendy, how about the Indiana end of this?
08:33Miles Turner was somebody that I think a lot of people thought they might bring back, right?
08:37What does this mean for the Pacers?
08:40Well, he's been their franchise center for a decade,
08:42and while there's been times where they've looked to trade him,
08:45he is coming off of a very strong year.
08:47And look, they have two star players on the Pacers.
08:50That's Tyrese Halliburton and Pascal Siakam.
08:51They're going to make $90 million next year.
08:54And the Pacers are an organization that has not paid the luxury tax in 20 years.
08:59It appeared that they were getting ready to do that by retaining Miles Turner.
09:04In fact, a couple of weeks ago, they traded their first-round draft pick
09:07in last week's draft to help just clear off a couple extra million dollars
09:10to make sure that they could afford him.
09:13But in the wake of the Tyrese Halliburton injury,
09:15it seems like they just opted out of that.
09:17Now, they were offering him a contract that would have put them in the luxury tax.
09:22They were prepared to go deeper than they had,
09:24but they clearly had a line they were not going to pass.
09:26And if I was a Pacers fan, I would be pretty really crestfallen right now
09:30because my team a couple of weeks ago was in Game 7 of the Finals
09:34and ahead early in that game.
09:36And now they are facing no Halliburton for the next year,
09:39and your franchise center has walked away for nothing,
09:41and you have no feasible means to replace him.
09:44So when Halliburton comes back,
09:46the Bucs are not going to have a franchise center sitting there for him to play with.
09:49It was 10 days ago.
09:51They're playing in Game 7 of the Finals.
09:53Halliburton's starting the game red hot, and things are looking great.
09:56It's amazing how much has changed for Indiana
