The Sacramento Kings have a busy offseason ahead of them. Once the draft happens and free agency fully opens, things are going to kick into high gear. A big list item is moving several veteran contracts, such as DeMar DeRozan, and the Los Angeles Lakers could benefit from this.
Bringing DeRozan to the Kings was part of a larger push by former general manager Monte McNair and co-owner Vivek Ranadive. The goal appeared to be stocking the team with shoot-first guards and the occasional small forward with Domantas Sabonis at the center of it all. It wasn't a great scenario.
Sacramento's roster featuring DeRozan, Sabonis, and Zach LaVine was dead on arrival. The imbalanced composition of this group, combined with the lack of defense, made it impossible for them to build any sustained momentum. There was another huge issue that this strategy created.
The combination of Sabonis, LaVine, and DeRozan is also incredibly expensive. Sacramento is having major payroll issues because of this. With all of these contracts still on the books, it has been and will continue to be very hard for the Kings to make the moves they need to make to get better.
DeRozan would look good on the Lakers
There are a lot of potential moves and even more theories on how this is going to play out for Sacramento. One of those theoretical moves is DeRozan heading to the Lakers. He's actually an addition to their roster that makes sense, both from a roster perspective and a financial one.
At this point, DeRozan is a respected veteran in this league, not to mention one of the most elite mid-range shooters the game has ever seen. The Lakers could use a player like him to add scoring as well as floor spacing that would help Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves succeed on the court.
On top of that, he only has one year left on his contract and is guaranteed $10 million as part of it. DeRozan would be an affordable addition to the roster, one with a really low risk threshold. Even if bringing him in doesn't work out, his time in Los Angeles would be up at the end of the season.
The move for the Kings is trading him for a young player like Adou Thiero, Jake LaRavia, and/or Dalton Knecht. Any one of them, or a combination thereof, could be great for their rebuild process. And it helps the Lakers with their win-now approach based around Doncic.
Add us as a preferred source on Google