3-Team NBA Trade Idea: How Los Angeles Lakers Can Salvage 2024-25 Season

The Los Angeles Lakers have slumped recently despite expectations that new head coach JJ Redick could compensate for last year's shortcomings. What's certain is that the front office did not improve the team over the offseason, outside of drafting Dalton Knecht and Bronny James.

Can the Lakers make a deal before the February 6 trade deadline to add size, defense, and, if D'Angelo Russell is the primary outgoing player, a ball-handling guard to replace him?

The following is a three-team idea roping in the Brooklyn Nets and Detroit Pistons that may help the Lakers salvage their season.

Lakers get:

• Dennis Schröder (from Nets)
• Dorian Finney-Smith (from Nets)
• Day'Ron Sharpe (from Nets)
• Shake Milton (from Nets)
  
• Wendell Moore Jr. (from Pistons)

Nets get:

• D'Angelo Russell (from Lakers)
  
• Gabe Vincent (from Lakers)
• Jalen Hood-Schifino (from Lakers)
• 2029 first-round pick (top-5 protected, else a 2030 second-rounder; from Lakers)
• 2031 first-round pick (top-5 protected, else a 2031 second-rounder; from Lakers)
• $4 million trade exception (Day'Ron Sharpe)
• $2.9 million trade exception (Shake Milton)

Pistons get:

• Christian Wood (from Lakers)
• Maxwell Lewis (from Lakers)
• Rights to Vanja Marinković (from Nets)
• $3 million (from Lakers)

Note: The Nets could choose to use the $23 million Mikal Bridges trade exception (expiring 7/7/25), which would lead to a $14.9 million trade exception for Finney-Smith instead (expiring a year after the trade with the Lakers and Pistons). If Brooklyn goes under the salary cap this summer, they would renounce their existing trade exceptions.

Marinković, 27, plays overseas for KK Partizan in Belgrade, Serbia.

The Lakers are invested in the LeBron James/Anthony Davis tandem. They aren't going to pivot to rebuild, and while the incoming Nets may be short on star power, they fit L.A.'s specific needs. The Lakers might need until the deadline to see if they can get more for their picks, but this deal starts with Finney-Smith as a multi-positional defender who adds needed shooting (43.2 percent from three).

The team has gone to the Schröder well twice before. The 31-year-old guard is having one of his best seasons in Brooklyn, scoring 18.6 points per game while shooting 38.5 percent from three-point range. He's shorter than Russell and Vincent but is a better defender than the former and a better offensive player than the latter. As a backup guard, Milton is shooting 42.2 percent from three-point range.

Finally, Sharpe is a big-bodied center who would give the Lakers the toughness they need behind/alongside Davis. Sharpe missed most of the year with a hamstring strain, recently playing his first three games of the year. Los Angeles must do its due diligence to ensure Sharpe's medicals are clear.

The Lakers should be able to keep the incoming players beyond this season (Schröder will be an unrestricted free agent, Sharpe restricted, Finney-Smith has a player option, and Milton's salary is non-guaranteed) without going over the projected second apron ($207.8 million). James could opt out and re-sign at a further discount in the summer to help the Lakers add another player via the mid-level exception.

The Nets are better than many expected this season. Still, several NBA sources believe the team will focus on rebuilding, development and lottery position for the season half of the year. The team projects to have more cap room than any team in the league this summer at roughly $56 million (depending on its free agents and the position of several incoming draft picks),

Vincent is the only incoming player with a multiyear salary for 2025-26, but he'll earn less ($11.5 million) than Finney-Smith's $15.4 million player option. The Nets could choose to keep Russell, an All-Star for the franchise in 2018-19, but the primary value in the deal would be the two future firsts from the Lakers.

That's the fulcrum of the deal. L.A. would probably do one first and a pair of seconds, but Brooklyn may hold out until the deadline, banking that the Lakers won't find a better return for their picks. Call it a game of chicken, but Brooklyn may bet the Lakers cave to the pressure to try and win with James and Davis.

The Pistons get a free look at the No. 40 pick from 2023 in Lewis, who is playing most of his minutes on the South Bay Lakers in the G League (averaging 20.7 points a game). The Lakers pay most of Wood/Lewis with $3 million in cash. If Detroit likes Lewis, he's under contract next year at a non-guaranteed $2.2 million.

Detroit has the roster space and would still have about $7.8 million in cap space (more, depending on what the team does with Paul Reed Jr.'s non-guaranteed $7.7 million salary). The rights to Marinković, who may never come over to the NBA, are strictly to make the three-team trade legal.

Email Eric Pincus at eric.pincus@gmail.com and follow him on X/Twitter @EricPincus.