Los Angeles Lakers: Sooner or later, Brandon Ingram won’t be in the picture anymore
By Keith Rivas
How bad do they really want to land Paul George?
For the Los Angeles Lakers to be taken seriously, acquiring a proven, veteran star wouldn’t be a bad addition. It’s not like they’ve really been able to do that in the Luol Deng, Timofey Mozgov, or even Kentavious Caldwell-Pope signings, so that leaves trades as an open possibility to try and make something happen.
Oklahoma City seems like they would be willing to part ways with Paul George, even if it meant doing so in the middle of a successful run alongside Carmelo Anthony and Russell Westbrook, because of the fact that the belief George will head to LA in free agency no matter what is so strong.
The Thunder would be smart to keep their options open for getting a deal done in that regard, and if LA offered Brandon Ingram, I don’t see how the Thunder don’t say yes.
Los Angeles can really sell them on that because of how strongly Magic Johnson has been drawn to George since he was still with the Pacers and rumors of landing with the Lakers were still strong at that point in time. OKC would get a valuable young piece to the puzzle in Ingram, who could still excel in similar ways to what George has been asked to do.
Brooklyn bought into it with D’Angelo Russell, and the Lakers seem to believe they have enough on their side of the table to convince a team to buy into Jordan Clarkson and/or Julius Randle as well.
Ingram has made a noticeable improvement in his overall game as a sophomore in the association, and the fact that he’s still so young could actually help the Thunder tremendously.