Over the years, the Los Angeles Lakers have been one of the teams that have always been linked with superstars. Los Angeles is an amazing city to live in, and the Lakers are a storied franchise where many superstars want to make history. Superstars like Anthony Davis and LeBron James left their former franchises in order to play for the Los Angeles Lakers, and many before them have as well, such as Shaquille O’Neal.
While there are many superstars who could have played for the Los Angeles Lakers, not all of them eventually get to. Today, we cover some of the superstars that could have landed in Los Angeles with the Lakers but ended up never playing for them.
5. Tracy McGrady
Tracy McGrady is famously known as a superstar who blossomed during his time with the Orlando Magic, and as someone who played with Yao Ming on the Houston Rockets. McGrady was clearly an elite talent, and there have been claims that the Los Angeles Lakers were considering trading for him. Marc Stein of the New York Times revealed that there was a time that the Lakers were interested in McGrady.
“I don’t think anybody can look at an 18-year-old and say he’s a Hall of Famer,” Harris said. “You couldn’t even do that with Jordan. And Kobe was a young 18 in his first season. He was still in a pretty normal teenage body, compared to when LeBron James came in and had a man’s body.
“McGrady came in the next year with a more mature body and worked out so well that Jerry kind of tooled around with the idea that maybe we should just go ahead and make a deal for whatever it took to get this guy — even though it’d be a step back in the short term — to have two guys like this on the same team.”
Tracy McGrady could have played on a team with Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. While the Los Angeles Lakers still managed to three-peat with just Bryant and O’Neal, one has to wonder how many they would have won with McGrady in the mix.
4. Chris Paul
Chris Paul’s move to the Los Angeles Lakers was vetoed by David Stern, but eventually, Paul did make his way over to Los Angeles, getting traded to the Clippers instead. One can only imagine what would have happened if one of the best point guards in the world was allowed to team up with Kobe Bryant, the world’s best shooting guard at the time. Here is what guard Chris Paul had to say:
I was on the phone with my brother and my agent, and all that. We figuring out a plane to get to New Orleans to get us to L.A… let’s just say my agent clicked over, said hold on, clicked over and then he came back on and he was like, stuttering. And we was hot. We was hot. Me and Kobe had talked, you know what I’m saying? We had talked already and all that. And it was a lot. It was a lot.
Needless to say, this was a huge missed opportunity for the Los Angeles Lakers: with Chris Paul in the mix, they probably would have won a couple of titles. Chris Paul could have helped Kobe Bryant equal Michael Jordan in titles, and possibly even more.
3. Scottie Pippen
In 1999, there was the potential for Scottie Pippen to have been a Los Angeles Laker. The Los Angeles Lakers were interested in acquiring Pippen, but his contract would have robbed them of flexibility in the future. Here is what Jerry Buss had to say on Pippen joining the Lakers:
Phil definitely felt that Scottie would be a big improvement for us in the next year or two.
But he is aware that if you take somebody like Scottie with a long-term contract under the current rules, it would have been impossible to ever improve this team.
Scottie is just a great player and certainly for a year or two it would’ve been the right thing to do.
We would’ve probably done it had he not had a four-year contract.
Scottie Pippen certainly would have been a valuable addition to the Lakers, and winning more rings with the Los Angeles Lakers would have probably made Pippen’s legacy even more astounding. Pippen could have been part of two dynasties.
2. Kevin Garnett
Kevin Garnett was the 2004 MVP, and he also could have been a member of the Los Angeles Lakers. When talking to Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson on the All The Smoke podcast, Garnett revealed that he wanted to join up with Kobe Bryant before his move to Boston. Here is what Garnett had to say:
Garnett says the Warriors and Suns situations just weren’t right for him. He said his first choice was the Lakers, saying “I wanted to link with (Kobe Bryant),” but he says Bryant didn’t answer his call.
“I shouted at Kobe he didn’t pick the line up,” he told podcast hosts Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson. “T-Lue (Tyronn Lue) and Kobe were close and he said ‘shoot at him again and see what he on.’ So I shouted again and he didn’t get back, so I had to make a decision.”
Kevin Garnett managed to win a championship with the Boston Celtics in 2008, but one can only imagine the havoc that Kevin Garnett and Kobe Bryant would have brought upon the league. Their ferocious mentalities on the court were similar, and Kevin Garnett could have won at least one championship when paired up with Kobe Bryant.
1. Charles Barkley
Charles Barkley is most famous for his time with the Phoenix Suns and the 76ers. But before he went over to Phoenix from Philadelphia, the 76ers briefly had a deal agreed with the Los Angeles Lakers. The hypothetical deal for Barkley would have involved trading him for Los Angeles Lakers legend James Worthy. Here is what Barkley stated in an interview with Sports Illustrated:
Yeah. The Sixers backed out. It was going crazy for two weeks so I knew it would come down to Portland, [the] Lakers or Phoenix. So I get a call from my agent one morning and he said, “Philly has traded you to the Lakers.” So I went to lunch and started drinking. I’m f—ing so excited that I am going to the Lakers. Three hours later I get a f—ing phone call from my agent saying that the Sixers backed out of the deal. I said, “Oh, s–t, I’m feeling pretty good right now.” So I went out and played that night.
While Charles Barkley did end up having a great time in Phoenix and making the NBA Finals, it would have been interesting to see what he could have done as a centerpiece in Los Angeles. Perhaps he’d be even better with the Lakers than he was with the Suns.
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