- D’Angelo Russell’s 2022-23 season with the Lakers was a mixed bag
- Russell struggled massively at the end, but the Lakers still decided to re-sign him on a two-year deal
- GM Rob Pelinka came up with quite an analogy to describe Russell’s season
Los Angeles Lakers GM Rob Pelinka is quite an orator, and he came up with an interesting analogy to describe D’Angelo Russell’s 2022-23 season with the franchise. During a recent press conference, Pelinka addressed Russell’s less-than-ideal end to the last campaign.
“I remember Darvin and I sitting in our exit meeting with D’Angelo,” Pelinka said. “And it was coming off the emotional, obviously, Western Conference Finals, you lose to the champions, and he didn’t get a chance to play as much in that series.”
Pelinka then brought up quite an analogy that he had used at the time regarding Russell’s second stint as a Laker.
“We talked about it, we said ‘Listen, from the time the trade happened until the end of the Denver series… Let’s look at it as a great honeymoon, you can go on a honeymoon with your significant other, and you can have 13 incredible days. Perfect days. And if lunch on the 14th day isn’t as good as you want it to be, it doesn’t mean it wasn’t an incredible trip,’” Pelinka stated.
(starts at 45:33 mark):
That was just about the perfect analogy from Pelinka to his credit. There was a lot to like about how well Russell played for the Lakers, before the Western Conference Finals against the Denver Nuggets.
D’Angelo Russell’s 2022-23 Season With The Lakers
D’Angelo made his return to the Lakers as part of the Russell Westbrook trade in February. Just like all the other new faces, he really impressed and averaged 17.4 points, 2.9 rebounds, 6.1 assists, 0.6 steals, and 0.5 blocks per game in the regular season.
The 27-year-old then had some big playoff games, but everything went wrong once they came up against Denver. Russell put up 6.3 points, 2.0 rebounds, 3.5 assists, 0.5 steals, and 0.5 blocks per game, as the Lakers were swept. He got benched for Game 4 too, and played less than 15 minutes as L.A. lost 113-111.
It led to many calling for the Lakers to not retain Russell, but they weren’t going to be caught up in the moment. The front office looked at the good things he did, and Russell got a two-year, $37 million deal with the Lakers.
D’Angelo Russell Has Been Given A Great Chance By The Lakers
He probably would have gotten a lot more than that, though, had he just played well against the Nuggets. That series meant his stock was probably at an all-time low as he entered free agency, but the Lakers did him a big favor with that deal.
Russell has a player option for the second year, so all he has to do is play well, and he can get a big deal in 2024, from the Lakers or from someone else. It is a prove-it year basically for him and Russell will only have himself to blame if he messes it up, as he is in a great situation.
Russell felt he deserved more credit for how he played with the Lakers, and now he has another chance to show the basketball world that he can be a significant contributor toward a winning cause.
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