Hello, Lakers Nation. Welcome into the ideal offseason roster build. I'm Trevor Lane for

Lakers Nation.com. What I'm doing today, I'm peering into the Crystal Ball Studio Stu,

apparently is going to be here with me for it as well. And what we're going to do is we're going to

look ahead and see how the Lakers could really build out their roster this summer. Now, there are a few parameters.

For example, on today's roster build, we're going to pursue a depth model. Last time I did one of

these, the Lakers landed Donovan Mitchell. They had three stars to build around and that's the path

that we chose. Today, we're looking at what if the Lakers decide they're going to go two stars,

LeBron James and Anthony Davis, and build around depth. What exactly does that roster look like? And I'm going to put some parameters in that make things a little bit tricky as well. And I'll get to that in a moment. But remember, this is all based on reality while looking at things through a purple and gold lens. So while the Lakers aren't going to do anything crazy, they're not going to somehow trade Rui Hanchomerov for, I don't know, Janus Anta Kumpo or something like that, that's not going to happen. However, this is going to be slightly tilted in the Lakers favor. So we can look at, hey, what's the best case scenario if the Lakers were to pursue this kind of a model. But again, like I said,

I threw in some complications. Let's take a look at the Lakers roster as it currently stands. This is via spot track. You can see you've got LeBron. We're going to assume that, of course, he stays. Before I even dive in anything else, LeBron James, I've just got him under contract right around where he's at here. Yes, I'm expecting him to opt out of his contract. I don't think he's

really going to pick up that $51 million. just got him under contract right around where he's at here. Yes, I'm expecting him to opt out of

his contract. I don't think he's really going to pick up that $51 million player option, but I'm going to assume that he does, let's say a two-year deal at about $51 million starting. So that's the number that I'm going to work off of with LeBron James, $51.4 million. I think he's going to do a multi-year deal, but that's the number that we're going to work off of for

this season.

Anthony Davis, DeAngelo Russell, I'm going to get to him in just a minute. We're going to throw a little wrinkle in there. Rui Hachemura, Austin Reeves, Gabe Vincent, Jared Vanderbilt, Jalen Hood, Christian Wood, Jackson, Hayes, Cam Reddish.

And we're going to talk about them as well because they do have player options on their deals.

Remember, we are operating under a new CBA collective bargaining agreement.

And it does have some very, very difficult complications and punishments for spending too much.

Right now, the Lakers would be over the first apron, assuming DeAngel Russell were to pick up his player option. He's not going to. We're going to get to that in just a moment. But there would be some tough things to deal with. For example, you would be limited to using just your taxpayer mid-level exception, which is going to be a little over $5 million to spend in order to go get a player. You would not be able to use your biannual exception. You would not be able to use, which the Lakers don't have one anyway because they used it last year on Tori and Prince. They wouldn't be able to use a full mid-level exception. So anything between that $5, I believe it's $0.2 million for the taxpayer mid level and the full mid level,

which is a little over 13 million, they wouldn't be able to spend any of like seven million.

They couldn't give out. They couldn't do anything over that taxpayer mid level without triggering

a hard cap at the first apron, which is again where the Lakers are already over.

Now again, losing DeAnga Russell opens things up a little bit,

but you'll see why I'm still probably not going to want to hard cap myself at the first apron.

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