What do you think about the Laker team now?

You follow the box scores of the games every day?

Just the Lakers.

You're kidding.

That is really a compliment.

I was pleased to see you smile at the top part show because once the game starts, you have a game face.

You don't smile much out there.

I don't think you have to do things for money anymore. Correct. What's up, Laker fans? Welcome to the Laker Film Room podcast. I'm Pete, joined by Darius. Thanks again to Isok Franco for joining us on yesterday's pod. He does great work. We'd love to have him back. Hope you enjoyed. Today, we're going to shift gears. and Darius, you just wrote a piece for silver screen and roll that gives, I would say, a case for optimism. I'll let you frame this much better than I will. And we were talking about it beforehand and it was one of the rare cases where we disagree, I think, a bit. I would love to talk about it. So set us up, my man. What was the premise of your piece? We've been talking a lot about LeBron, and LeBron's been in the news about whether or not he's going to be on the Lakers or not. A most recent report actually came out of the athletic, that the expectation is that LeBron will start the season on the Lakers. It got me thinking, Pete, that over the last, I would say, three to four weeks,

there's been a slight push from the media about are the Lakers really the best solution

for LeBron next season?

And it comes on the heels of Rich Paul's comments right after LeBron opted in and the idea of

building for the future versus winning now and how those two things can be at odds.

Rich Paul later went back and sort of walked back some of his comments.

And then on another media appearance, he basically said, look, people are going to say things.

We're not going to go out in the news and refute and do rebuttals for everything that gets said out there. And so a further

sort of calming of the water, so to speak. But all of this is the environment, Pete, of where

LeBron obviously has this history of like leaving teams and things sort of ending, if not sourly, ending with him somewhere else.

And I think that that history has informed some of the conversation around media sort of pushing LeBron out the door.

And it's just like, if he's going to go and win somewhere else, he should do that

because it's not going to be on the Lakers. And that got me thinking, Pete, about, all right,

well, where is the most realistic place, both the best and most realistic place for LeBron to compete

next season? And I think if you were to find the best

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