Last week, Daily 49er assistant sports editor Michael Morris wrote that “the Los Angeles Lakers are doomed. At least for as long as Kobe Bryant’s on the team.”
Morris backed up his statement by comparing Bryant, who recently signed a two-year, $48.5 million extension, to Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett.
Pierce and Garnett were traded by the Boston Celtics to the Brooklyn Nets for young talent and draft picks.
Teams like the Celtics and Lakers don’t rebuild. They reload.
The Celtics unloaded expensive contracts and added draft picks, but the Lakers could not afford to do the same with Bryant.
Besides the riots that would likely take place on Figueroa Boulevard in Los Angeles if Bryant were traded, trading a veteran star would not guarantee a championship for the Lakers.
The bigger mistake that the Lakers committed was trading two first-round picks to the Phoenix Suns for Steve Nash, whose plethora of injuries have seen him looking like old Jay Gatsby on the sidelines.
This, alongside the huge decline of Pau Gasol, whose numbers have been terrible for a 7-footer making $19.2 million per year, has done much more harm to the Lakers’ championship chances than Bryant’s contract will.
Yes, the Lakers did overpay for a 35-year-old coming off one of the most severe injuries in sports.
An injury like the one Bryant suffered has halted the careers of guys like Elton Brand and Chauncey Billups.
How Bryant plays upon returning will be a large determining factor in telling whether the Lakers made the wrong move by extending his contract.
Financially, Bryant’s deal will not send the Lakers to their demise.
There are only three Lakers with guaranteed contracts next season: Bryant, Nash and Robert Sacre, while Nick Young has a player option.
With the large contract of Gasol coming off the books, the Lakers will have some wiggle room and could afford a max contract soon.
The most likely candidate for that contract in the upcoming offseason would be Carmelo Anthony, but many people have their doubts about whether he would be worth that kind of money.
In a perfect world, the Lakers would save the money reserved for Anthony until the following offseason, when former UCLA Bruin Kevin Love will test the free agent waters.
Love is four years younger than Anthony and a more versatile player that makes his teammates better, unlike Anthony.
Like Morris said, winning a championship will not be an easy achievement for the Lakers in the next few years.
The big three in Miami — Lebron James, Chris Bosh and Dwayne Wade — took paycuts, and it got them back-to-back championships. Bryant took a minimal paycut, but this does not doom the Lakers in any way.
Last season, the Lakers struggled to make the playoffs with one of the best centers in the NBA, Bryant, and two other future Hall of Famers.
At this point in the season, they have a better record than they did last year.
This season’s roster is full of reclamation projects and guys trying to prove that they still have what it takes to play in the NBA.
Players like Wesley Johnson and Shawne Williams were on their way out of the NBA but have proven their talent this year under the bright lights of the Staples Center.
The right group of players around Bryant could still bring him his sixth ring, but finishing his career as a Laker is just as, if not more, important.
Alex Campos is a senior journalism major and a contributing writer at the Daily 49er.
