Agreed Deal: Lakers sign Atlanta Hawks 24 years old Dejounte Murray for $72 Million… See More…
The Lakers’ top offseason priority has now become to replace D’Angelo Russell with a better starting point guard who can take over much of the primary scoring and playmaking responsibilities from LeBron James.
While there’s been online chatter about trading for Hawks’ point guard Trae Young, who like LeBron James is a Klutch Sports Group client, the better fitting target is Trae Young’s backcourt partner Dejounte Murray.
While Murray has struggled playing shooting guard while Young plays point guard, his size and skillset as a legitimate 3&D player are perfect fits to play alongside Austin Reaves in the Lakers’ backcourt of the future.
The Lakers’ top priority is a point guard to take the primary scoring and playmaking workload off of LeBron James and be the team’s aggressive point-of-attack defender with size and length to harass opposing points.
Dejounte Murray has the size at 6′ 5″ and length at 6′ 10″ to be the attack dog Darvin Ham and Anthony Davis need to make the Lakers’ defense the best in the league. Murray could ultimately be the Lakers’ future third superstar.
Let’s look at the details of the proposed trade, why the Lakers should make the trade, why the Hawks should make the trade, and whether the Lakers’ roster and depth chart after the trade are a championship caliber team.
In proposed trade, the Los Angeles Lakers send Malik Beasley, Mo Bamba, Max Christie, #17 pick in 2023 NBA draft, and top-5 protected 2029 first round pick to the Atlanta Hawks for Dejounte Murray and Saddiq Bey.
The trade brings the Lakers an elite young two-way starting point guard in Dejounte Murray to replace D’Angelo Russell, who struggled mightily in the conference finals and whose contract would now just be allowed to expire.
The Lakers would also receive a young 3&D wing in Saddiq Bey, who would help fill a void in small forwards to backup LeBron James and help defend the bigger wing scorers that so many of the better teams in the West have.
Dejounte Murray is a 24-year old 6′ 5″ point guard with a 6′ 10″ wingspan who averaged 20.5/5.3/6.1 with 1.5 steals while shooting 46.4/34.4/83.2% in 36.4 mpg while playing shooting guard 70% of his minutes with Hawks.
Playing 70% of his time at point guard with the Spurs the year before, Murray averaged 21.1/8.3/9.2 with 2.0 steals while shooting 46.2/32.7/79.4% in 34.8 mpg. That’s the Dejounte Murray the Lakers are going all-in on.
The Hawks get two vets on expiring contracts they can easily flip at the deadline, the Lakers #17 pick this year’s draft, the Lakers’ top-5 protected 2029 first round draft pick, and a promising young guard in Max Christie.
Christie is poised to become a regular part of the Lakers’ rotation next season and was essentially untouchable at last year’s trade deadline. He’s clearly worth a solid first round draft pick, which is why he is included.
The beauty of the trade is it’s simplicity. For the Lakers, they upgrade the starting point guard position with a younger, better player who’s the elite point-of-attack defender with size they desperately need to be contenders.
Meanwhile, the Hawks get a mulligan for the failed Dejounte Murray trade instead of overreacting and looking to trade franchise face Trae Young in the wake of the disappointing season and the firing of their head coach.
The Dejounte Murray trade is a win-win trade that gives both the Lakers and Hawks a clear and easy way to fix broken backcourts without making complicated risky moves that could backfire and stall their progress.
