And as this adventure unfolds, it sounds like for the second summer in a row, it’s James himself who’s pushing harder than anyone else for a new co-star. NBA veteran Marc Stein — in his latest Substack column — reported as much on Sunday (emphasis mine): Brooklyn insists the talks are only preliminary at this point, but Chris Haynes’ report on Saturday that the Nets and Lakers have discussed a Kyrie Irving trade only fueled what is already widespread expectation that Irving is destined to end up to the Lakers. I certainly believe so too. I know Irving was in Los Angeles this week, but that’s not my source of confidence. From the repeated cries going around, LeBron James is pushing hard to add Irving to the roster. James, I’m told, wants to see Irving in Lakerland more than anyone. What other team, moreover, has a personality the size of LeBron with the experience to deal with all the chaos that comes with the addition of Kyrie? James, remember, often thrived on chaos. That’s not exactly a surprise — after all, replacing Westbrook with Irving might be James’ last real chance to build a winner in Los Angeles after last year’s debacle — but it’s notable that it’s confirmed. This interest from James is also another reason to view this deal as a matter not of “if,” but “when.” And to continue Stein’s point, not only does James have experience working with Irving, but the Lakers are perhaps the only team in the NBA that would feel confident enough to deal Irving, based on two other factors: For those reasons alone, the Lakers are likely to be bidding against themselves here, and they have several compelling reasons to do so. Whether they do it today, this week or this month is still up in the air, but at this point, it’s hard not to see it happening. It just doesn’t seem like there are any other options for anyone involved. For more Lakers talk, subscribe to the Silver Screen and Roll podcast stream on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher or Google Podcasts. You can follow Harrison on Twitter at @hmfaigen.
