Los Angeles Lakers Move On Without LeBron James as Luka Doncic Inherits the Franchise

It finally happened on Friday. After eight seasons, one championship and a June conversation in which he told the front office he would not be back, LeBron James signed with the Philadelphia 76ers on July 24, a reported two-year deal worth roughly $8 million with a player option. The Los Angeles Lakers are now, for the first time since 2018, a team without him. What they are instead is a Luka Doncic team with a $185 million running mate, a $130 million center who played five games last season, and a payroll problem that will define the next two years. That is a lot to absorb in one week, and it arrived on top of a month that had already reshaped the roster from the middle out.

Los Angeles Lakers news: the LeBron James era ends in Philadelphia

James informed the Lakers in late June that he intended to play elsewhere, and his agent Rich Paul framed the summer as the first time James had made a decision "pressure free," with something close to the whole league in play. Miami and Cleveland were among the reported suitors before Philadelphia, which had already traded Paul George and picks to Boston for Jaylen Brown, landed him alongside Tyrese Maxey, Joel Embiid and VJ Edgecombe.

James explained the choice himself: "I thought I was done when the season ended. I still truly love this game, and I have more to give." He added that he believes he can help make the 76ers a championship team. In his final season in Los Angeles he averaged 20.9 points, 6.1 rebounds and 7.2 assists. He leaves as the franchise's all-time leading scorer and the central figure in its 17th title, the 2020 run in the bubble, though the post-bubble playoff ledger in Los Angeles was a losing one.

The practical fallout is smaller than the emotional one. The Lakers had already built this offseason on the assumption he was gone, and the roster they have assembled is younger, deeper and considerably more expensive.

Where the 53-29 season left them

Last season was not a failure so much as a ceiling check. The Lakers went 53-29, took the fourth seed in the West, won a second straight Pacific Division title and posted back-to-back 50-win seasons for the first time since the 2009-11 stretch. They went 4-0 in NBA Cup group play before losing to San Antonio in the quarterfinals. They beat Houston 4-2 in the first round. Then Oklahoma City swept them out of the conference semifinals in four games, which is the number that actually drove the summer.

JJ Redick returns as head coach. Rob Pelinka runs basketball operations. The diagnosis was not subtle: not enough size, not enough rim protection, not enough young legs around Doncic, and a team that finished 29th in the league in offensive rebounds.

The Walker Kessler bet and the rest of the rebuild

Los Angeles moved first and hardest on the center spot. On July 1 they acquired Walker Kessler from Utah in a sign-and-trade, sending unprotected first-round picks in 2031 and 2033 plus first-round swaps in 2028 and 2030. Kessler signed for four years and $130 million with a player option on the fourth year and a full trade kicker. It is a large number for a player who appeared in five games last season, averaging 14.4 points on 70.3 percent shooting with 10.8 rebounds and 1.8 blocks before a left shoulder labral tear in early November ended his year. He had reportedly turned down a five-year offer from Utah worth about $140 million. The Lakers decided a 7-foot-2 shot blocker who led the league in offensive rebounds in 2024-25 was worth paying a premium and surrendering that much draft capital for.

The same day, they added three free agents:

• Quentin Grimes, four years and $60 million with a player option, after averaging 13.4 points, 3.6 rebounds and 3.3 assists for Philadelphia.
• Collin Sexton, a reported two years and $19 million with a player option, off a 15.4-point season.
• Sandro Mamukelashvili, four years and $52 million with a player option in year four, after averaging 11.2 points and 4.9 rebounds for Toronto.

With Kessler in place, Deandre Ayton became redundant. On July 3 the Lakers sent him to Washington for guard Jaden Hardy and second-round picks in 2031 and 2032, a move that recouped a little draft capital and cleared the backup center slot without actually filling it.

On July 13 came the anchor signing. Austin Reaves inked a four-year, $185 million maximum contract with a player option for 2029-30, declining a $14.9 million player option to do it. It is the richest deal ever given to an undrafted player. "I want to be in L.A. I love it," Reaves said. "I want to be here, I want to win." He and Doncic, who signed a three-year, $165 million extension in August 2025 with a player option for 2028-29, are now under contract together through the end of the decade if both want to be.

The Los Angeles Lakers depth chart and cap sheet

The projected starting five reads Doncic, Reaves, Grimes, Mamukelashvili and Kessler, with Jarred Vanderbilt, Dalton Knecht, Jake LaRavia, Hardy, Adou Thiero, Bronny James and rookie Cameron Carr behind them. Two gaps stand out and neither has been closed. There is no true stopper for the elite 6-foot-6 to 6-foot-9 wings the West is full of, and there is nothing resembling a backup center behind Kessler, which is a real problem for a player with a fresh shoulder repair on his record.

The money makes that hard to fix. Following the Ayton trade the Lakers were roughly $105 million over the salary cap while staying under both aprons, per Spotrac, with 13 players under contract at the time. Minimum deals and buyout scavenging are the realistic tools left. The outgoing traffic was heavy too: Rui Hachimura signed with the Clippers for two years and $28 million, Marcus Smart went to Houston, and Luke Kennard, acquired from Atlanta at the February deadline, signed in Phoenix after leading the NBA at 47.8 percent from three.

Cameron Carr, Bronny James and the young end of the roster

Carr, a 6-foot-5 guard out of Baylor, came to Los Angeles as the No. 24 pick in June's draft; New York made the selection and his rights moved to the Lakers as part of a four-team deal on June 24 that also brought back the No. 47 pick and sent out the draft rights to Sergio de Larrea. He played in both the California and Las Vegas Summer League slates alongside Thiero, Arthur Kaluma and Anton Watson, and the early reviews have been mixed rather than damning, which is roughly what you expect from a late first-rounder joining a win-now roster.

Bronny James did not play Summer League at all, an omission the team attributed to his G League progress and to a desire to give development reps to Carr and others. He remains under contract at a reported $2.3 million for one more season and has been the subject of persistent trade chatter, particularly to whichever team signed his father. That story is now live in a way it was not two weeks ago.

What's next on the Los Angeles Lakers calendar

The next real date is the schedule release. The league typically teases Christmas Day and opening night matchups in the first half of August and publishes the full slate in mid-August, which puts 2026-27 dates for the Los Angeles Lakers within a couple of weeks. Training camps open in late September, media day sits just ahead of it, preseason follows in early October and the regular season tips later that month.

Between now and then, the roster work is unglamorous: find a backup five, find a wing defender, and do both with minimum contracts. The bigger question is not solvable in August. Doncic turns into the sole gravitational center of a Lakers team for the first time, with Reaves paid like a co-star and Kessler paid like a solution. If Kessler's shoulder holds and the defense climbs, this is a top-four team in the West again. If it does not, the Lakers spent 2031 and 2033 to find out.