Lakers’ Offseason Drawing Harsh Reaction From NBA Executive originally appeared on Athlon Sports.

The Los Angeles Lakers have had a slow offseason thus far. Rob Pelinka has made just two outside moves to bring in more talent, signing both Jake LaRavia and Deandre Ayton.

While those two moves both offer the potential of improvement for the team, the Lakers also lost Dorian Finney-Smith to begin the NBA free agency period. There is still more work to be done if the team wants to compete for a championship.

Ayton will be a big upgrade at the center position for Los Angeles. That was a major need heading into the offseason. However, that move alone will not make the Lakers a contender in the Western Conference.

LeBron James has started dominating the NBA offseason headlines. His future with the team is very much in question. Amid all of the questions surrounding his future, trade chatter has begun picking up.

Amid what has been a decent, but not great offseason, one NBA executive spoke out with major criticism for Los Angeles.

As shared by Ashish Mathur of Hoops Wire, an NBA executive did not hold back his thoughts about what the Lakers have done this offseason.

“Yeah, usually when a star player like LeBron opts into his contract, the team announces the move,” the executive said. “I find this very strange. Something is definitely going on behind the scenes. I mean, the odds of LeBron getting traded are very, very low. His salary is just too high.”

He continued on, ripping into Los Angeles for what it has done this offseason.

“But I think LeBron and the Lakers’ front office are butting heads. They haven’t had an impressive offseason at all and then there are rumors that Rob (Pelinka) is saving cap space for 2027. That’s just idiotic when you have LeBron and Luka,” he concluded.

There are still many questions that need to be answered. It’s possible that the Lakers could have more moves up their sleeve this offseason, but for now fans are scratching their heads waiting to see what comes next.

This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports on Jul 13, 2025, where it first appeared.