NBA Free Agency: Lakers Among Teams to Meet Klay Thompson

There won’t be an immediate decision from Klay Thompson on when free agency begins, but the Lakers are still involved. Thompson’s time in Golden State is over and he will meet with a number of teams in free agency.

Among the teams he will meet with to open free agency are the Lakers, Mavs, Clippers and Sixers, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.

Klay Thompson plans to have discussions with the Mavericks, Lakers, Clippers and 76ers during the opening hours of free agency, sources told ESPN.

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) June 30, 2024

More importantly, it appears Thompson and the Warriors are willing to work out a sign-and-trade deal, which opens up a lot more landing options for Thompson. It also doesn’t require him to take a significant pay cut.

After 13 iconic seasons together, sources say Klay Thompson is leaving the Warriors and the teams will begin working on sign-and-trade options – we discuss it now @Stadium Free Agency Special Offer: https://t.co/UzzmWYSvJk

– Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) June 30, 2024

Looks like Klay Thompson will be a sign and trade player and not the MLE…hear Dallas will be aggressive. Apparently the Lakers are interested.

– Dan Woike (@DanWoikeSports) June 30, 2024

That doesn’t rule out the Lakers, of course. They’ll still have the option to trade some of the mid-sized contracts like D’Angelo Russell, Rui Hachimura and others. And with those contracts, they could probably offer him as much, if not more, than anyone else.

But that doesn’t help them. Using those contracts to trade for Thompson means they can’t use them to upgrade elsewhere on the roster. Likewise, LeBron James was willing to take a pay cut for only certain players, including Thompson.

Additionally, part of the appeal of signing Klay to the MLE was that it would have been an incredibly valuable contract. Signing him to a bigger contract takes away a lot of that value.

Finally, if Klay isn’t an MLE signing, the Lakers don’t have the same opportunities to sign him as other teams.

The Mavericks have a $16.1 million trade exception created from the Tim Hardaway Jr. trade.

The Lakers and Clippers would represent $12.8M in tax-free ML barring a sign/trade.

The 76ers could have $14 million if Paul George signs with them. https://t.co/yMEkjHcltQ

— Bobby Marks (@BobbyMarks42) June 30, 2024

This isn’t a big development for the Lakers. Their best bet was for Klay to take the MLE willingly, perhaps out of pettiness against the Warriors, which made the Lakers a very attractive option.

The other thing that could have worked in the Lakers’ favor is that the relationship between Klay and the Warriors had deteriorated so much that they didn’t want to sign and trade together. Working together now opens up all NBA teams, technically.

The Lakers are still in the mix, but there is strong competition for him.

You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude.