3 Los Angeles Lakers players who won’t be back next season

With the Los Angeles Lakers being eliminated in the first round of the 2021 NBA Playoffs, here are three players that won’t be back next season.

The Los Angeles Lakers were sitting at the top of the world after they won the NBA championship for the first time in a decade. Even entering the 2020-21 season, they made moves to push them further ahead of their fellow Western Conference teams in the hopes of repeating as champions. Unfortunately for them, the wheels fell off right around the All-Star Break, and it carried over into the NBA Playoffs.

On Thursday night, the Lakers were eliminated by the Phoenix Suns in six games, earning them an earlier-than-expected vacation.

With the loss, the Lakers will now have to find solutions that can help them hoist the Larry O’Brien trophy next summer. To do so, staying healthy is obviously the No. 1 goal, but it will also have to come at the expense of losing some current players on the roster. Here are three who could very well be donning a different uniform next season.

3. Jared Dudley

Jared Dudley is slated to become a free agent at season’s end. After signing with the team in the summer of 2019, Dudley was not much of a contributor for LA.

Dudley played in 45 regular-season games in his first season with the Lakers, where he only received an average of 8.1 minutes per game. During Los Angeles’ run to the title in the playoff bubble, he played an average of 3.4 minutes per game and logged a total of 4 steals and 2 rebounds.

This year, Dudley was a non-factor for the Lakers due to injuries. Earlier this year, Dudley tore his MCL but opted against surgery. Instead, he chose to rehabilitate the injury. Overall, Dudley played in just 12 regular-season games and made one appearance in the playoffs ahead of Game 6.

With this, it appears unlikely that Dudley will return to the Lakers at the start of next season.