Lakers: 3 free agents Los Angeles should sign in 2021 offseason

1. Kyle Lowry

Of course, we have to include the player that the Lakers were reportedly targeting at the NBA trade deadline this season: Toronto Raptors guard Kyle Lowry.

The Lakers were one of a few teams that were linked to landing Lowry at the deadline. However, reports indicated that the Raptors wanted guard Talen Horton-Tucker in exchange for Lowry, which was too high of a price LA’s front office. Now, they get their chance of signing him as a free agent.

Lowry is coming off a 2020-21 campaign where he averaged 17.2 points, 7.3 assists and 5.4 rebounds per game while shooting 43.6 percent from the field and 39.6 percent from 3-point range in 46 appearances.

While the guard class in this free agency class is ridiculously deep, Lowry is in the top tier. You would think that the Lakers would try to land a strong point guard to feed passes to James and Davis next season. However, they may have some competition in the Philadelphia 76ers and Miami Heat, who were both trying to land Lowry at the deadline.

With that looming competition in mind, the Lakers have to bank on Lowry willing to take a significant pay cut if he wants to win his second NBA championship ring. They’d also need to clear out way more cap space by trading Kuzma and/or KCP while hoping Harrell opts out, but it’s not impossible, and a Big 3 of LeBron, AD and Lowry would be tantalizing.