One reported Darvin Ham replacement option is seemingly off the table for Lakers

Despite just making their targets publicly known on Friday, the Los Angeles Lakers may have already lost out on one of their candidates for their head coaching spot.

On ESPN's NBA Today, Adrian Wojnarowski reported that the Los Angeles Clippers are "determined to do a long-term deal" with head coach Ty Lue.

The Clippers are currently battling it out for a spot in the second round of the playoffs and will need to win the last two games against the Dallas Mavericks if they want to move on. With a new arena in place next season, all signs seem to indicate that the Clippers will try to keep their crew of James Harden, Paul George, Kawhi Leonard and squad together in place despite injury concerns, old age, and luxury tax issues.

The Lakers have been connected to Lue in the past and almost hired the coach with the previous success that he has had with James in mind. The Lakers are in a very different spot than the Clippers as the franchise could end up changing their entire roster or end up keeping Anthony Davis and Lebron James for one more possible miracle run. With the Lakers' head coaching candidates dwindling, where does the franchise go from here?

Where do the Lakers go from here after possibly losing out on Tyronn Lue?

The Lakers are rumored to pursue Mike Budenholzer, Kenny Atkinson, and JJ Redick with Lue out of the picture. Of these three possible coaches, Redick would be the most interesting one since the former 3-point flamethrower is currently hosting a podcast with LeBron.

Redick has received a lot of praise for his basketball analysis around the league but his inexperience may come into play when it comes to rotations and split-second decisions that coaches need to make. Budenholzer would most certainly be an interesting choice as the coach has won a title and has been able to manage multiple egos but his rotations were very subpar.

Atkinson, who is currently a Warriors assistant head coach, had a stint coaching the Brooklyn Nets. The former Nets coach has a 118-189 coaching record. During his time with the Nets, h3 was able to lead a roster to competitive basketball even though that squad didn't have any first-round draft selections for several years.

Most notably, Atkinson was able to coach D'Angelo Russell after the guard was traded from the Lakers in the 2017 offseason. Russell was able to play his best ball under Atkinson and has never really recovered since being coached by Atkinson.

The clear downside of Atkinson is the fact that the coach got fired at the beginning of the Kevin Durant-Kyrie Irving era since the head coach couldn't handle egos very well. While Lue was not a perfect coach by any means, he was the best option available considering the situation going on in Laker-land. With him out, the franchise may have to settle for someone else instead.