Following the NBA's announcement of the Los Angeles' Lakers' schedule for Las Vegas Summer League, we know when the purple and gold will play during the offseason tournament. We know who their opponents will be. We just don't know who will actually be taking the court.
We did, however, get a better idea of some names the Lakers expect on their tournament roster. Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Daily News reports "second-year guard D'Angelo Russell, second-year forward Larry Nance Jr. and second-year forward Anthony Brown are expected to play along with the Lakers' No. 2 and No. 32 picks." Jordan Clarkson and the newly engaged Julius Randle, meanwhile, will not take part in the Vegas exhibition.
As Medina notes, Randle and Clarkson's status as three-year veterans meant they were always unlikely Summer League participants. Clarkson also showed during his time in Vegas last summer that the level of competition was below his ability, and his restricted free agency puts the final nail in the coffin of his Vegas candidacy.
It would have been nice to see Randle get extra time with his fellow developing young players, but he probably would have dominated in a similar fashion to Clarkson last summer with a year of NBA experience under his belt.
Russell seems like a lock to be this year's version of Clarkson and show the difference a year of time in the NBA has made in his game, but the short training camp and couple of days of practice and game time with his teammates in new head coach Luke Walton's schemes (it's unknown if Walton will coach the team but he will surely have input on what they run regardless) will be good for him moving forward. To a lesser extent, the same goes for Larry Nance, Jr., last year's surprise hero of summer league.
Anthony Brown had already confirmed to Silver Screen and Roll that he would play in Las Vegas, and the exhibition tournament will be an opportunity for the Stanford product to either solidify himself in the rotation heading into training camp or raise questions about his fit on the team going forward if his shot hasn't improved from last season.
The Lakers will kick off summer league on July 8th against the New Orleans Pelicans.
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