How serious are the Kyrie Irving to the Lakers rumors?

The rumors aren’t going away, so it’s probably time to discuss them more seriously. Kyrie Irving to the Lakers feels like a far-fetched possibility. But where there’s smoke, there is fire and there is a LOT of smoke when it comes to Kyrie.

On this week’s episode of “Can U Dig It,” a podcast by the Silver Screen & Roll network, I welcome in Gary Kester — an OG of LakersOutsiders and long-time Lakers fan — to talk about Kyrie and the Lakers and what the situation would look like.

Before we dive into that, we wrap up the 2022 NBA Draft, touching briefly on the Lakers selection of Michigan State wing Max Christie with the No. 35 pick. We then look at the remainder of the Lakers’ work in the aftermath of the draft, including their two-way signings in Cole Swider and Scotty Pippen Jr. and Summer League signing Shareef O’Neal.

After that, we switch to the topic of Kyrie. As wild as an idea as it is, it seems like one that has at least some legs to it. From an on-court, basketball perspective, there could hardly be a more seamless fit of swapping out Russell Westbrook for Kyrie. The large sample size of Kyrie playing alongside LeBron provides plenty of reason to believe it would be a wildly successful experiment.

But it’s impossible to discuss Kyrie without mentioning the litany of off-court concerns. Between injuries and his decisions that have kept him away from basketball, Kyrie has not been a dependable player in recent seasons. Would a change of scenery impact his off-court issues? Would being around the likes of LeBron James, Phil Handy and Anthony Davis have a positive impact?

You can listen to all that and more on our latest episode in the player embedded below, and to make sure you don’t miss a single one moving forward, subscribe to the Silver Screen and Roll podcast feed on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher or Google Podcasts.

You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude. And for a short-form recap pod, check out Lakers Lowdown, in which Anthony Irwin recaps the previous day’s news and gets you ready for the day ahead in LakerLand, every weekday morning on the Silver Screen & Roll Podcast feed.