Lakers NEW Trade Plans with Jarred Vanderbilt Just CHANGED after Latest Update!

Well, according to reports, the Likers had been and were trying to trade Jared Vanderbilt for pretty much the entirety of this summer, offering trades for him, trades that we directly heard about, even names that we heard about, you know, offering him be a sign in trade for he who shall not be named.

We're not going to go down that route.

Even apart from that, they have been trying to salary dump him and likely for a future financial implication.

What they're preparing for, what they're trying to map out, mentally plan out for next summer.

which Jared Vanderbilt would have previously gone against.

He still does, but maybe less than what he previously did.

As according to the NBA, the salary cap for the 2027-28 NBA season will now be higher than they previously thought, which for Jared Vanderbilt is great news.

Even a minor increase will give the Lakers enough leeway to potentially keep him rather than trade him, which is good for both of them.

Rather than Vanderbilt being traded, you know, he'll get to stay in a situation on a team that he, you know, definitely does like.

You know, he had a lot of fun during their Slovenian minicamp, probably more fun than anyone else on the team.

You know, even taking a camcorder and recording the whole thing, putting it on Vando's vault, his little Instagram side page, whatever you want to call it.

Vanderbilt's obviously a good teammate, a well-liked teammate, and he would like to stay here.

But, with the salary, with a contract that is a negative value, bad contract, the Lakers really couldn't afford to keep him, or they couldn't afford to keep him long term.

With what they had been planning, really have obviously been planning, for next summer, trying to gain access to both their full, non-taxpayer mid-level exception, and their biannual exception, keeping Vanderbilt was going to be really difficult.

as the $13.5 million salary that he had guaranteed for next summer, or rather next season, would be hard to keep.

But, now with the salary cap going up, which therefore pushes the luxury tax apron, and therefore both the first and second apron up, they might be able to, and that's a good thing.

Keeping Vanderbilt will then allow them to keep their draft assets, keep their tradable draft assets, in which they have a very limited amount.

Right now, the Lakers have four tradable draft picks.

Yes, four of them.

Obviously not very many, none of which include a first-run draft pick, only one of which includes a first-run draft pick swap, probably worth like half, even a little bit less than half of a real first-run draft pick, and then only three tradable second-run draft picks, meaning they have very limited draft capital.

So getting to keep that, rather than spending all of it or part of it to just simply offload Vanderbilt, is obviously a good thing.

And let's talk a bit more about why, why they can now afford to keep him, what the salary cap is now increased to, and why Vanderbilt likely has a much more likely chance of remaining with their team till this contract ends, or at least until next summer at the bare minimum.

Let's talk about that and go through it bit by bit.