The Lakers will finish somewhere between tied for the No. 2 seed and the No. 4 seed in the NBA draft lottery.
Their exact place will be pivotal, because they owe the 76ers (via the Suns) a top-five protected first-round pick.
They currently have, and are likely to finish with, the league’s fourth-worst record. That would bring a 17.2 percent chance of losing the pick in the lottery.
How do you like those odds?
It’s an essential question for Lakers season ticket holders, with the stakes even higher than last year.
Eric Pincus of the Los Angeles Times:The Lakers set the deadline to renew on May 18, exactly one day ahead of the lottery.
Ticket prices did not increase, an apparent acknowledgment of the team’s recent struggles.
The Lakers went a franchise-worst 14-27 at home last season, and this year’s squad could only tie that mark by winning its three remaining games in Los Angeles.
It must be tough to justify spending thousands of dollars to keep watching that product.
Sure, Kobe Bryant and Julius Randle will return. And the Lakers will have cap space to pursue elite free agents. They’ll probably keep their lottery pick, too.
But on May 18, with so much still up in the air, how many Lakers fans will renew? Certainly more than would if the forms were due two days later and the Lakers lost their pick.
It seems the Lakers don’t want to take that chance, which puts the risk on their season-ticket holders. Fun team to root for.