Silver Screen and Roll

The Sparks will head into the FIBA World Cup break with momentum after winning back-to-back games following a 90-74 win over the Storm on Saturday. With the victory, LA has won three of the last four games. Against Seattle, they jumped ahead with the first 13 points of the game and never looked back, holding a double-digit lead for nearly the entire game. Rae Burrell got things going for LA with a layup. It jump-started an impressive 13-0 run. Seattle missed their first six shots.

Welcome to SB Nation Reacts, a survey of fans across the NBA. Throughout the year, we ask questions of the most plugged-in Lakers fans and fans across the country. Sign up here to participate in the weekly emailed surveys. With the sports world experiencing an unusual wave of team sales, most notably the Lakers, fans are understandably feeling apprehensive about these sudden shifts.

A second-half comeback by the Sparks saw them overturn a 17-point deficit to come away with an 88-82 over the Mystics on Friday. Rae Burrell scored all but three of her 15 points in the final frame as the hosts outscored Washington 23-14 in the fourth and 48-31 in the second half. LA turned 17 Washington turnovers into 31 points, fueling their victory. They also had 28 assists on 36 field goals and outscored the Mystics 50-34 in the paint.

Sandro Mamukelashvili and Georgia opened up the second round of FIBA World Cup qualifying on Friday with a thoroughly dominant win over Montenegro, 101-74. Georgia never trailed in the game and led for all but 13 seconds of the contest. Mamu was at the center of much of that great play, finishing with 17 points, seven rebounds and six assists. He finished the game shooting 6-13 from the field and 4-8 from the 3-point line.

As underwhelming an option as he may have been, the Lakers’ chase for Jonathan Kuminga felt like a necessary one given the hole in their starting lineup. His decision to spurn purple and gold for the Wolves, then, leaves that hole in the starting lineup unfilled. With about a month until training camp opens, the clock is ticking if the team is going to make a move. Taking that into mind, who are some players LA could target for that starting lineup spot now that Kuminga is off the table?

Even after a 53-win season and a first-round victory without Luka Dončić, the Lakers braintrust determined it was time to scrap the roster and start over. President of Basketball Operations Rob Pelinka’s highly anticipated 2026 summer with space and flexibility arrived. Players with massive roles last season left unceremoniously in free agency, leaving behind vital positions to be filled, and hopefully upgraded. ​The roster now completely orbits around the planets of Luka Dončić and Austin Reaves.

The long, long wait is over as Jonathan Kuminga has finally made a decision this offseason. Unfortunately for the Lakers, he will not be coming to Los Angeles. Despite it seemingly being one of the best options available, Kuminga opted not to join the purple and gold, instead signing with Wolves, according to Shams Charania of ESPN. After a flurry of signings early in free agency, things downshifted quickly and drastically as everyone waited on Kuminga.

“Kuminga, I think, has seemed to prefer going to the Lakers. They’ve had the most opportunity to negotiate there. Minnesota is just limited to signing Kuminga to the taxpayer mid-level. He would walk into a starting job, I think, in both situations where Minnesota is thin at the forward spot, the Lakers have been selling him on this vision of having him start next to Luka. They’re going to have the spending power, in theory, to reward him next year if all goes according to plan.

As the countdown for the NBA season approaches, the predictions and projections will start to follow. And ESPN started things off with a bang. They kicked off their week-long preview of the season with their prediction of each team’s record. In what should hardly be a shock, not only did they predict the Lakers to drop in the standings, but they also predicted a pretty significant drop in wins as well. Here’s their projected standings for the West this season.

I didn’t think we’d need a second one of these so soon, but I also don’t think any Lakers fan expected the chaos of the last two weeks. After having just enough time to catch our collective breath from free agency, Mark Walter and the Buss family chose chaos for the rest of the summer. Now, the rest of the offseason will be spent wondering what the future of the franchise is even going to look like. Naturally, lots of questions will come with that uncertainty.