The Los Angeles Lakers have signed some solid, young players this offseason but are still looking to add more. One veteran that they have their eyes on is Patrick Beverley. The pesky defender was included in the Rudy Gobert trade and the Utah Jazz will likely reroute him to a different team.
There is one key catch to the Lakers' interest in trading for Beverley. According to NBA insider Marc Stein, the Lakers are not looking to trade Talen Horton-Tucker to the Jazz in a deal that nets them Beverley.
While they continue to register the league's only tangible trade interest in Brooklyn's Kyrie Irving, it's likewise true that the Lakers have prioritized adding speed, youth and athleticism to the roster. As such, according to one source familiar with the team's thinking, there is no push forthcoming from the Lakers' side to swap Talen Horton-Tucker (as rumored) for Patrick Beverley, who ranks as one of Utah's very available veterans alongside Mike Conley, Bojan Bogdanović and Jordan Clarkson.
The Lakers were not willing to trade Horton-Tucker for Kyle Lowry, so keeping him out of deals for Beverley makes total sense. Horton-Tucker's diminishing value and Los Angeles' additions of Lonnie Walker and Troy Brown do make him more expendable but LA has a lot of faith in THT.
Horton-Tucker averaged 10.0 points, 3.2 rebounds and 2.7 assists across 25.2 minutes per game. Although Beverley will likely have a bigger impact on the Lakers than Horton-Tucker, Los Angeles remains steadfast in developing their young wing into a very good player.
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