As the Los Angeles Lakers navigate the early stages of the 2025-26 NBA season, a growing narrative around the league suggests that the team may be gearing up for aggressive trade activity.

However, according to multiple insiders, the Lakers may be slowing those conversations down, at least temporarily, as they finally get their full roster healthy and gather the data they’ve been missing.

Despite an impressive 11-4 start, Tuesday’s 140-126 win over the Utah Jazz felt like the real beginning of the Lakers’ season. It marked LeBron James’ long-awaited return from sciatica and the first time Los Angeles had all 14 rostered players available.

With James distributing 12 assists and Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves rediscovering their offensive flow, the Lakers want to see how this version of the team looks before pulling the trigger on anything major.

One major reason the brakes are being pumped: the Lakers’ surprising need for shooting. Even with elite offensive creators in James and Doncic, L.A. ranks just 23rd in three-point percentage and 27th in attempts.

Doncic (31.7%) and Reaves (32.6%) are both shooting below their career averages, and defensive-minded wings like Marcus Smart and Jarred Vanderbilt continue to struggle from deep.

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LeBron’s return could help immediately; he’s drilled 39% from three over the past two seasons, and young shooters Dalton Knecht and Jake LaRavia are expected to improve. But the front office knows that spacing remains one of the key questions determining the team’s ceiling.

Financially, the Lakers could be a major player on the trade market. They have more than $100 million in expiring contracts (James, Rui Hachimura, Gabe Vincent, Maxi Kleber) and could create nearly $50 million in cap space next summer.

But because of hard-cap restrictions at the first apron, L.A. cannot take back more than $1 million in additional salary in trades, severely limiting their options midseason.

With only one tradable first-round pick over the next seven years, the margin for error is razor-thin. That’s why the Lakers’ approach is shifting, for now, from exploring splashy trades to evaluating whether their newly healthy roster actually needs one.

As one team source told ESPN: “There’s just a lot of data right now that we don’t have.” The Lakers intend to find that data before deciding their next move.