Lakers’ dream Keon Ellis trade a realistic possibility in light of new rumor https://t.co/UeE3RkYH0b— LakerTom (@LakerTom) January 25, 2026

Knicks better hope the latest Jaren Jackson Jr. trade rumors aren't true https://t.co/W9DezeY4T4— LakerTom (@LakerTom) January 25, 2026

Lakers predicted to acquire Nuggets' $125 million NBA champion guard to help Luka Doncic https://t.co/vtg2X6VVUd— LakerTom (@LakerTom) January 25, 2026

Lakers Given Chance to Land 3-Time All-Star Amid Buyout Reports https://t.co/TCypQ9X5up via @heavysan— LakerTom (@LakerTom) January 26, 2026

As reported earlier, the belief around the league is that the Mavs will be able to get a first-round pick for Naji Marshall, as his market begins to rise.As @TheSteinLine is reporting, Dallas will only listen to offers including a first.The price has been set for Marshall. https://t.co/8dehjpukPp— Brett Siegel (@BrettSiegelNBA) January 26, 2026

Jaren Jackson Jr. is one of the dark horse candidates that could be moved ahead of the deadline this season.The Grizzlies still appear to view the two-time All-Star as a franchise cornerstone, but that feeling may not be mutual, especially if the organization were to part ways…— Jake Weinbach (@JWeinbachNBA) January 26, 2026

Pelicans Yves Missi 10 PTS, 14 REB (6 offensive), 2 AST, 1 STL, 2 BLK vs. SpursOne of 3 centers in the entire NBA who is top 10 in both OREB% & BLK% https://t.co/VmEb3Cpx83 pic.twitter.com/mCBj1W3Aoh— Role Player Performances (@BenchHighlights) January 26, 2026

Ahead of his second return to Dallas, JJ Redick challenged Luka Dončić to pass the basketball. His response: “A-plus,” the Lakers coach said. https://t.co/uCveaGmUe5— Dan Woike (@DanWoikeSports) January 25, 2026

New story: Last year was all about Luka’s scoring back in Dallas, tonight it was his defense that made the difference in another win against his former team https://t.co/ThATuZBKwg— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) January 25, 2026

Luka is 4th in charges drawn, 7th in steals and averages nearly 8 rebounds. The dialogue around his defends needs to change some— Parks (@24Dparks) January 25, 2026

LAKERS DEFENSE 5TH BEST IN THE NBA LAST 4 GAMES!Last 4 games, the Lakers' defense has come alive, posting a stunning 107.4 defensive rating, which was the 5th best in the entire NBA.Narrowing the defense further, when limited to second halves of last 4 games, Lakers'… pic.twitter.com/nYGwF5onJe— LakerTom (@LakerTom) January 25, 2026

Highest 4th quarter +/- in 2026 1. LeBron +702. Smart +66 3. Ajay +534. Mikal +455. Aaron Wiggins +42T6. Quickley +41T6. Holland +418. Hauser +399. RJ Barrett +38T10. AJ Green +37T10. Jarrett Allen +37— UncoveringTheTruth (commentary) (@shendy456) January 25, 2026

LUKA DONCIC TONIGHT:33 POINTS11 ASSISTS8 REBOUNDS53% FG pic.twitter.com/fk2jzHsWYo— LakersMuse (@LALMuse) January 25, 2026

Comeback complete ✔️ pic.twitter.com/BSSZCbCKDR— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) January 25, 2026

RUI HACHIMURA TONIGHT:17 PTS8 REB1 BLK4 3PM+21CLUTCH. CLUTCH. CLUTCH. pic.twitter.com/ySHAqCg0U9— BronMuse (@BronMuse) January 25, 2026

MARCUS SMART TONIGHT 🧠 32 minutes 🧠 13 points 🧠 6 rebounds 🧠 4/8 FG🧠 +12 +/-CLAMPS ON COOP 🗜️ pic.twitter.com/zxErKJ0n3c— Lakers Lead (@LakersLead) January 25, 2026

LEBRON IN THE 4TH:👑 11 PTS👑 3 REB👑 2 AST👑 1 STL👑 1 BLK👑 79% TSLeTAKEOVER! 🐐 pic.twitter.com/qxG49KY0np— Witness King James (@WITNESSKJ) January 25, 2026

That was an impressive as hell Lakers comeback win. I know it’s just Dallas but Luka made all the right decisions, hustle plays by Marcus Smart, and LeBron James played great two-way ball with small ball 5 minutes. And Rui!— Kevin O'Connor (@KevinOConnor) January 25, 2026

LEBRON JAMES TONIGHT 👑 37 minutes 👑 17 points 👑 8 rebounds 👑 5 assists 👑 8/16 FGCAME UP CLUTCH 👏 pic.twitter.com/55TsGXdAq7— Lakers Lead (@LakersLead) January 25, 2026

JARRED VANDERBILT TONIGHT:8 PTS4 REB2 AST1 STL2 3PM3-6 FGIN 12 MINUTES. pic.twitter.com/K63HyDcVmJ— BronMuse (@BronMuse) January 25, 2026

LeBron James on Rui Hachimura's late 3-pointers that helped the Lakers ahead of the Mavericks en route to their eventual victory in Dallas, as well as Rui's rebounding/defense tonight: "I told him some of the shots that he missed in the fourth quarter against the Clippers, I… pic.twitter.com/LE9ZHUulhn— Khobi Price (@khobi_price) January 25, 2026

FROM ABOVE ARTICLE:

Before the second quarter of the Dallas Mavericks’ Dec. 6 game against the Houston Rockets, the operations staff at American Airlines Center cut to a familiar face on the giant video screen: Dirk Nowitzki.

The 2011 NBA Finals MVP was seated next to his son, Max, who was wearing a Cooper Flagg jersey. Max proudly displayed the Mavs rookie’s No. 32, and the crowd cheered in approval.

Nowitzki’s presence that night was notable. It was his first time back in the arena for a game that didn’t involve Luka Dončić since the blockbuster Feb. 2, 2025, trade that sent Nowitzki’s friend and former understudy to the Los Angeles Lakers.

Nowitzki was among the thousands in Dallas and elsewhere who felt stung by the Mavericks’ decision to ship out Dončić eight months after he led his team to the NBA Finals. Mavericks fans never accepted then-general manager Nico Harrison’s logic behind trading one of the most gifted offensive players in NBA history for Anthony Davis, a member of the NBA 75th Anniversary Team but a player who is six years older than Dončić, with a long track record of injuries. Fan outrage eventually played a significant part in Harrison’s firing 11 games into this season.

As deafening as their “Fire Nico!” chants were, though, nothing spoke louder than Nowitzki choosing to travel to Los Angeles to support Dončić in his first game as a Laker.

The Dončić trade — along with other decisions Harrison made after winning a power struggle against former majority owner Mark Cuban for now-governor Patrick Dumont’s ear — created distance between the Mavericks and their all-time leading scorer. Nowitzki’s presence at their Dec. 6 game was a signal that Dallas was making progress toward repairing at least some of the emotional damage that had been done.

On Saturday, Dončić is scheduled to play his second game in Dallas since being traded. Nearly a year after the deal went down, the Mavericks are still cleaning up the wreckage.

Dallas, in 12th place in the Western Conference standings, has the fourth-highest payroll in the NBA, which is why team decision-makers are exploring the trade market for many of the veteran players Harrison brought in, including Davis. Dallas is in a difficult position because it doesn’t have full control of any of its own first-round draft picks after this year until 2031. The Mavericks also have yet to name a permanent general manager as Harrison’s successor.

There’s likely plenty to talk about in the next few weeks ahead of the trade deadline. But we figured now was a good time to look back.

Mavericks fans can at least take solace that they have another young star to build around in Flagg. The 19-year-old from Newport, Maine, is averaging 18.8 points, 6.3 rebounds and 4.1 assists. Flagg’s numbers aren’t that far off from the ones Dončić put up in his rookie season, when he averaged 21.2 points, 7.8 rebounds, 6.0 assists and won Rookie of the Year — the first chapter in his electric 6 1/2-season run in Dallas that ended abruptly last February.

As demoralizing as last spring was, the Mavericks still sounded confident they could be a force in the West this year. At media day in September, Klay Thompson said that once injured guard Kyrie Irving returned to the lineup, “I don’t see why we can’t win the whole thing.”

Davis’ availability, however, was a major question mark. He got hurt in his first game with the Mavericks in February, suffering a left adductor strain that knocked him out of the lineup for nearly six weeks.

He had offseason eye surgery to repair a detached retina and was ready for the start of the season. But five games in, on Oct. 29, Davis suffered a left calf strain trying to wrangle a rebound. Cruelly for Mavericks fans, it was the same injury Dončić was recovering from when he was traded.

Without Davis, the Mavericks faltered, going 3-11 in the 14 games he missed. When he attempted to return before the Mavericks were in a full-on tailspin, Dumont intervened, wanting to make sure his $54.1 million player was fully healthy before returning to the court.

Davis was still sidelined when Harrison was fired Nov. 11. Harrison’s two lieutenants, Matt Riccardi and Michael Finley, were named co-interim GMs. For the past 2 1/2 months, both have been in charge of fielding trade offers for Davis so the Mavericks can reset around Flagg.

As the Feb. 5 trade deadline approaches, moving Davis for anything of value looks difficult. As The Athletic reported earlier this month, Davis’ agent, Klutch Sports CEO Rich Paul, has wanted Davis to go to a team with which a contract extension appears more likely (Davis is extension-eligible this offseason). But that appears unlikely, as Davis is hurt again, this time with ligament damage in his left hand that will keep him out until at least the end of February.

Catch Up On The Story

What we’re hearing about Anthony Davis and a possible trade from the Mavericks

With Dallas struggling to hold down a Play-In Tournament spot, will the team look to deal its star big man before the Feb. 5 trade deadline?

The Mavericks have already started vetting candidates to take over as their permanent lead basketball executive, according to team sources, but they aren’t expected to make a hire until this spring at the earliest. That is because the Mavericks want to be able to choose from the widest possible pool of candidates — potentially even ones who are already running NBA teams.

Before the Mavericks hired Harrison in 2021, he spent 19 years with Nike but had never worked for an NBA team. The Mavericks, one league source said, have no interest in taking a risk on a candidate without NBA experience again.

“(They) are going to over-index on the safety aspect of it,” the league source said.

Unfortunately for the Mavs, Anthony Davis is once again sidelined due to injury.Stacy Revere / Getty Images

Mavericks ownership knows it must have someone in place before this year’s draft. The way things are trending, the Mavericks will own a top-10 pick. With so much outgoing future draft capital, it’s a decision Dallas needs to nail.

The Mavericks owe a top-two protected 2027 first-round pick to the Charlotte Hornets as payment for the P.J. Washington deal and must fork over their unprotected 2029 first-round pick to the Brooklyn Nets for the Irving trade. Their 2028 and 2030 firsts are tied up in pick swaps.

The Mavericks do control the Lakers’ first-round pick in 2029. It was the only first-rounder they secured for sending Dončić to Los Angeles.

As Dončić sat inside his new home arena on the final day of his first season with the Lakers, he admitted he needed to figure things out.

“I’m mentally kind of exhausted from everything that happened,” he said. “A lot of people won’t believe me, but I am. I just think now is the time to process everything.”

Whatever excitement he felt for the opportunity to become a Laker, to take his skill and showmanship to an unquestionably bigger stage, had been suppressed by the hurt and confusion from the shocking trade.

Unlike most stars of his stature, Dončić had not played a role — at least not directly — in his exit from Dallas. Concerns about his conditioning, his prolonged calf injury recovery and injuries he’d hadn’t yet suffered could be linked to bad habits. Few around the NBA, other than Harrison and other Mavericks stakeholders, believed those were sufficient reasons to move on from someone so young and talented.

Those close to Dončić found themselves hate-watching the Mavericks, growing angrier when they saw things like photos of him being removed from displays at the team’s practice facility. His first stint with the Lakers was good — but below Dončić’s standards. He didn’t really find his full-on footing until his first game back in Dallas, when he scored 45 points in front of his old fans in the final week of the regular season.

The Lakers, though, didn’t catch their stride. Dončić suffered an illness before Game 3 of the first round of the playoffs against the Minnesota Timberwolves. Austin Reaves was seriously slowed by a toe injury. And LeBron James, by the end of the series, had suffered a knee injury.

With it all over, Dončić was hungry for closure.

Within days, he met with Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka to discuss the franchise’s vision to build around him. He returned to Slovenia to begin an intermittent fasting diet and a new workout regimen overseen by his medical team. Pictures of his slimmed-down physique flooded social media. He appeared on the cover of Men’s Health, did a segment on the NBC’s “Today” show and, on Aug. 2, swiftly signed a three-year, $165 million extension to stay with the Lakers.

The Mavericks traded Dončić, in part, because they believed his habits wouldn’t have changed if they awarded him a supermax contract in excess of $300 million. One team source likened him to Elvis Presley — and that the trade to the Lakers helped save him from those habits.

“They (fans) got skinny Elvis,” said the team source.

Sources close to Dončić, though, point to that kind of thinking as a reason why things in Dallas ended in the first place. Instead, they believed Dončić was on a path to improving his diet and conditioning as he matured, regardless of any trade. Their focus, especially since the end of last season, has been on the future and not the past.

FROM ABOVE ARTICLE:

Late Lakers run not enough, but they might have found something along the way.

The Lakers almost made another comeback, but this time the hole was too deep to crawl all the way out, falling 112–104 to the Clippers.

If we are looking for positives, though, amid all the drama surrounding the team at the moment, there was still a lot of fight at the end. After it looked like they had given up while falling behind by as much as 26 in the third quarter, the Lakers clawed their way back to as close as two points. It was a familiar scenario for the third straight game: an uninspiring start, followed by a late push, but in the end they simply couldn’t make enough shots to complete a massive turnaround.

Source: NBA dot com

But as up and down as the game was, the post-game interviews brought some light to why the team is so unpredictable and vulnerable to swings at the moment.

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Today’s notes:

Lakers not ready for a playoff-like fight and whistle early

Every man for himself

More drama in an already difficult season

Small-ball, big pressure led by Vando (VIDEO)

More John Collins thoughts (VIDEO)

1-Lakers not ready for a playoff-like fight and whistle early

The biggest takeaway from the start of the game was that the Lakers got punched first and needed more than half the game to respond. The refs allowed a lot of physicality on both ends, and the Clippers took much better advantage of it. I wrote last week about the NBA making another adjustment to how fouls are called, and this game was a perfect example of it. Kris Dunn’s hands were everywhere—he easily could have had 10 fouls or more if what was called earlier in the season was still being whistled now.

𝐏𝐮𝐫𝐩𝑮𝒐𝒍𝒅
@PurpGolded
Who tf isn’t cutting their nails on the Clippers?!

9:26 PM · Jan 22, 2026 · 29.6K Views
20 Replies · 31 Reposts · 1.2K Likes

And Ivica Zubac was simply bullying his way through Deandre Ayton, Jaxson Hayes, and every Laker in his path, finishing with 19 rebounds, 10 of them on the offensive glass, and giving the Clippers a huge edge on the boards.

Source: Cleaning the Glass

The Lakers eventually adjusted and turned the force up later in the game, but the long adaptation period proved too costly overall.

2-Every man for himself

What the Clippers’ early force achieved was pushing the Lakers out of their actions, out of their offensive rhythm, and out of their comfort zone. Luka Dončić was scoring early. He had 14 points in the first quarter but needed 11 shots to get there and struggled with his three-point shot all night. And when he tried to get his teammates involved, they were either missing layups, missing open shots, or, in Ayton’s case, simply lacking the focus to follow up and finish lobs. The Lakers had six of their 10 total turnovers in the second quarter, and most of them were committed by role players rather than the playmakers.

Things escalated at the beginning of the second half, when after a couple of missed opportunities everyone started looking for their own shot, including calling their own numbers on ATO plays.

Postgame, JJ Redick highlighted the lack of ball movement as the biggest blueprint for the Lakers’ early struggles, saying it starts with Luka trusting the pass. Redick has not been shy about challenging his players, including Dončić, and to their credit, I think both have managed to respond positively to moments like this. To be fair to Dončić, there was also a stark difference in spacing and outlet options around him compared to James Harden. Ayton struggled to follow his ideas in pick actions, while the spacing was even more limited with Hayes on the floor because another non-shooter, Vanderbilt, was also out there.

3-More drama in an already difficult season

One has to wonder how much of the Lakers’ on-court chemistry, or at times lack of it, stems from the off-court drama that has followed the team since the offseason—from the moment LeBron James didn’t receive a new extension, to his agent’s podcast controversies, and most recently the ESPN story on a Buss family Succession-like fallout, both internally and even between the last Buss standing, Jeanie Buss, and LeBron James. James’ postgame comments on the latter were another indication of how uncomfortable the end of his Lakers tenure is becoming.

If you add that to another challenge—one Redick admitted publicly for the first time—of much of the roster playing on expiring deals, it becomes easier to understand why this team is so susceptible to swings on the court.

To the Lakers’ credit, with all of that in mind and down 26 in the middle of the third quarter, they didn’t fall apart. Dončić led the first charge late in the third, in his usual style, scoring and finding teammates for lobs.

4-Small-ball, big pressure led by Vando (VIDEO)

The interesting thing about this game was that, while watching, it felt like the Lakers were actually playing solid defense, but it was offset by their poor offensive rhythm early. Dončić had a solid defensive game, staying in front of James Harden on several possessions. And that was before they really turned up the pressure and eventually became the aggressors in the fourth.

After Ayton’s struggles, Redick benched him again following a short stint in the third quarter and went to smaller lineups with Drew Timme at the five in the fourth. With the smaller lineup, the Lakers played even more aggressively, blitzing James Harden and doing a great job scrambling on the back end. It was the same strategy they employed against Jamal Murray in the previous game, when I wrote that this aggressive, scrambling scheme is the best way to utilize the motor, hands, and defensive playmaking of Smart, LaRavia, Vanderbilt, and even James and Dončić.

Vanderbilt probably had his best defensive half of the season, flipping the tone of the game with his energy and being everywhere down the stretch.

So even though they lost this one, I think Redick and his staff have found something over the last couple of games with smaller, more aggressive units, reminiscent of last year’s small-ball lineups with Dorian Finney-Smith that had a lot of success in the second half of the season.

5-More John Collins thoughts (VIDEO)

For those who missed it, with the trade deadline nearing, I’ve started embedding analysis and thoughts on interesting players into my game coverage. That began with a deeper dive on Peyton Watson in the Denver preview and observations, and continued with a closer look at John Collins, who will be a free agent this summer, in yesterday’s preview for this game.

In a way, this game was a perfect encapsulation of how I described Collins yesterday: a bigger, more athletic version of Rui Hachimura, and one of the better low-usage, high-efficiency play finishers in the league. Collins scored 13 points on 5-of-7 shooting at just 11% usage, with all of his makes coming as an outlet for James Harden or Kawhi Leonard after they created the advantage. Collins showed a full portfolio of ways to keep and close those advantages: finishing in transition, attacking closeouts for layups at the rim or soft mid-range jumpers, providing a baseline lob outlet, and finally icing the game with his trademark corner three. As I noted yesterday, the data backs that up—he’s among the best corner snipers in the league.

Collins wouldn’t make much sense on the current roster, as the Lakers already have plenty of players at the power forward spot with James, Hachimura, and Vanderbilt. He could, however, become an intriguing option in a hypothetical rebuilt roster centered around Dončić, if he were, say, a fifth- or, even better, a sixth-man type.

A strong second-half push wasn't enough as the Lakers fall 112-104 to the Clippers. @geeter3, @mike_bresnahan, and @JamesWorthy42 share their thoughts. pic.twitter.com/918xnRjhNJ— Spectrum SportsNet (@SpectrumSN) January 23, 2026