L.A. Lakers: Moving Derek Fisher Improves Lakers for This Season and the Future

The NBA is big business. Nobody understands that better than Derek Fisher.

Mere months after playing a central role in negotiating the league's new labor deal, Fisher was surprisingly dealt by the Los Angeles Lakers to the Houston Rockets for backup big man Jordan Hill.

Faced with the reality of looming salary cap issues, it seems like the Lakers are finally ready to ditch their usual "free-spending-on-veterans" disposition for a more financially feasible plan.

In flipping Fisher, the Lakers brass showed that they value cold-blooded basketball-centric decisions over committed service and loyalty. Despite being a key component of five championship teams in L.A. and hitting numerous clutch shots in the playoffs, Fisher's Lakers run came to an abrupt and unceremonious end on Thursday.

The 2012 trade deadline marked the beginning of a new era in Lakers management. Despite a serious lack of valuable commodities, GM Mitch Kupchak and the Lakers front office managed to swing a pair of deals that not only improved their team this year, but laid the first stone on their path to the future.

By shipping out the 37-year-old Fisher and two 31-year-olds in Luke Walton and Jason Kapono and bringing in three guys ages 25 or under in Ramon Sessions, Hill and Christian Eyenga, the Lakers not only got significantly younger, but also cheaper and, most importantly, better.

Sessions gives the Lakers their best point guard since Gary Payton's brief stint in L.A. (that's a scary thought). Though Sessions is just an average lead-guard in today's point-guard-laden league, average is actually a massive upgrade for the Lakers at the position. Not since 2004 have the Lakers had a starting point guard post a league-average or better PER. Sessions has achieved that mark in three of his four full seasons in the NBA.

In Sessions, the Lakers add a fourth guy who can score in double figures on a nightly basis. Throw in the fact that Sessions—who's averaging better than 15 points and nearly eight assists per 36 minutes this season—can get his own shot as well as create for others, and all of a sudden the Lakers become much more difficult to guard. 

Sessions has also vastly improved as a three-point shooter this season. He's already made twice as many threes this year as he had in his entire career coming into the season. Plus, he's been shooting the long ball at a rock solid 42 percent clip so far in 2012. That's 10 percent better than either Fisher or Steve Blake have been at knocking down threes this year.

Don't sleep on Christian Eyenga either, the other player coming over from Cleveland with Sessions. While he hasn't learned how to play basketball yet—and I'll admit that is certainly a large obstacle in his career path—this young guy is a super athletic wing, a dimension that the Lakers sorely lack. He can spark a team on the defensive end of the floor and get you three steals and two blocks in nothing flat.

Eyenga is definitely a work in progress, but he may make an impact defensively in small doses as soon as this season. His acquisition reminds me a little of Shannon Brown's arrival in L.A. a few years ago, when everyone thought that Brown was just a throw-in in the Adam Morrison trade. We all remember how quickly that scenario flipped.

I'm not saying he'll be a better acquisition than Sessions, but at the very least, Eyenga is a cheap upside guy who may eventually crack the rotation or could turn into a trade chip down the road.

The most important aspect of the deal for the Lakers may be getting out from under Luke Walton's cap-killing contract. The Lakers save over $12 million next year by ridding themselves of his contract when you factor in the luxury tax hit. The Lakers also now have a clear choice for their amnesty waiver—see ya, Metta Word Peace!

Moving Fisher for Hill is another step in going younger and cheaper. 

Like Eyenga, Hill is on an inexpensive rookie deal. The Lakers have the option of cutting bait with him as soon as this summer, but I suspect they will hold on to him at least until he's eligible to become a restricted free agent. Hill can spot minutes at the 4 and the 5 to give the Lakers big men some precious rest. Plus, young bigs are always an asset in the NBA. After all, Hasheem Thabeet is still floating around the league.

With their deadline deals, the Lakers improved their roster enough to make them a viable threat to win the West this year, but what's more amazing is how much financial flexibility they suddenly gained. The Lakers are now in a position to completely retool their roster this offseason.

Now that Walton is officially off the books, the artist formerly known as Ron Artest—who's owed $15 million over the two seasons—will surely be waived via amnesty, shedding even more fat from the Lakers' bloated payroll. 

The organization's next move will probably be to move Pau Gasol to an up-and-coming lottery team looking to make an immediate run (like Minnesota, Utah, or Toronto) for young assets/draft picks in order to rid themselves of the nearly $40 million Gasol is owed in 2013 and 2014.

That move would satisfy the Lakers' urgent need to avoid the NBA's new severe luxury tax penalties and begin the shift in franchise player from Kobe Bryant to Andrew Bynum. 

The moves that the Lakers made on Thursday not only helped them gear up for a title run, but also set the team up to reload quickly in the post-Kobe era. It's that kind of shrewd forward thinking—even at the expense of loyal service—that has made the Lakers the most successful franchise in NBA history.