How Overactive GMs Doomed L.A. Lakers and League Powerhouses

NBA powerhouses are not all fun and games. Just ask the Los Angeles Lakers.

While the notion of multiple superstars playing on the same team is both captivating and inspiring, it's also somewhat demoralizing.

Assembling a star-studded roster is a delicate process. It's not only about the present, but also the future. Just because your team looks good on paper now doesn't mean it will three, four or five years down the road.

And that's a concept certain teams and their front offices have failed to grasp, which is a shame, because the ramifications of such negligence are harsh and unrelenting. 

Free Agency

Once a GM successfully orchestrates the formation of a powerhouse, they're left with filling out the rest of the roster.

Most powerhouses are assembled through the decimation of a respective roster. A team gives up a bounty of players in exchange for one or more star players.

And with salaries as high as they are for max-caliber players, it only takes three athletes to eat up an entire organization's worth of cap space. That's where veteran minimums and mid-level exceptions come into play.

However, the MLE won't last forever. In the case of both the Lakers and Heat, they're both over the luxury tax threshold, meaning no MLE, just veteran minimums.

Now, each team is tasked with either convincing key free agents to take substantial pay cuts or accepting the reality that outside of their starting five, they'll have one of the most shallow rotations in a league.

And while shallow doesn't seem like a huge problem when you have LeBron James and Dwyane Wade, what happens when they reach Kobe Bryant's age? As a player ages, he needs more help from his supporting cast, an aspect of a team that is usually built via free agency.

But if a team cannot afford to become a major player in the free-agent market, they're signing on to operate with minimal depth.

And that's a dynamic that's bound to catch up to them. 

Trades

If you can't build a supporting cast through free agency, there's always the trade market to fall back on, right?

Wrong.

The Lakers, for the sake of this argument, have three untouchable superstars—Kobe Bryant, Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol. Any player except one of those three can be traded, but who's left?

Strike that—who of adequate value is left? Hardly anyone, thus limiting the type of accords a team like Los Angeles could pull off.

A lack of tangible assets isn't where it ends, though. It leads to powerhouses relinquishing draft picks left and right, in order to make a trade that they believe will push them over the championship hump.

So now, not only is your supporting cast wafer-thin, but you're devoid of meaningful draft picks.

And that pokes at a whole other issue altogether. 

NBA Draft

Anyone happen to notice which teams are without a first-round draft pick this year?

The Lakers, Knicks and Clippers will all be watching from the sidelines for the majority of the 2012 NBA draft because they relinquished their selections in order to keep their powerhouses running.

Even the Nets, a lottery team, are without a first-rounder because they opted to give theirs up in favor of the pursuit of a powerhouse.

Star-studded blueprints have become contagious, but they're also costly, and not just in terms of dollars and cents.

In a deep draft class like this year's, any of those teams could have strengthened their roster substantially. But instead, the Lakers, Knicks, Nets and Clippers are void of a worthwhile draft pick.

And while we could chalk this up to a one-time occurrence, just look at the Knicks. Over the past decade, they have given up first-rounders like candy. 

And for what? The attainment of a powerhouse—one that has given them two consecutive early postseason exits.

The same goes for Lakers and Clippers, and we witness the vicious cycle's continuance through the Nets.

It's simple: If you don't have draft picks, you can't build for the future. And if you can't build for the future, you're doomed when any of your superstars begin to taper off.

Sorry, Kobe.

Team-Wide Implosion

Assembling a powerhouse does make a team stronger in certain aspects of the game, but it also renders them more likely to fail altogether.

Whenever egos of a superstar magnitude join together, there is bound to be an array of clashes.

Look at Carmelo Anthony and Mike D'Antoni, Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol, and Andrew Bynum against whatever teammate he offends. 

There's a huge difference between catering to one star and catering to a few, so teams are setting themselves up for inevitable failure to some degree. There will always be a star unhappy with the coach, unhappy with his touches and unhappy with the way the team is run in general.

Championship Windows

Believe it or not, the window of opportunity to win a championship within a superstar powerhouse dynamic is actually shorter than other contending teams.

Teams like the Spurs and Thunder, who have built their star-studded rosters complete with depth on the bench from the ground up, have a leg up on teams like the Lakers, Heat and Knicks, who have decided  put their team together via free agency and trades.

San Antonio and Los Angeles are arguably in the same boat to an extent. Both have a couple of aging stars on their docket, accompanied by some untested youth and stubborn, but not ancient, veterans.

And look where the Spurs are compared to the Lakers. San Antonio has a much deeper supporting cast, one that plays efficient, unselfish basketball, instead of the feed-the-star routine.

That's why the Lakers' and rest of the league's powerhouses are owners of smaller championship windows.

When a team has to depend on one or two stars to lead them to a title, they have an expiration date on their contention. They can only contend as long as their stars are fit to lead.

In the case of Los Angeles, Pau Gasol is hardly fit to lead anymore, Andrew Bynum has yet to reach that point and Kobe Bryant is clearly exhausted.

When a team operates as a collective, though, like San Antonio does, their window to win a title is extended.

The difference is simply staggering and, thanks to the playoffs, unfolding right before our eyes.

Knowing When It's Time to Rebuild

Perhaps the greatest problem facing a powerhouse is knowing when it's time to rebuild.

Superstar cores are not going to age seamlessly and in unison, and some may just never reach their perceived potential. But how do you know when it's time to move on, or better yet, how do you justify dismantling what you have given up so much for in the first place?

That's potentially an unanswerable question. There's never an ideal time to rebuild a roster, but that's even more true of a team laden with star-power

If they call it quits to early, they'll be chastised, but if they go too long without obtaining any hardware, they're blueprint is a systematic failure.

It's easy to justify growing pains or trades that shed salary in favor of talent when neither of the two are happening within a superstar dynamic. Deeming a player like Pau Gasol or Amar'e Stoudemire expendable, though? That's a cardinal sin, because if you're looking to shop them, they shouldn't have been signed or acquired in the first place.

And thus the vicious cycle continues to be perpetuated. 

General Consensus

It would be foolish and ignorant for us to conclude that there is a right and wrong way to form a powerhouse, or that assembling a powerhouse is wrong altogether.

What we must note, though—especially for those of us against such pairings because they taint the purity of the game and genuine competition—is that star-studded rosters don't necessarily have edge.

Bigger market teams may have the mean to build a superstar trio, but it comes at a price that extends well beyond contract length and terms.

And at the end of the day, every team faces the same problems and questions, just to a different degree depending upon their structure.

But what kills powerhouses is their freedom to find solutions or offer excuses. The league is built on superstars, so teams that boast multiple superstars are held to higher standards, and they should be.

Forming a powerhouse doesn't guarantee a championship, it guarantees higher expectations and an increase in controversy.

It's simply different, not necessarily better. 

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