New Lakers Rumors on LeBron James vs. Austin Reaves 'Priority' Ahead of NBA Free Agency

The Los Angeles Lakers have a pair of prominent free agents in LeBron James and Austin Reaves, and who they ultimately prioritize this summer may come as a surprise to some, as NBA reporter Jovan Buha elaborated upon on Friday.

"There's two big differences between LeBron and Reaves right now. One, LeBron is a short-term solution. Reaves is viewed by the franchise as a long-term cornerstone. So if it comes down to, would you rather pay Reaves $40 million for the next five years, or LeBron $40 million for one year, they're going to prioritize the long-term contract here," he noted (36:40 mark). "Reaves is more of a priority for the Lakers than LeBron is. That's just a fact. The second part of it is that Reaves is going to have a market. And LeBron—maybe he wants to go to Chicago, or Brooklyn, I do not foresee that—but the issue with LeBron is that all of the teams that are going to want LeBron are going to have somewhere between a vet minimum offer and a non-taxpayer mid-level exception offer. So LeBron can't leverage the market against the Lakers the same way Reaves can. Reaves can go get a monster contract offer from Chicago or Brooklyn, and put pressure on the Lakers to be like, 'They're about to pay me $40 million annually. Maybe I'll take a [hair less] than that, but you need to give me that fifth year, and it needs to be pretty close to $40 million.' Lebron is not going to have the same leverage."

Reaves is 28, on the same career timeline as franchise cornerstone Luka Dončić and is a solid fit alongside Dončić. In other words, the Lakers can't afford to lose him (especially after his fantastic but injury-riddled 2025-26 season, which saw him average 23.3 points and 5.5 assists per game).

James, meanwhile, may not love that his no longer the franchise's top priority, or even second priority. But if he wants to move on—and doesn't want to take a massive pay cut—he may yet need the Lakers. A sign-and-trade is probably the best avenue for James to get to another contender while still signing a market-value contract.

The Lakers have full bird rights on James and can go over the salary cap to re-sign him, or to facilitate a sign-and-trade. In many ways, the ball is in their court, prioritizing a long-term deal for Reaves makes sense.