With the calendar turning to 2023 and the NBA season approaching its midway point, here are our second-half predictions.
1. The Lakers will make a trade, but pull the trigger too late for it to matter.
If you’d been tasked with guessing the Lakers’ two most likely problems heading into the season, it wouldn’t have been surprising if you’d landed on the lack of perimeter shooting, and the fact that Anthony Davis was likely to suffer an injury that keeps him shelved for significant time. Both those things have come to pass, with Los Angeles’s shooting dreadfully from deep, and Davis’s being out. I’d guess the Lakers will try something via the trade market at some point. But if they do, it’d almost be disappointing that they waited so long. —Chris Herring
