Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak and the rest of the team’s front office have been busy since the regular season ended last month.
Before and now during the NBA Draft Combine this week, Los Angeles has turned its focus from working on filling out new head coach Luke Walton’s head coaching staff to gearing up for the NBA Draft and the draft lottery on Tuesday. While the lottery will determine if they have a first round pick or not this year, the Lakers are surveying all options for the June 23 NBA Draft, including second round and potential undrafted free agent candidates.
Los Angeles has started interviewing some of the top players in this year’s draft class. They have also started a list of pre-draft workouts with some prospects expected to go very late in the draft if they are selected. According to Adam Zagoria of SNY, the Lakers have added three names to that list: Providence’s Ben Bentil, Kentucky’s Isaiah Briscoe and UNLV’s Derrick Jones (h/t Harrison Faigen of Silver Screen and Roll).
Bentil, a sophomore power forward, ranks No. 52 on DraftExpress’ big board, while Briscoe ranks 82nd and Jones is barely in the top-100, coming in at No. 99.
The common theme for the Lakers’ list of invites has been the fact that every player is projected to be selected well after their final pick in the draft, which is at that No. 32 spot.
This list of names will undoubtedly continue to grow by the day, as the Lakers leave no stone unturned in the NBA Draft process. But so far, it appears they are getting an early look at some of the candidates that could be part of the undrafted free agent pool. Their entire draft strategy depends heavily on how the ping pong balls bounce on Tuesday, so we will just have to wait and see.
One thought