Kyle Kuzma Agrees to Three-Year Extension With the Lakers

The Los Angeles Lakers are well-prepared for their title-retention bid. The team lost key players like Rajon Rondo, Dwight Howard, Danny Green, Javale McGee, and Avery Bradley but they were able to add Montrezl Harrell, Dennis Schroder, Marc Gasol, and Wesley Matthews to their lineup.

Los Angeles also signed LeBron James and Anthony Davis to extensions which ensure that the Lakers have every fighting chance of keeping the trophy in the City of Angels. But with a couple of days to go before the start of the 2020-21 season, there was still one order of business that was left unfinished.

Fourth-year forward Kyle Kuzma is entering the final year of his rookie contract with the Lakers. As a first-round draft pick, he was bound by a December 22 deadline for his rookie extension contract. If he doesn’t have a deal by that date, he will enter restricted free agency after the season. Well, the Lakers beat that deadline by a couple of days.

Kuz’s Extension

According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, the 25-year old forward has agreed to a three-year contract extension worth $40M, including a player option for the third year. His deal is similar to the one recently signed by swingman Kentavious Caldwell-Pope for the Lakers. An unrestricted free agent, KCP agreed to stay with the Lakers on a $39M deal for three seasons although the final year of that deal is not fully guaranteed.

OFFICIAL: @kylekuzma has signed a contract extension with the #LakeShow 💜💛 pic.twitter.com/lO4nXDVFnJ

— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) December 20, 2020

While Kuzma didn’t get the same maximum-salary commitment that his fellow 2017 first-round picks Jayson Tatum, Donovan Mitchell, Bam Adebayo, and De’Aaron Fox, Kuzma is the first player to get a player option in the final year of his rookie extension. This is seen as a smart move from him and his management team because it enables Kuzma to enter unrestricted free agency when he reaches his prime at the age of 28 years. If he is able to outperform his new deal, he should set himself up for a big contract in 2023.

Like all rookie extension deals, Kuzma’s has a “poison pill restriction“. This means that he will count as $3.6M in outgoing salary in a hypothetical trade but $10.9M (average salary of the last year of his contract and extension) to the incoming team.

So while he isn’t ineligible to be traded this season, putting together a deal will be difficult with the complications in salary matching salaries which in turn reduces his chance of being traded anytime soon.

Kuzma’s deal doesn’t pay him like a superstar but it is more than enough for someone playing the kind of role he does on the Lakers. This contract also takes some load off his shoulder and enables him to focus on just getting better so that if he plays well in the next two seasons, he will be rewarded with a big contract during his next negotiation, wherever that will be,

Locking Up the Future

Kuzma averaged just 12.8 points and 4.5 rebounds per game last season in a reduced role with the arrival of Anthony Davis. But the Lakers still believe in him the way they did when they traded their young core except for Cuz in the deal that landed them AD. Remember that Kuzma averaged a career-high 18.7 points per game as LeBron’s sidekick during the 2018-19 season. If Frank Vogel can make him understand better his new role, he should be a key player in this Lakers team for years to come.

Lakers locked up LeBron, AD, KCP, and Kuz pic.twitter.com/tGsTR2kWLv

— Hoop Central (@TheHoopCentral) December 20, 2020

The Lakers have always been smitten with Kuzma since he came to the team via the Utah Jazz as the 27th pick of the 2017 NBA Draft. When they traded for Anthony Davis the previous summer, Los Angeles gave up Brandon Ingram, Lonzo Ball, and Josh Hart to get AD but kept Kuzma. Since then, his name has always emerged in trade talks but the Lakers have not put him on the trading block.

What the Lakers have done this offseason is to lock up their future.

The key to this really was Anthony Davis signing a five-year deal. With Davis secured, the Lakers then ensured that the remaining core players for their 17th title season will be staying a little longer in Lala Land to give the team continuity and with no cap space to worry about in the next couple of offseasons.

The Lakers have all the pressure in the world being the +250 odds on favorite to repeat as 2021 NBA champions at NBA betting sites. But with their key players secured for the future, they can focus on building chemistry with the new guys, hoping that their plug-and-play style will work again this season. That we have to see. The Lakers open their title defense bid on Tuesday night as -2.5 point betting favorites against their cross-town rival Clippers