LaMarcus Aldridge Admits First Lakers Meeting ‘Didn’t Go As Well As I Wanted It To’

USA Today

Heading into NBA free agency, the Los Angeles Lakers were determined to pursue the big-name free agents on the open market. General manager Mitch Kupchak and company had their sights set on veteran forward LaMarcus Aldridge and many believed the team had a legitimate shot of signing him.

Unfortunately, the first meeting with the perennial All-Star didn’t go smoothly. Aldridge met with the Lakers first and recently admitted it didn’t go well, according to Basketball Insiders:

“With the Lakers, it wasn’t anything crazy,” Aldridge said. “It was just the [first] meeting didn’t go as well as I wanted it to, so I did another one. People blew it out of proportion about things happening in the meeting. That wasn’t correct. It just didn’t go as good as I wanted it to so I had one more.”

Ultimately, once the news of a poor pitch from the Lakers to Aldridge surfaced, Los Angeles had suffered a major blow publicly. Aldridge seemed to seriously consider signing with the Lakers in free agency and therefore making the franchise relevant once again, but the poor pitch really hurt the team’s chances of turning over a new leaf this summer.

After Aldridge ended up leaving the Portland Trail Blazers to sign with the San Antonio Spurs, the Lakers basically lost all hope of landing a big-name in free agency. DeAndre Jordan decided to return to the Los Angeles Clippers, Greg Monroe agreed to terms with the Milwaukee Bucks and Kevin Love surprised everyone by simply re-signing with the Cleveland Cavaliers on a long-term deal.

Fortunately, despite missing out on bringing in a proven star, the Lakers were able to sign a couple solid free agents in Lou Williams and Brandon Bass while also trading for Roy Hibbert. The ideal scenarios didn’t pan out for the Lakers, but the team did well to bounce back after failing to add top-tier talent.