Well at least we cleared that up. With Los Angeles Lakers guard Russell Westbrook picking up his $47.1 million player option this week, it signaled to the organization that he wasn’t planning to leave the City of Angels. However, it could also be that $47.1 million is a lot of money, so who really knows?
Regardless, Shams Charania reported this week on The Pat McAfee Show Tuesday that the Lakers would like to see Westbrook succeed in a Lakers jersey. Imagine that. As if they wanted him to fail. No matter what, Westbrook has been subjected to countless trade rumors this offseason and that finally seems to be finished now, especially with Kyrie Irving staying in Brooklyn.
The 33-year-old had one of the worst seasons of his career by just about all measures last year. He averaged 18.5 points and 7.1 assists per game while shooting 44.4% from the field and 29.8% from three-point range. We’ll see if that was an anomaly or the new normal for Westbrook at this stage of his career.