Los Angeles Lakers reportedly create flexibility, open max cap space for NBA Free Agency

The Los Angeles Lakers already made a massive splash in acquiring Anthony Davis from the New Orleans Pelicans and all indications are that one of the NBA's flagship franchises will be very active in the coming days. In fact, the Lakers now have the ability to credibly pursue any available free agent when the frenzy begins at 6:00 pm ET on June 30, after two key moves to create flexibility this week. 

ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski, Zach Lowe and Bobby Marks report that the Lakers were able to send the trio of Mo Wagner, Jemerrio Jones and Isaac Bonga to the Washington Wizards in a trade, allowing Los Angeles to remove those players from their salary cap books. In addition, the reporting indicates that the recently acquired Davis has agreed to waive a trade kicker that would have paid him $4 million. That confluence of events opens the door for the Lakers to approach free agency with $32 million in salary cap room, which happens to coincide with the maximum salary.

While nothing is assured at this juncture for the Lakers, Los Angeles could pursue Kawhi Leonard, Jimmy Butler, Kyrie Irving, D'Angelo Russell and others in the coming hours. If the team was able to grab a third star to pair with Davis and LeBron James, it would be difficult to build around them with very little flexibility but, in the same breath, Los Angeles would be able to deploy a three-headed monster that would be on par with any franchise in the league today. 

There is an additional option in that the Lakers, already the betting favorites to the win the 2020 title, could find themselves shopping for bargains in the event that they are unable to land another max-level player. In some respects, that might be a more optimal team building strategy with the presence of star power in Davis and James but, for the Lakers, everything appears to revolve around stars and recent machinations allow them to really dive in to the deep end.