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Kobe Bryant and Nick Young are recruiting Rajon Rondo, Goran Dragic, others

Kobe Bryant and Nick Young are recruiting Rajon Rondo, Goran Dragic, others

The Los Angeles Lakers’ owners can’t comment on potential free agent additions specifically, which is why they’re left to take in the slings and arrows as they publicly defend their team’s course in the midst of a 12-30 season. The team’s general manager, Mitch Kupchak, can’t talk on record about the sort of player he’d like to go after with his team’s potential $20-something million in cap space this summer. The squad’s coach, Byron Scott, can’t be seen whispering in a free agent’s ear, and he can’t muse openly about how great it would be to add a specific contributor currently working for another team.

If any faction is caught talking, they’ll be heavily fined by the NBA for tampering. They can’t say anything until July, when contracts either turn over for another year, or expire. It’s Quiet Time, in the middle of a season that was designed to be a lost one.

Players, on the other hand, can chatter away. They can admit to the press that they’d love to see a specific player on their team next season, and they can call, text, Facebook or Twitter message loving missives to free agents all they want. Those guys can recruit.

The two most prominent Laker holdovers for 2015-16 are Kobe Bryant and Nick Young. Both have admitted to trying to stay in the ear of two of this summer’s most coveted free agents, looking to build a case that the Lakers are a team on the rise.

It started with Nick Young whispering sweet nothings into Phoenix Suns guard Goran Dragic’s ear. From the Los Angeles Daily News:

“I told Goran Dragic on the court, ‘You might be my teammate next year.’” Young told the L.A. News Group shortly after the Lakers’ loss on Monday to the Phoenix Suns. “I’ll talk to Marc (Gasol.) Me and him are cool. Kevin Love, I’ll talk to him.”

Several, if not every, NBA team will at least put in a pitch to Marc Gasol and Kevin Love, but as we’ve discussed before with both players, neither is likely to leave their championship-contending teams to take less money to rebuild in Los Angeles. Despite Nick’s charms.

Dragic, on the other hand, might be a possibility. Even if it is a slim one. I mean, the guy’s brother is under contract to play with the Suns next season.

The Suns have rebounded from an iffy start to hang on to the eighth seed in the killer Western Conference playoff bracket. The team is on pace to threaten for 50 wins, and though the team’s three-game lead over the improving Oklahoma City Thunder isn’t exactly “comfortable,” Phoenix should be credited for keeping the Thunder at bay for far longer than we presumed they would.

Dragic is technically under contract next season, but he will most certainly use his player option and opt out of the final year of his deal, a year that stands to pay him a below-market mark of $7.5 million. If the Suns miss the playoffs and Goran deduces that the team’s approach with Dragic, Eric Bledsoe and Isaiah Thomas isn’t working, there is a chance (however slight) that he could decide to start all over. Decide to ink a one-year deal somewhere and await the increased NBA salary cap slated to hit in 2016.

That’s a reach, but in Nick Young’s mind, it’s reachable.

Kobe Bryant? He’s shooting higher, as you’d expect, and refusing to sign off on any chance that Rajon Rondo remains a Dallas Maverick. Not until Rondo literally signs off on things. From the Boston Herald:

While Mavericks owner Mark Cuban expressed confidence his club can and will sign Rondo to a new deal, Bryant told the Herald he’s not about to cease working on getting him to LA.

“No way,” Bryant said. “I’m not done. I’m not stopping until he signs an extension.”

Though many rightfully worried about Rondo’s fit with Dallas offensively, he has helped turn the team’s defense around to a significant degree, the offensive drop hasn’t been severe in the slightest, and Dallas is 10-4 with him on board (0-1 with him out of the lineup). That’s a sterling record considering that the Mavs’ move for Rajon was created midseason, without the aid of a training camp. The fit was made even more impressive due to the fact that Rondo isn’t your typical, orthodox NBA point guard.

The dude can’t even hit free throws. Mark Cuban, however, isn’t worried:

“It’ll get better,” owner Mark Cuban said. “If we can improve (former center) Erick Dampier’s free-throw shooting, among others, we’ll improve Rajon’s. How he starts is going to be different from how he finishes.”

(Mark’s memory might be a little off, here.

Damp’s free throw percentage dipped to 60 and then 59 percent in his first two seasons in Dallas, down from nearly 66 percent in the year prior to the Mavs trading for him. He rebounded a bit to shoot in the low 60s two other years, but fell to 57 percent in his penultimate year with the Mavericks. His best mark with Mark, at 63.8 percent, was eclipsed four other times with teams he played for in the years before the Mavericks dealt for him.)

Rajon has missed 13 of 17 free throws as a Mav, but even an embarrassing “hack-a-Rajon”-incident in the playoffs won’t dissuade Dallas from offering him a max extension this summer.

It’s unlikely that Kobe’s presence will dissuade Rajon from accepting it, either. The Lakers have cap space, but Dallas (as the incumbent team) can offer Rondo more money if they see fit to.

Then there is the idea of Rondo’s fit, as is the case with any team he plays for. Kobe Bryant has backed off of late, relative to his previous play, but he still dominates the ball. Rajon Rondo dominates the ball as well – he needs it to be effective. Neither player is even an average three-point shooter.

The Lakers, eventually, will be an intriguing destination. Unless they take in terrible lottery luck, dropping to out of the top five in the 2015 draft and relinquishing their selection to Dragic’s Suns, the team will enter this offseason with plenty of space and two consecutive highly regarded top draft picks on its rebuilding roster. They’ll have space in 2016, as well, when Bryant’s contract comes off the books.

Until then, however, it’s just noise. Even Bryant, at his most dogged, probably knows that Rondo, Dragic and others aren’t coming to Los Angeles this summer.

As he likely knew last summer, when considering another potential teammate:

Rebuilding takes time, Los Angeles. It’s your turn to do it.

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Kelly Dwyer

is an editor for Ball Don't Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at KDonhoops@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!