Lakers Are Encouraged to Offer an Extension to a "Underrated" Player

Ahead of the 2025–2026 NBA season, the Los Angeles Lakers are under pressure to extend the contract of Rui Hachimura. Next summer, Hachimura, who is in the last year of his current contract, will be free to sign with any team.

The former ESPN journalist spoke with Sam Amick of The Athletic on the September 22 episode of "The Zach Lowe Show" about a variety of subjects, including the Lakers' association with Andrew Wiggins in spite of Hachimura.

Lowe urged the team to sign Hachimura to a new contract, while Amick thinks he gets along well with Luka Doncic.

According to Lowe, "they can give Rui Hachimura enough money to attract his attention." Based on his present compensation, I believe his extension would begin at about $26 million and increase from there. According to Lowe, Rui Hachimura is good and underappreciated.

The Lakers' issue is that they want to have cap flexibility for the 2027 summer, when a number of superstars, including Nikola Jokic and Giannis Antetokounmpo, may become free agents. In his September 16 report for The Athletic, Sam Amick brought it up.

Hachimura is reliable at that end of the court, even though he isn't a particularly good defender. In his first two complete seasons with the Lakers, he has also shown himself to be a proficient 3-point shooter. He shot 41.3% the previous season and 42.2% in 2023–24. With the Lakers, he might be P.J. Washington for Luka Doncic.

It is unlikely that Rui Hachimura would sign a contract extension with the Los Angeles Lakers.

Rui Hachimura is among the Los Angeles Lakers players who are available for an extension this offseason. According to Arthur Hill of HoopsRumors, if he doesn't sign an extension before the 2025–2026 season ends, he will become an unrestricted free agency.

Zach Lowe stated on his podcast that although the Lakers and Hachimura will have some talks, it is unlikely that they will reach an agreement on a new contract. On the August 15 edition of his "Buha's Block" podcast, Jovan Buha of The Athletic expressed the same opinion.

"I don't think the Lakers will extend Rui's contract in the next six weeks based on the information I currently have." Though I would say that much of what has been going on is them wanting to keep the books clean and see if he starts or if he's their sixth man and how the pieces fit this year, it's definitely possible that anything could occur," Buha stated.

Although the Lakers' training camp is scheduled to begin on September 29, a few of players have already started exercising at the team's facilities in the previous week.

Andrew Wiggins' trade to the Lakers is not something that an NBA executive sees.

The Los Angeles Lakers' quest to improve perimeter defense and scoring has made Andrew Wiggins' name associated with the team this offseason. But if the Miami Heat moved Wiggins to the Lakers, Ashish Mathur of Lakers Daily was informed by an unidentified executive that it would be startling.

The reason for this is that LeBron James' 2014 departure from South Beach still irritates Heat president Pat Riley. The CEO does not believe that Riley is assisting James in improving his team at his expense.