All of the Los Angeles Lakers’ work so far this offseason has come in the free agent market, and they’ve done so without the benefit of real cap space.
By letting Dorian Finney-Smith walk in free agency, they opened up their full non-taxpayer mid-level exception of around $14 million, which they split between Deandre Ayton and Jake LaRavia. Ayton was available at such a cost-friendly price because he was bought out of the final year of his contract with the Portland Trail Blazers.
The Lakers could also use their bi-annual exception (BAE) of around $5.1 million, although considering they are hard-capped at the first apron of the collective bargaining agreement, they needed to open up some money in order to use that.
With reports coming out that the Lakers were signing Marcus Smart with their BAE after he was bought out by the Washington Wizards, they had to make the necessary moves in order to open up that space.
The obvious one was waiving Shake Milton’s non-guaranteed contract to get them to around $3.9 million in available space. That meant one more move would be needed to get to $5.1 million though, with the options being to waive Jordan Goodwin’s partially-guaranteed salary or make a trade that clears up some money.
It looks like the Lakers are choosing to waive Goodwin, per Shams Charania of ESPN:
The Los Angeles Lakers have waived guard Jordan Goodwin, sources tell ESPN. Goodwin emerged as a key rotation piece for JJ Redick late last season, playing 29 games and four playoff contests. Goodwin and Shake Milton were released to clear space for arrival of Marcus Smart.
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) July 21, 2025
The Lakers chose to pick up Goodwin’s team option earlier this offseason, which made sense considering he was only guaranteed $25,000 of his $2.3 million contract until January.
In 29 games for the Lakers last season (five starts), Goodwin averaged 5.6 points, 3.9 rebounds, 1.4 assists and 1.0 steals while shooting 38.2% from 3-point range. His two-way play made him a key piece of JJ Redick’s rotation down the stretch of the regular season.
Luka Doncic helped recruit Marcus Smart to Lakers
One person who was likely happy to the Lakers able to add a player of Marcus Smart’s caliber is Luka Doncic, who reportedly helped recruit the guard.
Smart has guarded Doncic a ton over the years and there appears to be a mutual respect there as they now get set to team up in L.A.
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