Waiters Island is coming to Los Angeles. Only three days after Dion Waiters came into the Los Angeles Lakers practice facility and had an “impressive workout,” the sturdy guard out of Syracuse has agreed to join the Lakers, taking the spot created by the decision to waive Troy Daniels on Sunday, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic/Stadium.
Waiters’ 2019-20 season in Miami was an abject disaster, as he was sent home from training camp for being out of shape, had a mishap on the team plane with a weed gummy and was suspended by the Heat three times before getting traded to Memphis, before immediately getting released. Now Waiters finds himself on the best team in the Western Conference. Waiters, like Dwight Howard was earlier in the season, will be on a short leash as the Lakers reserve the right to release him.
Waiters has career averages of 13.2 points, 2.7 rebounds and 2.8 assists per game while shooting 41.2% from the field and 34.8% from the 3-point line. Waiters also has many connections to the Lakers. He was a former client of Lakers president Rob Pelinka and now he is currently represented by Rich Paul of Klutch Sports.
Waiters played with LeBron back in 2014-15 in LeBron’s first season back and it didn’t go too well as Waiters was eventually traded to Oklahoma City. However, Waiters did prove to be a valuable role player on the Oklahoma City squad in 2016 that pushed the 73-9 Golden State Warriors to seven games, averaging eight points, 2.3 rebounds. 2.6 rebounds and shooting 37.5% from the 3-point line on 56 attempts over 18 games. He then had a career year in Miami as their lead ballhandler the following season before an ankle injury cut his season short. Perhaps now that he has the Miami Heat DNA that LeBron also has, the connection will be much stronger the second time around.
