The Los Angeles Lakers’ Trey Murphy III Trade Problem Is Picks, Not the Hard Cap

The Los Angeles Lakers can legally take on Trey Murphy III’s $27,000,000 and still sit $5,110,812 under their hard cap. They still cannot get him, because New Orleans wants first-round picks and the Lakers spent every one they had on Walker Kessler. The money was never going to be the thing that killed this.

Nine Teams Have Scouted New Orleans, and Los Angeles Is One of Them

Chris Dodson of ClutchPoints reported that nine teams have been named by sources or seen in the arena evaluating Herb Jones and Trey Murphy III: Houston, the Lakers, Chicago, Washington, Golden State, Oklahoma City, San Antonio, Detroit and Memphis. Writing on Oct. 30, Dodson said New Orleans “remain steadfast at a ‘ridiculous’ price” on Jones — two first-round picks, one of them unprotected, a figure ClutchPoints first reported in June 2025.

The need on the Lakers’ end is the one their own week kept describing. Opposing players say the way to beat Los Angeles is to trap Austin Reaves, because there is no third creator to punish it when Luka Dončić sits. Murphy is 26, and through the five games Basketball-Reference had logged on Nov. 1 he had started all five, averaging 32.4 minutes and 14.2 points. He is the shape of player that problem asks for.

The Hard Cap Binds Before Salary Matching Does

Basketball-Reference put the Lakers’ 2026-27 payroll at $201,332,759 on Nov. 1. That is $904,759 past the $200,428,000 tax line but $7,682,241 short of the $209,015,000 first apron, which matters because it selects the rule: a team below the first apron may take back what it sends out plus $9,095,709. On Murphy’s $27,000,000, that means only $17,904,291 has to go the other way.

The hard cap asks for more. Hoops Rumors lists the Lakers as capped at the first apron for acquiring Kessler by sign-and-trade, so the deal has to leave them under $209,015,000 — which requires $19,317,759 out, not $17,904,291. Jarred Vanderbilt ($12,428,571) and Jaden Hardy ($6,000,000) clear the matching rule on their own and then blow the hard cap by $889,188.

Add Jake LaRavia’s $6,000,000 and it works: $24,428,571 out, $27,000,000 in, a payroll of $203,904,188 and $5,110,812 to spare. All three are trade-eligible today, and the Lakers sit far enough below the second apron — the only line that bars a team from combining salaries — to aggregate the three.

The Asking Price Is Picks the Walker Kessler Trade Already Spent

Which is where it ends. As SES argued on Oct. 29, the Kessler sign-and-trade left the Lakers without a tradable first-round pick for seven years, reporting Brett Siegel first published. New Orleans wants two of them, one unprotected, for Jones — the cheaper and less productive of the two wings, at 20.4 minutes and one start in five games. Murphy’s price is higher still; Heavy’s Owen Crisafulli noted that the offseason asking price for him “scared off several teams.”

There is a second reason to leave it alone. Sean Deveney of Heavy reported on Oct. 31 that the Lakers are at the tax line and want to get under it to keep the full mid-level exception available next summer. This deal adds $2,571,429 instead, and it does so by shipping out the one rotation big who has helped on the glass.

What is not knowable from here: no outlet has reported an asking price for Murphy, or that New Orleans would move him at all, and nobody has reported whether the Pelicans want Vanderbilt, Hardy or LaRavia. Scouts in an arena are not an offer. But the arithmetic above is the whole of the Lakers’ flexibility, and it buys a salary slot, not a wing.

The Figures

Contract figures and payroll totals via Basketball-Reference; cap, tax and apron levels via the NBA; hard-cap status via Hoops Rumors; salary-matching brackets via Over The Apron. All figures as of Nov. 1, 2026.