Lakers 2024-25 season player grades: Dalton Knecht

USA Today

2 days ago

Lakers 2024-25 season player grades: Dalton Knecht
A year ago, the Los Angeles Lakers seemed to be in a sort of malaise as a franchise. After a geyser of hope had emerged following their appearance in the Western Conference finals in 2023, they got run down in the first round of the 2024 NBA Playoffs in five games by the Denver Nuggets.
Then-head coach Darvin Ham got exiled and was replaced by a neophyte in JJ Redick, and the franchise looked like it needed a serious injection of good fortune. It got just a bit of that in the draft, when it was lucky enough to take University of Tennessee stud Dalton Knecht with the No. 17 pick.
Knecht had been widely expected to be one of the first 10 players chosen, but for some bewildering reason, he fell into the Lakers' laps. His rookie season had plenty of ups and downs, but he got through it in one piece, and his potential hasn't been dampened.
Dalton Knecht's season stats
In 78 regular-season games with the Lakers, Knecht averaged 9.1 points, 2.8 rebounds and 0.8 assists in 19.2 minutes a game while shooting 46.1% from the field and 37.6% from 3-point range.
Overall Analysis
Bereft of depth, the Lakers needed Knecht to play significant minutes right away, and it wasn't long before he started to deliver. In the month of November, he averaged 13.6 points in 26.3 minutes a game and hit 50.7% of his shot attempts while going 46% from downtown.
But in early December, his shooting became as frigid as the weather at Mammoth Mountain, and his playing time went down, especially as the Lakers became more of a defensive-oriented unit. Just as it looked like he was perhaps perking up a bit in late January and early February, fate delivered him a weird curveball.
The Lakers agreed to send him, forward Cam Reddish, a 2031 first-round draft pick and a 2030 pick swap to the Charlotte Hornets for Mark Williams, a young and promising center. It was thought that Williams would team up with recently acquired generational superstar Luka Doncic for years to come — until Williams reportedly failed his physical and the trade was rescinded.
Knecht could've pouted and felt rejected, but he responded like a professional. He rediscovered his mojo in March and posted double figures in scoring in nine of 11 games, only to see his playing time almost completely disappear by the end of the month as Redick established his playoff rotation.
Again, Knecht didn't complain, even though he got a total of three minutes and 40 seconds of playing time in L.A.'s five-game loss in the first round of this year's playoffs against the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Although he's first and foremost a 3-point specialist, he has shown at least a rudimentary ability to score adeptly from all three levels. He moves well without the ball and gets out in transition, and he finishes strong at the rim by dunking.
His defense has been a problem, and it is presumably a big reason he has had trouble holding onto his spot in the rotation. However, he does possess ample athleticism, and therefore, he should have the physical tools to at least become a neutral defender.
What's next for Knecht?
Knecht is under contract for three more seasons, and the final two years of his contract are team options. In the meantime, expect his name to consistently come up in trade rumors over the next several weeks. He's a young talent whose ceiling could be relatively high but is still hard to discern at this point, and that presumably makes him an attractive piece to other teams.
Overall Grade: C