It is a trying time to be a Los Angeles Lakers fan. With this abysmal season and our living legend, Mr. Kobe Bean Bryant retiring, it's been a hard year. The future of the Lakers looked bright with rising stars like Jordan Clarkson and Julius Randle taking more of a share of the team and having solid contributions to the team. Obviously, they can't hold the whole team up. The Lakers desperately need more scoring and better defense all around. D'Angelo Russell was also one of the rising stars in the Laker's organization with around 13 points per game. The problem is that you cant play three on five in the NBA. Roy Hibbert has shown flashes, very small and inconsistent, flashes of being the player he used to be all those years ago with the Indiana Pacers, but has largely remained a non-factor. The second unit is anemic with little or no scoring and even worse defense. Marcelo Huertas has been improving late in the season, becoming more than just the gimmicky passing European point guard. Other than that, it has been nothing special.

After we get past the basketball portion of the Lakers we run into this situation with Russel and the ever famous Swaggy P. Sometime in January, Russell was recording a conversation between himself and Nick Young (aka Swaggy P). In this video, Young admitted to cheating on his fiancé, Iggy Azalea. Somehow in the past week, this video was released and the metaphorical feces hit the fan. After the second-worst loss in franchise history, a 48 point loss to the Jazz, it was revealed that there were deeper underlying circumstances that had to do with the loss. The entire team was supposedly isolating Russell because of the video incident.

Now we get to the backlash of all of this. Russell apologized to the whole team and they are all trying to move past it. The frustrating thing with this Laker's team is the front office. I have heard rumors that they are trying to move Russell. Why? Why waste the No. 2 pick like that. Sure he made a mistake. He is 20 years old. The age of a college kid just like any of us and he recorded a friend saying something he shouldn't have said or done. That is past the Lakers now and they need to focus on what the future holds. Nick Young needs to go. I've loved Swaggy P for as long as he has been a Laker but, his production has been abysmal the past two years and the Lakers need to move past him and hopefully move on to a brighter future WITH D'angelo Russell.