Luka Doncic And Rob Pelinka Holding Each Other Accountable

This offseason for the Los Angeles Lakers is one in which the team fully moved into the Luka Doncic era. With LeBron James gone, Doncic is the clear leader of the team and general manager Rob Pelinka led the front office in a complete rebuild of the roster with Doncic in mind, getting the ideal pieces to allow the superstar guard to thrive most.

Pelinka and Doncic were in constant communication throughout the summer with the two bouncing ideas back and forth about the roster construction and what they were looking for and Doncic characterized their conversations as honest one.

“I mean, yeah, we just talked honestly about what they like, what I like,” Doncic said during Lakers Media Day. “So just honest conversation about everything around the team.”

As Doncic described it, this wasn’t a matter of him making demands on specific players or even the kinds of players that he wanted on the Lakers, but simply Pelinka saying what the front office was thinking, Doncic giving his input, and then going from there. By all accounts the two have a great relationship with Doncic even noting how they hold each other accountable in their roles within the organization.

“Just like I said, honestly,” Doncic reiterated when asked to describe the dialogue between himself and Pelinka. “We hold each other accountable, so that’s very important. So just honestly.”

This says a lot about their relationship and how they are on the same page in trying to reach the same goal. Both Pelinka and Doncic want the same thing, to win a championship with the Lakers. And both need to perform their jobs at the highest level in order to do that.

For Pelinka that means identifying and acquiring the right pieces to surround his superstar player in order to put him in the best position to shine. For Doncic, that means bringing those pieces together as the leader of this Lakers team, and coming through in the biggest moments when this team needs it the most. If both can do that, they will ultimately reach that goal and the fact they are holding each other accountable is a good sign in the belief they each have.

Luka Doncic ‘really wanted’ Walker Kessler this offseason

One of the well known wants for Doncic with the Lakers was bringing in a new center and the one the front office acquired, Walker Kesler, was the one superstar himself really wanted.