Are The Lakers Lame For Hanging A Banner For Winning The In-Season Tournament?

The Los Angeles Lakers have decided to sell out and change their longstanding tradition of only hanging NBA Title banners in the rafters by now including their recent In-Season Tournament (IST) Championship.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, that's precisely the point - nobody cares about the IST and definitely not enough to raise a banner. Yet here we have the Lakers, who don't even have banners for Western Conference Championships, paying homage to the IST as if it matters.

According to The Athletic's Shams Charania, the Lakers weren't originally going to hang the banner but suddenly had a change of heart and will now raise the banner on December 18th when they host the New York Knicks. The new banner will be a different size and color than the other Championship ones currently sitting atop the Crypto.com Arena.

It's unclear why the Lakers changed their mind, but many on social media believe that Commissioner Adam Silver might have made them do it in an attempt to force-feed a Tournament that nobody asked for. This year marked the inaugural season of the multi-stage tournament that culminated in Las Vegas last weekend with the Lakers defeating the Indiana Pacers 123-109.

But just because Silver may have wanted the team to do it doesn't mean they had to. The whole thing just comes across as pandering and desperate.

Even their own players didn't give a damn -

EACH WINNING PLAYER RECEIVED $500,000

From the get go the whole IST idea seemed like a cash grab as Silver and the league launched the tourney in a bit to get fans (and players) to care about NBA games that happen earlier in the season. Upon winning the IST's "NBA Cup Trophy," the Lakers still had 59 games remaining in the season. But hey - congrats!

In recent years, NBA fans have ripped the league for not putting a stop to the "load management," excuse that continues to see many star players like LeBron James sit out games. Ya know, because 82-games is way too much for the multi-millionaire players to do what they're paid to do.

But what does Silver do instead? He launches a multi-week tournament with hideous court colors and all.

For one of the NBA's great franchises to lower their standards for an IST banner of all things is just lame. But there is one thing that could drive this point across even better... if the Lakers fans just start relentlessly booing as the banner is raised.

We can only hope.

What do you think? Should the Lakers have a banner for the In-Season Tournament?
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