Dalton Knecht’s Lakers run has gone from promising to precarious, and Draymond Green says the turning point was the botched trade involving Mark Williams.
Knecht is only entering the third season of his career, but the sense around the Lakers is that his time in Los Angeles may be nearing the end. With the team needing to trim one player before the start of the 2026-27 NBA regular season, he has emerged as the most likely casualty of the roster squeeze.
That’s a sharp fall for a player who not long ago flashed real scoring juice. Knecht posted two 30-point games during his rookie season, and there was a stretch when he looked like a young piece worth building around. Now, some around the Lakers view him as a case of wasted potential.
Green thinks the damage started when the Lakers backed out of the deal that would have sent Knecht to the Charlotte Hornets and brought Mark Williams to Los Angeles after Williams failed his physical.
“It's crazy because Dalton Knecht seemed to like he had a little bit of promise to him, but after that trade that got voided by the Hornets to bring him in and send Mark Williams to the Lakers, the Lakers voided the trade because of Mark Williams' back. Dalton Knecht just been in purgatory ever since and ultimately I think it ruined him,” Green said on the latest episode of “The Draymond Green Show”.
The numbers back up how sharply things changed. Before the failed Williams trade, Knecht was putting up 9.4 points while playing more than 20 minutes per game. In the 84 games since, he has averaged 5.7 points in 12.5 minutes a night, and long stretches have passed with him outside the Lakers rotation altogether.
Green also pointed to training camp, where he said Jaden Hardy and Bronny James have been outperforming the Tennessee sharpshooter. For now, that has only strengthened the feeling that Knecht is the odd man out in Los Angeles.
If he does end up on the market, there should be teams willing to take a swing. A microwave scorer with Knecht’s touch can still draw interest, even if his Lakers stint has gone sideways.
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