{"id":769307,"date":"2026-06-29T17:42:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T17:42:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/769307\/"},"modified":"2026-06-29T17:42:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T17:42:08","slug":"sources-deandre-ayton-picks-up-lakers-option-marcus-smart-opts-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/769307\/","title":{"rendered":"Sources: Deandre Ayton picks up Lakers option, Marcus Smart opts out"},"content":{"rendered":"

Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> center Deandre Ayton<\/a> is opting into his $8.1 million player option for the 2026-27 season, while Marcus Smart<\/a> is declining his $5.4 million option, sources told ESPN’s Shams Charania.<\/p>\n

Ayton gave up $10 million of his $35.6 million contract to reach a buyout agreement with the Portland Trail Blazers<\/a> last summer in hopes of reestablishing his value with a high-profile starting role on the Lakers.<\/p>\n

The former No. 1 pick signed a two-year, $16.2 million deal with L.A., with a player option on the second season. Ayton averaged 12.5 points on 67.1% shooting and 8.0 rebounds per game in the regular season and 10.0 points and 9.6 rebounds in the playoffs — including a strong showing to close out the Houston Rockets<\/a> in the first round.<\/p>\n

Ayton, who turns 28 this summer, spent his first five seasons with the Phoenix Suns<\/a> followed by two in Portland before joining the Lakers last offseason.<\/p>\n

Smart, a former Defensive Player of the Year, returned to form with the Lakers, leading the team in plus-minus with L.A. outscoring its opponents by 256 points in the minutes he was on the floor last season.<\/p>\n

The 32-year-old guard was recruited to the Lakers by Luka Doncic<\/a> after two lackluster seasons with the Memphis Grizzlies<\/a> and Washington Wizards<\/a>. Smart averaged 9.3 points, 3.0 assists, 2.8 rebounds and 1.4 steals while starting 54 of the 62 games he played in for Los Angeles.br\/]<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Los Angeles Lakers center Deandre Ayton is opting into his $8.1 million player option for the 2026-27 season,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":769308,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[273278,205106,49,48,1161,8231,459,44,82],"class_list":["post-769307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-273278","tag-ayton-deandre","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-espn","tag-los-angeles-lakers","tag-nba","tag-news","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/769307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=769307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/769307\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/769308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=769307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=769307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=769307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}