Luka Don\u010di\u0107 is taking on a larger leadership role after LeBron James\u2019 departure, inviting the Lakers to Slovenia for a preseason minicamp focused on building chemistry<\/p>\n
The Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> are entering a new era after LeBron James<\/a> signed with the Philadelphia 76ers earlier this month, with Luka Don\u010di\u0107 stepping into a leadership role as the franchise prepares for its first season without James since 2018.<\/p>\n The Lakers have built around Don\u010di\u0107 while also locking up Austin Reaves<\/a> with a four-year, $180 million extension, signaling the duo will lead the franchise into its next chapter.<\/p>\n According to ESPN\u2019s Dave McMenamin, Don\u010di\u0107 invited the entire roster to his home country of Slovenia for a four-day minicamp in August featuring workouts, golf and team-building activities.<\/p>\n Don\u010di\u0107 joined the Lakers in a blockbuster trade from the Dallas Mavericks<\/a> in 2025. A Grade 2 hamstring strain ended his season in April, but he has spent the offseason recovering in Europe while preparing for next season.<\/p>\n Last season, Don\u010di\u0107 averaged 33.5 points, 8.1 assists and 7.8 rebounds.<\/p>\n The Lakers also reshaped the roster by acquiring Walker Kessler<\/a> in a trade and signing Quentin Grimes<\/a>, Sandro Mamukelashvili<\/a> and Collin Sexton<\/a> during free agency.<\/p>\n Don\u010di\u0107 hopes the trip to Slovenia will help the Lakers establish chemistry before training camp as Los Angeles begins its first season of the post-LeBron era.<\/p>\n Scroll to continue reading<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Luka Don\u010di\u0107 is taking on a larger leadership role after LeBron James\u2019 departure, inviting the Lakers to Slovenia…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":793946,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[11654,6306,3013,337343,355,2113,80026,99],"class_list":["post-793945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-austin-reaves","tag-lakers","tag-lebron-james","tag-luka-doni","tag-nba","tag-philadelphia-76ers","tag-slovenia","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/793945","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=793945"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/793945\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/793946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=793945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=793945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=793945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}