Lakers Waive Dalton Knecht a Day Before Tipoff: Fantasy Fallout

The Lakers cut Dalton Knecht loose Monday, waiving the No. 17 pick from the 2024 draft a single day before the 2026-27 season opens. It's a stunning fall for a player who, in his lone season at Tennessee, looked like a steal — and who dropped 37 points with nine triples on the Jazz in the NBA Cup as a rookie back in November 2023.

That night should've launched a career. Instead it became the high-water mark. Knecht appeared in just 54 games across two seasons, averaging a touch over 10 minutes a night, and bounced in and out of L.A.'s rotation while living in the trade rumor mill the whole time.

How It Unraveled

The turning point wasn't on the court. Knecht was packaged — with picks — to land Mark Williams from Charlotte, days after the Lakers pulled off the Luka Dončić blockbuster. Then Williams failed his physical, the deal got rescinded, and Knecht came back to a team that no longer had a clear use for him. Coach JJ Redick, asked what changed, pointed at the roster itself: the team changed, the needs changed, the fit changed. He credited Knecht as a better player now than two seasons ago, which only underlines how little fit matters when the fit isn't there.

Zoom out and Knecht is a symptom, not an outlier. The 2024 class was flagged as thin before draft night and the data has backed it up — four lottery picks already traded, including No. 1 overall Zaccharie Risacher, who's now trying to reboot in Dallas. Only three No. 1 picks this century have been dealt before their third season even started.

The Bright Spots

It's not all wreckage. Stephon Castle looks like a genuine star, and Alex Sarr has become a real NBA center — he put up 16.3 points, 7.4 boards and 2.7 assists for 35.9 fantasy points per game across 48 games last season (2025-26, actual). The sneaky winner is Ajay Mitchell, a playoff contributor for OKC who posted 13.6 points, 3.3 rebounds and 3.6 assists for 26.1 fantasy points per game over 57 games last season (2025-26, actual). In our rankings he sits at #134 overall, #66 among guards — a usable deeper-league piece, though his last five games ran 6.2 fantasy points below his season mark.

For fantasy managers, the Knecht move is simple: he's a drop in any format. A waived player with no roster home carries zero value until someone signs him, and even then he'd be walking into an unknown role. If you were speculatively stashing him, that experiment is over — reinvest the spot. The more actionable 2024-class names on the wire are Mitchell in deeper leagues and Sarr as a standard-league big; park your attention there and let Knecht's next chapter write itself before you buy back in.