The Los Angeles Lakers didn't want to pay Alex Caruso.
After the 2021 season, Caruso left L.A. in free agency to sign with the Chicago Bulls for four years and $37 million.
In retrospect, it's wild that the Lakers couldn't recognize what they had already seen up close. Caruso was one of LeBron James' favorite on-court partners, which usually is a lock for sticking around. But instead, they let him walk.
And on Sunday, as the Lakers sat at home, Caruso led the Oklahoma City Thunder to the Western Conference Finals with an incredible Game 7 performance against the Denver Nuggets.
Caruso had the best plus-minus of anyone in the game Sunday, an insane +40. The Thunder outscored the Nuggets by 40 points in the 26 minutes Caruso was on the floor. That's absurd.
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He scored 11 points on 5-for-7 shooting and had three assists and three steals. On the defensive end, Caruso was his super-pest self. He even spent many possessions guarding Nikola Jokic, who is much, much bigger than the Thunder guard.
It's no telling what the butterfly effect of the Lakers' re-signing Caruso four years ago would've been. Maybe things would've been much different, or maybe the Lakers would've messed up a different move and not been any better off.
But man, it's tough to watch how Caruso plays and wonder what L.A. was thinking.
He's as championship-level as a role player can be. And he's trying to help a different Western Conference team climb to the mountaintop.
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