Lakers receive no votes from NBA GMs to win 2026 NBA Finals

General managers around the league participated in an NBA.com survey ahead of the 2025-26 campaign, and as part of it, they were asked which team will win the championship in 2026.

Five teams in total garnered votes, with an overwhelming majority of those going to the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder, who received 80 percent of the vote. The Cleveland Cavaliers, Denver Nuggets, Houston Rockets and New York Knicks also got some love.

Unfortunately for Los Angeles Lakers fans, the storied franchise didn’t earn a single vote from general managers to be the last team standing in the 2026 NBA Playoffs.

Despite the fact that the results of the survey don’t paint the Lakers as legitimate title contenders, their ultimate goal is to win the 18th title in team history in 2026. Los Angeles is looking to build on a 2024-25 season that saw it land a top-three seed in the Western Conference and secure 50-plus wins for the first time in a bit, and it might have the personnel needed to do just that.

Some new faces in Marcus Smart, Deandre Ayton and Jake LaRavia all project to be impactful players for the Lakers in the coming season with the skills that they bring to the table. Ayton gives the Lakers a nightly double-double threat at the center spot. Meanwhile, LaRavia is a solid floor spacer, and Smart is a former Defensive Player of the Year.

The Lakers are led by a star-studded duo that knows what it takes to lead teams deep into the playoffs as well. LeBron James is a four-time champion who’s played in numerous NBA Finals over the course of his career, and Luka Doncic spearheaded a Finals run for the Dallas Mavericks in the 2024 NBA Playoffs.

How the Celtics fared in the 2025 NBA Playoffs should perhaps tell Lakers fans that they should take the results of the survey with a grain of salt. Heading into last season, the Celtics were the overwhelming favorites to win the title according to the survey with 83 percent of the vote, yet they didn’t even reach the Eastern Conference Finals.

They bowed out to the New York Knicks in the second round of the playoffs due partly to some devastating injury luck.