But like I said elsewhere, one of the reasons Malone feels sleighted by the Jazz is because they are not going to offer him the amount of money he feels he's worth. He's currently getting $19 million. The Lakers can't offer anywhere near that. With money obviously a factor, it's hard to believe that the Mailman will settle for the MLE - not impossible, of course, but improbable.
(Why do I get the feeling I'll have to eat my words in the offseason? I really should stop making predictions.

)
But I still feel fairly confident in saying the Lakers won't acquire the five free agents mentioned earlier, nor four, not three, and even two seems a stretch. In a perfect world, these guys would realise they could form an almost unstoppable force (on paper, if nothing else) if they took a pay cut. But this is the NBA - they're probably not going to.
PJ Brown, Juwan Howard, even Scottie Pippen might work for the MLE or the veteran's minimum, but I don't see Karl Malone, Alonzo Mourning or Gary Payton taking that kind of pay cut, just yet.