The Los Angeles Lakers have hardly showed progress from last year and the bad thing about it all is that Kobe Bryant is around when needed.

Jordan Clarkson and Julius Randle are living up (somewhat) to expectations, but it seems that there is still something missing. D'Angelo Russell? Roy Hibbert? How about Nick Young?

There are plenty of names to mention but depending on how patient the Lakers are, it may boil down to either winning or giving up some youth to see some progress.

But as everyone perhaps knows, that is a short-term solution, meaning that giving up potential young guns for tested veterans will just return the Lakers to where they are now.

So what about the middle-aged ones?

Nick Young has been mentioned before, someone who could help out the Memphis Grizzlies; but nothing has materialized to date.

How about Ryan Kelly? Or maybe throw in Robert Sacre in the pack for a special deal with teams wanting to free up some cap space or a troublesome player? There are possibilities, but it depends on who the Lakers can afford to trade in the event they are considering it.

But going back, unless the Lakers start taking risks on their younger guys, the development angle will not work.

Lakers head coach Byron Scott calls them soft; well, then push them to be hard. Benching them is a good tactic, but at this point and with the Lakers hardly having players who can do better, the approach may not work for Scott.

The thing is a trade could work, but is not a guarantee that the Lakers will start to win. Scott needs to do his part outside of being a good defensive coach. If he is indeed a defensive maestro, he will find a way to get his players to play better, result will result in a better team.

So other than the players, the coach is in the hot seat too. With the roster they have, there aren't many trade options and Scott and the Lakers just have to deal with it in another way.