It has undoubtedly been a tough several years for arguably the most storied franchise in the NBA, the Los Angeles Lakers.

The only reason to pay attention to the team was Kobe, even with all of the young talent waiting in the wings.

With Bryant no longer in the picture after his retirement, a new era in Lakers lore has officially begun, and with that, a team loaded with young talent has been unleashed to wreak havoc on opponents.

While the Lakers were celebrating Kobe’s career, they were also racking up a ton of losses.

So many in fact that the team set records for most losses in a season in two consecutive seasons, with 27 and 17 in 2014-’15 and ’15-’16, respectively.

The losses were hard to stomach,  but they have set the team up with high draft picks, like highly esteemed power forward, Julius Randle from Kentucky University, point guard, D’Angelo Russell from Ohio State, and forward Brandon Ingram from Duke.

That chemistry has improved this season and Ingram has blended in seamlessly. The result has been an offense that is miles ahead of where it was just one season ago, where Los Angeles had one of the worst offenses in the NBA.

Last season, the Lakers were ranked 29 out of 30 teams in offensive efficiency, a statistic from TeamRankings, a website that specializes in sports data analysis and prediction.

In 2016-’17, the team ranks ninth in the same category, a massive improvement over the span of a single season, especially without a major overhaul to the roster.

Perhaps the biggest addition to the team over the offseason besides Ingram is not even a player, but a coach.

Lakers brass stole Luke Walton away from the Golden State Warriors, which was an ingenious  move by a management team that has made some questionable decisions in the past, like the disastrous hiring and subsequent firing of Mike D’Antoni and Byron Scott as head coach.

Walton, a former Lakers player himself and son of hall of famer Bill Walton, served as an assistant to Steve Kerr’s Warriors as the team set the record for most wins by an NBA team in a single season with 73. That team was first in offensive efficiency.

TeamRankings projects the Lakers to finish with a 34-48 record. If they were to achieve that, Walton should at least receive some consideration for the coach of the year award.

What can we look forward to with a roster full of young and gifted players over the next several years? To get an idea, let’s compare Los Angeles to a team that has been in a very similar situation as the Lakers.

The most obvious comparison that is available to be made is with the Minnesota Timberwolves. Like Los Angeles, the T’wolves were a basketball abomination just a few short seasons ago.

Fast forward a couple years and a couple of high draft picks of their own and voila, a team with talent to compete for the playoffs every year, lead by budding superstar center Karl Anthony-Towns and small forward Andrew Wiggins.

A championship over the next five years might be a little too steep of an expectation for the new Lakers to live up to, but rest assured, fans of the purple and gold will have plenty of reasons to celebrate.