Does adding Luol Deng make the Lakers a playoff team?

— -- After spending a combined $136 million on Luol Deng and Timofey Mozgov, it's clear the Los Angeles Lakers want to get better in a hurry.

Could signing Deng launch them back into the playoffs in the Western Conference?

How does the Lakers' projection look?

Having failed to secure a meeting with Kevin Durant or get in the running for the other top free agents on the market, the Lakers instead traded their superstar dreams for the certainty of role players who upgrade their current roster.

But with L.A.'s young draft picks stepping into larger roles after the retirement of Kobe Bryant, have the Lakers added enough?

Let's take a look at a preliminary forecast for the 2016-17 Lakers using the multiyear, predictive version of ESPN's real plus-minus (RPM) along with my projections for rookie Brandon Ingram.

Because the Lakers have only 10 players under contract, including Deng and Mozgov (who can't officially sign until after the NBA's moratorium ends on July 7), I've assumed they'll re-sign restricted free agents Marcelo Huertas and Tarik Black to fill out the roster.

I've also assumed that Deng will start at small forward, keeping Ingram in a reserve role as a rookie, though I'm still projecting Ingram will play 25 minutes per game.

Based on those assumptions, the results are ... not good. The Lakers project about three points per 100 possessions worse than league average on both offense and defense -- for a total of six points per 100 possessions worse than average.

Of course, that would still be a major improvement over last season, when the Lakers were more than five points per 100 possessions worse than average at each end.

In all, the combination projects to be most similar to last year's Brooklyn Nets (who were a bit worse on defense than the Lakers project) or Phoenix Suns (who were a bit worse on offense), and it would yield an expected 26 wins -- the most the Lakers have won since 2013-14, but still a bad investment given how much salary they've committed for the future.

Why do the Lakers look so bad in the projection?

A big part of the problem is the young core the Lakers have been building just doesn't figure to be that good yet -- at least not next season.

None of L.A.'s recent first-round picks projects to have an RPM better than D'Angelo Russell's minus-1.6, which is not dramatically better than replacement level. (That's the level of players who can be obtained at any time, which is an RPM of about minus-2.1.)

While the youngsters' "supporting cast" was weak, it's worth noting that with Jordan Clarkson, Julius Randle and Russell all on the court together, the Lakers were outscored by 16 points per 100 possessions last year.

Box-score stats are more optimistic than RPM about Russell and Clarkson, who project closer to league average next season. Still, the only player on the Lakers' roster who can credibly be considered an average or better player for 2016-17 is Deng, and even he was far more effective as a power forward last season in Miami than he was as a small forward -- and it's likely small forward where the Lakers will use him primarily.

None of this spells doom for the Lakers' long-range future. It's perfectly fine that Ingram, who will be the second-youngest player in the NBA next season (only No. 4 pick Dragan Bender is younger), won't be much help as a rookie. That's par for the course for a 19-year-old. It makes sense that Ingram and Russell (who recently turned 20) are far away from being finished products.

But the fact that the Lakers' young core isn't close to ready to compete does suggest the problem with signing Mozgov (soon to be 30) and Deng (31) to four-year contracts. By the time the Lakers' youngsters are ready to win, Deng and Mozgov will be in decline while continuing to get paid like average (Mozgov) or better (Deng) starters.

Meanwhile, the money the Lakers will pay the two players will prevent them from offering two superstars the chance to team up in L.A. in future summers, or at least force them to trade off several pieces to create the necessary cap space.

Even if you don't believe the Lakers should have held out in hopes of signing a superstar in 2017 or beyond, finding players on a similar timetable to their core -- Solomon Hill instead of Deng, or Bismack Biyombo instead of Mozgov -- would have made far more sense.

Can the Lakers improve their projection?

The Lakers do still have about $17 million in cap space remaining, and while that doesn't buy what it once did in the context of the rising cap, they should be able to upgrade their bench. Anthony Brown, Nick Young and the unsigned Huertas project far worse than replacement level by RPM, so finding superior players in free agency shouldn't be difficult.

And there's also a way to take a more optimistic view of the current roster. The Lakers' young players might develop somewhat more quickly under Luke Walton than they did under Byron Scott. And perhaps Mozgov will play more like he did in 2014-15 rather than during an injury-marred 2015-16 campaign.

All of that would bump up L.A.'s projection incrementally.

Still, on paper it's hard to get the Lakers much past 30 wins next season. If the Lakers expect their investment in free agency to translate into immediate results on the court, they're likely to be disappointed.