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Redick gave his honest thoughts as to how the Lakers can improve defensively without having made significant roster changes. He also cited one specific player as someone who could help change their trajectory on that end of the floor.
“Obviously we need to increase our physicality,” Redick said at a recent press conference. “We need to be a better team in terms of contesting shots. We were in the bottom third of the league last year in that.
“I think what will be big for us in sort of the player development work that we’ve done defensively is we’ve talked a lot about having elite presentation and trying to create marginal indecision. That could be in a shift, that could be with low man help, that could be the big up to touch and drop.
JJ Redick likes size and versatility of starting lineup
Lakers head coach JJ Redick announced recently that the team would be returning to their most successful starting lineup of 2023-24. That is the group that went 23-10 in games they started together last season.
Former head coach Darvin Ham experimented with several other lineup pairings, but ultimately landed on this one in the second half of the year when the Lakers desperately needed to go on a run. That lineup had a plus-5.2 net rating after Jan. 1 and was efficient on both ends of the floor.
Redick obviously likes the record associated with that lineup from last year, but he spoke specifically about what he likes when James, Davis, Russell, Reaves and Hachimura are on the court together.
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Still not hearing enough about cleaning up our rebounding issues but here’s hoping that just not getting asked about and that they’re working on it.
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“Finger wag!” and to the great “Charlie Hustle!” I am a Pete supporter for the Hall of Fame as a player. MLB don’t put him now after he’s passed!! I know he and some messed up, but can we have no compassion?
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Pete might get in…eventually…bad look to be a manager and betting against your own team. Hard for anyone to overlook that.
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I understand. If he wasn’t making it while he was alive, then do not put him in now.
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LakerTom wrote a new post
https://x.com/LakerTom/status/1841216302410842307
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. — The Los Angeles Lakers will open training camp Tuesday with largely the same roster for the first time since LeBron James and Anthony Davis joined forces in 2019.
Los Angeles is returning 13 of 15 players from last season’s team, including its starting lineup, for the fifth-most continuity in the league, according to ESPN analytics. Lakers brass is betting, to a large extent, that stability and the coaching switch from Darvin Ham to JJ Redick will unlock the group’s potential.
If Monday’s media day was any indication, Redick has left an impression on his players through their offseason conversations and interactions in voluntary summer workouts.
“JJ has done a really good job, I think, to start,” Max Christie said. “Definitely imposing himself as a coach. … I think he’s done a really good job kind of explaining what our offensive identity, defensive identity and so on is going to be.”
Redick’s communication, preparation and “structure” — the day’s buzzword — were popular talking points among the players. They’re optimistic that with more time together and subtle adjustments on both sides of the ball, this group can surprise the league and compete with the top of the West.
There were also some not-so-subtle shots at the previous regime.
“I just think the whole structure and foundation these coaches have brought in for us is a great start,” Austin Reaves said. “Because I feel like a lot of times last year we won games off talent. And when you have talent around structure, then you have the opportunity to do something really special.”
After inserting Rui Hachimura into the starting lineup on Feb. 3, the Lakers closed last season 22-10 — and 18-6 with their preferred starting unit. They posted the league’s third-best offense over that stretch and fifth-best record. It was the validation some internally felt they needed that the team had underperformed its potential and needed a new locker-room voice at the helm.
With another training camp under their belt, renewed optimism in their direction and a bunch of “basketball sickos” leading them, the Lakers are confident they’ll surprise those overlooking them.
“This is a team that we can win the whole thing,” Hachimura said. “We’ve been building it. As we can see, we have a lot of talented guys on the team.”
Here are four other storylines to monitor throughout training camp and the preseason.
1. LeBron appears refreshed
2. LA is already battling injuries
3. Russell apologizes in a show of maturity
4. A priority: 3-pointers![Profile Photo]()
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9-MAN ROTATION:
PG: D’Angelo Russell/Gabe Vincent
SG: Austin Reaves/Max Christie
SF: LeBron James/Dalton Knecht
PF: Rui Hachimura
CE: Anthony Davis/Christian Koloko-
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I’d say: DLo/GV, Reaves/Max, Rui/Cando, LBJ/Wood,
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AD/Hayes
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I know that’s 10 but, trust me, JJ will get there too at least for the regular season.
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Need to see what DK does in camp before I pencil him in anywhere.
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If DK is getting minutes it’s at Max’s expense, maybe Rui.
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Hopefully we get to see these 2 play together more often under JJ’s coaching pic.twitter.com/usSuVnxudp
— Washed LakersvsHaters 🅿️ (@notlakersgm) September 30, 2024
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https://x.com/Klutch_23/status/1840823238227624258
https://x.com/LADEig/status/1840824849356505169
https://x.com/Klutch_23/status/1840825001349693466
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https://x.com/DStarkand/status/1840818625760149873
https://x.com/MaskedInLA/status/1840848887696798000
https://x.com/BronMuse/status/1840822707358695578
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“I don’t lose touch with basketball but it felt damn good to play meaningful basketball. To play for the highest level. We had two game 7s.
That fire and desire was brought back to me and this is what it was all about and why we called ourself the Avengers.”
— LeBron James pic.twitter.com/BoiEMJlLFm
— 🎗NBA•Fan🎗 (@Klutch_23) September 30, 2024
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LakerTom wrote a new post
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D’Angelo Russell sends a message:
"I'm a problem for the opposing team."
(Via @ArashMarkazi ) pic.twitter.com/yt2FIZ9XeA
— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) September 30, 2024
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LakerTom wrote a new post
https://x.com/LakerTom/status/1840789509795197431
Lakers receive:
-Dennis Schroder
-Bojan Bogdanovic
-2026 First-Round Pick (Lottery Protected)
-2028 Second-Round Pick
-2029 Second-Round Pick (via Mavericks)Nets receive:
-D’Angelo Russell
-Rui Hachimura![Profile Photo]()
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Unless there’s a trade for an elite POA defender or second big who could play alongside AD, I probably prefer to see what JJ can do with this roster before making a move. Interesting trade as it brings in a better defensive point guard and proven elite shooter.
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Pelinka is preaching continuity and how the Lakers can benefit from keeping their core together in an interview with ESPN 710 Los Angeles:
“Listen, continuity is an ingredient in sports that is always successful. If you look at sort of sustainable championship teams, there is continuity at the center of it. So that’s an ingredient that we strive for. That said, we’re not gonna settle into continuity or not looking for ways to improve our roster. But that will be through a lens and sort of making sure that is we do something, it’s super smart for both the now and the long-term. That’s a tight rope to balance on.”
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The biggest positive in pursuing continuity is finding a head coach with the ability to optimize LeBron and AD while building for the future. JJ Redick is the key to Lakers ownership and management beging able to be successful. He has the vision Rob and Jeanie don’t.
As I said during last Saturday’s Lakers Fast Break Podcast, there is hope that the Lakers plans for continuity could signal a smart move by Pelinka and Buss. How big a difference does the head coach make? We’re about to find out and I suspect the difference will be dramaticly in the positive.
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I am deeply saddened by the news of Dikembe Mutombo’s passing. He was not just a basketball legend but a true humanitarian. I couldn’t help but wag my finger in disbelief, echoing his iconic gesture. My wife and I had the honor of meeting him at a restaurant in Atlanta a few years ago. He often visited the hospital where my wife works, and they grew quite close. She has met many celebrities through her job, but Dikembe’s warmth and generosity stood out. His loss is truly a significant one for the world.
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Why did you take this job?
“Um,” Redick, after pausing a beat, responds. “That’s probably the best question.”
Three years into retiring from a 15-season playing career, Redick detoured from burgeoning media stardom to shoot his shot with the Lakers. He has yet to coach a professional basketball game in any capacity. Not as a head coach. Not as an assistant. Not even roaming the sidelines for a summer league game.
But the self-described “basketball sicko,” despite the challenges ahead for a franchise seemingly in flux as it attempts to navigate the end of LeBron James’ career, the beginning of Bronny’s and keeping Laker Nation satisfied by competing in the present without forsaking the future, feels as if he is built for this.
“[With] my understanding of the modern game, my relationships with players, it felt like the right time for me personally to go into coaching,” Redick said.
“And then obviously I wanted to coach the Lakers.”
…
REDICK WAS EATING lunch with his dad when he fielded perhaps the most important phone call of his life. Plucked from the television and podcast studios with no previous coaching experience, he was offered a chance to call the shots for one of the most glamourous franchises in the world — and had someone he needed to talk to before he could accept.
“‘Dad, I got to go make one call,'” Redick said, recalling how he pushed his chair back from his table at the stately Washington Duke Inn on Duke’s golf course on June 20.
“So, that’s when I first called LeBron. First time we had talked about me coaching. And I came back. I sat back down. I said, ‘All right, I’m in.'”
Redick’s prioritization was telling. Pelinka and team governor Jeanie Buss offered him the gig and will ostensibly be his bosses. But Redick’s success, or lack thereof, will largely depend on getting the most out of a guy who is just six months his junior suiting up for his 22nd season.
After forging a connection with James over their shared love of the sport, Redick being “in” as the next coach of the Lakers will test if that sense of purity can remain.
And if it wasn’t challenging enough already to be the coach responsible for managing James at this stage of his career, he has to do it while also combating a perception he was hand-picked by James for the part. “It’s a juicy-ass story, but it’s not true,” Gallagher said.
What is true is there will be far more scrutiny on Redick for how he handles coaching LeBron’s 19-year-old son Bronny than there was coaching his sons, 10-year-old Knox and 8-year-old Kai.
Rather than perceive coaching LeBron and Bronny as a no-win situation, Redick has compartmentalized. Coaching LeBron, he says, is a chance to strategize with another savant of the sport. Coaching Bronny is a chance to pour into a young player determined to make it, something he can relate to as the guy collecting DNPs in his early days in Orlando. And Redick simultaneously possesses the audacity to think he can build a career with the purple and gold while knowing that none of the past six coaches since Jackson have lasted more than three seasons.
“There’s no assurances in this industry,” Redick said. “I recognize that at any point in time, I could be let go. That’s a reality.”
And James, whose final seasons will coincide with Redick’s first as a coach and Bronny’s first as a player, wants to make it work to set up his son, his co-host turned coach and the Lakers franchise beyond his playing days.
“I wanted the Lakers, as a player and as a fan of the franchise, to be able to hire the coach that should be there,” James said. “Not only as I’m finishing my career, but long after I’m gone because there’s been so many guys in that seat over the last few years. And to be able to find someone that could be stable in that position is very key for any franchise.
“And for me to be a part of a legacy franchise, I feel like that was important.”
And Redick is just enough of a basketball sicko to think he is the guy meant to pull it off.
“It’s kind of nuts,” Krzyzewski said. “But good nuts.”
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Fab article by Dave McMen. Rob Pelinka be damned, it’s easy to be optimistic about this season. If we can stay healthy and make a couple of good moves at the deadline, this team could be fun. I think we will finish in top 6 and have a puncher’s shot at #18. Key to it all imo is JJ Redick.
Note this quote from LeBron about LAL hiring JJ:
“I wanted the Lakers, as a player and as a fan of the franchise, to be able to hire the coach that should be there,” James said. “Not only as I’m finishing my career, but long after I’m gone because there’s been so many guys in that seat over the last few years. And to be able to find someone that could be stable in that position is very key for any franchise.”
LeBron has been very fair about not demanding the Lakers throw away the future to help the present. He did not do that for any of his previous teams. 7 years as a Laker now matches 7 with Cleveland. LeBron James will proudly go into the HOF as a Los Angeles Laker.
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While I’m not so sure Max Christie is the solution I think the solution does currently exist. I’m cool with that starting five but we need a few guys to be available (Vando and Vincent) and some guys to take a step or on that end (plenty of options but I’m personally looking at Hayes and Christie) we should see some improvement and consistency.