5 THINGS

We saw what a champion looks like last night. Problem is wears a different uniform and hails from Wisconsin. The Lakers folded early, tried to make a game of it late, but never seriously challenged the Bucks after the first couple minutes of the game. Small issues have ballooned into large ones, issues that were large to start have become colossal and there is plenty of blame to go around. But you know all that already.

1. The Bucks game. Honestly, not one good thing to say. Nobody played the entire game with the right energy or focus required to win in pro sport. It’s unacceptable. Frank lost the team weeks ago, LeBron looks ready to sign elsewhere and AD has no clue what to do because he’s such a nice dude. Nothing is working right now. Reasons: too many to list in five things. We all know what they are, anyhow, they’ve been the same all season long. Just now teams who have something to play for are playing harder than us, young teams looking to prove themselves have played harder than us all season. Nothing is given, it must be taken.
2. The Three Superstar Philosophy. In my opinion it doesn’t work. Not when all three are max salaried players. It’s not like Miami where everyone took less to fit under the cap and Miami had a ton of home-grown talent they could sign over the tax. We lost all of those tools via trade or stupidity. Oh, except future All-Star and current Bust (depending on the day) Talen Horton-Tucker. We kept him. Thank Klutch for that… Three max salaried players simply occupies too many resources to field a proper contender. You sacrifice too much team. Takes a team to win. Since we are too cheap to go deep into the luxury tax we need to build a better team around 2 super stars. You know, like how we did when we won the title?
3. The state of the team. Between the Rambii leaking that Vogel could be replaced, Rob handing the reigns of the franchise over to LeBron and AD and ownership looking cheaper and cheaper it’s time for Jeannie to clean house this summer. Sure, we might make the playin. Heck, if things break right we might even push as high as a 6th seed (we won’t). Regardless it’s become quite plain to me that the principles and standards guiding the Lakers are no in alignment with championship level basketball. James chose us, Klutch forced AD here, the best thing Rob ever did was (build a functioning team around AD and LBJ, for some reason, broken up right after it worked. The Bucks know what they’re doing. We do not.
4. The Fans. Much has been made of the booing of Russ and the team in general. To me that’s as much a symptom of the current reality (where the cost of things ever increases but the money most people make stays the same) as displeasure. The real thing I think fans are booing is energy, or lack thereof. As a team the Lakers energy hasn’t been right al;l season long. That takes a toll on the passionate Laker fan base and it’s showing. So, for my part, I think this has been a slow burn up to this moment and not that all of a sudden the fans are angry. We’ve stunk all season long.
5. How to fix it all? Nobody will like this answer but I say wait until the summer. Don’t double-down on dumb and trade Westbrook for Wall. It fixes nothing, absolutely nothing. It just means you have an expensive, broken down player signed for even longer on an even more untradeable contract. That’s it. Solutions don’t look like that, they don’t increase the length of the problem. They make it go away or resolve it internally. If you can break Russ’s deal into a few players, or someone who’s contract expires this summer now you’re talking about a real solution. Wall is not the answer.

We’ll probably win against Portland since it’s A) on the road and B) Portland. Thursday will pass without any deals being made in my opinion. I don’t even know if I hope I’m wrong to tell the truth. I’d rather ride out what’s left of a bad season, find a deal that actually improves the team, or even somehow convince Russ to accept a buyout or not to pick up his extension than bring a player in just as expensive but who hasn’t played in over a year. I see that as about the worst idea possible, worse than trading for Ben Simmons (which I am still opposed to). We made a mistake, yes. The way we fix that isn’t making a bad trade, again.

It’s been awhile but the three centerpieces the Lakers envisioned leading a ragtag squad of vet minimum deals to an NBA championship took the floor together for the first time in a long time. Russell Westbrook, LeBron James and Anthony Davis led the Lakers to a needed win over the Nets who were without Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, Paul Milsap and Joe Harris. The Lakers know the injury routine and did the right thing by not allowing the Nets to get anyone other than James Harden going. Here’s hoping the trio stays healthy and grows together over the rest of the season and start finding a way forward.

1. A starting five that makes sense to me. If you look at the total points scored by the starting 5 (69) and the fact that 33 of them were scored by one man (LeBron James) that the line up is unbalanced. While that could prove true on offense defensively this line up works. Taking Ariza out and inserting Stanley Johnson at the 4 allows LeBron to play his preferred position of small forward. With a front court of Davis, Johnson and James you have size, strength and speed. All three can guard 1-5, with help, and it allows Russ and Bradley to work on forcing guys away from their strengths on the perimeter. Nobody stops a good NBA player, you take something away. Bradley is good, if not still great, at doing that. What he’s been missing, as has the entire team, has been an elite defender in his prime in the paint. Dwight isn’t that guy anymore, he needs to be used in match ups that allow him to be bruising and vertical, he’s not as mobile as he was even two seasons ago. COVID hasn’t helped him, either, as he looks like he’s getting winded quicker than I’ve ever seen him.
2. Ariza’s DNP-CD. I applaud Trevor for being a gamer and going out and trying his hardest. It’s not his fault he’s old, it happens to everyone. But Trevor needs to work on his shot off the floor and get his legs back in some meaningful way before he sees a bigger role. Spot minutes up until the All Star break, garbage time minutes and role of “break glass in case of emergency” are what we need from him right now. I think he can be helpful in certain situations in a 7 game series and his presence in the locker room as both an NBA champ and vet is useful. On the court his game needs a lot of work and it feels unfair to demand a lot of him right now. Keep your head up, keep working, that shot will come back and hopefully you can make some plays in the playoffs when your number is called.
3. Malik Monk microwave scorer. While I think Monk works as a starter it’s probably better for the team if he comes off the bench in a role like we saw last night. The ebbs and flows of an NBA game are real, when starters go out and the bench come in the dynamics of the game change. Guys let down a lot of the time when they see a superstar take the pine for a break. Monk can exploit those moments better than any other Laker off the bench right now. Maybe Nunn could as well, he hasn’t played and who knows how long it’ll take for him to get up to game speed when he does. Frankly, we can’t keep waiting for guys anymore anyhow. Monk was the second leading scorer for the team off the bench in a performance that reminded me of super sub Lou Williams. One of three Lakers to reach double figures in scoring with 22 and he shot the ball great. If w can count on Monk for something akin to this every game, maybe get some spot starts depending or if a guy needs a game off or something, we have some pieces on the board we can start to count on consistently.
4. Gotta love Melo. They’re not all smart or good shots, he’s borderline absurd when it comes to shot selection honestly, and his defense can be more of a grabbing pushing kinda thing but…I don’t care. You need a gunner with no conscience and with Anthony you get that. There are things he doesn’t bring to the table and I get that, not every player is perfect…well, maybe LeBron is…but other than that you get warts of one kind or another. That’s where the coach comes in and, as we’ve seen, Frank may not be the best regular season coach but is great at adjustments in 7 game series.
5. The young guys. I don’t count Monk in this one, he’s in his 5th year. THT and Austin Reaves are whom I consider to be the young guys and are what will potentially be the building blocks of a future version of the Lakers or chips to cash in on a trade. I don’t see much happening simply because our best offer is essentially a salary dump. Monk and Nunn don’t come with any kind of Bird Rights and will be difficult to retain in the summer for almost every team, THT has honestly taken a pretty large step back in his game and doesn’t feel worth the price we’re paying for him. Reaves has hit the rookie wall, at least in terms of his shot-making ability although he still has a lot of hustle. Those are the trading chips. The ghosts of Kent Bazemore and DeAndre Jordan aren’t making a GM any more excited than any of us get when we hear their names. I actually like Kent and am glad he’s on the team, I still see him having an impact at some point on down the line and both he and DAJ have accepted their fate with grace and style. But including either in a trade is ridiculous, honestly, nobody wants those guys. Reaves and Monk move needles but we’ll need them so unless it’s for someone who improves the defense and the offense you have to say no.

Another good test against a more complete team looms in Philly tomorrow. We need to keep winning now, the Clippers have found a groove, Denver is playing better and better, the Timberwolves are playing their best basketball in years and Dallas has caught fire. That’s the competition right now. We need to win 30 games before we lose 27, obviously the fewer the losses the better. Need to move up the .500’s towards a .600 winning percentage if we want to be taken seriously and create the foundation for a winning culture this season. Treading water is no longer an option.

Until the Lakers can figure out how to play defense nothing else matters. One could choose to quibble over this or that but it truly does not matter. When you give up 50+% shooting from everywhere, allow the other team to just dominate you in the paint with no resistance, and in general play without energy you will lose the game. Every time. That, Lakerholics, is exactly what happened today.

1. Compete. Written that word too much this season. Lakers did not show up ready to compete which is inexcusable on multiple levels. From the coaches to the Gatorade person, show up with some kind of intention that you will be competing. Play with energy, focus and intent to win. Showing up is not enough, I don’t care what the resume’ has on it. Lazy 35 foot shots, often quite early ion the shot clock, are not a recipe for a success and certainly not a comeback. Our screen roll coverages are a joke right now. Compete boys or just pack it up and save us all the drama.
2. Three point game is not our strength. Hasn’t really been all season long. Not sure what Rob was thinking this summer but it’s obvious it isn’t working in terms of “improving” the offense. Our offense stinks. We don’t get the specialists shots which begs the question why we play them at all? If you’re not going to get Wayne going from the outside why are we playing him at all? At least when we had Wes you could argue he had a presence on defense. No, the three ball is not the weapon the Lakers need to focus on right now. Frankly, the offensive end isn’t where the largest issues lie, either.
3. Too many donuts. Sometimes I really do wonder what this team works on between games. If it’s defense I don’t see it translating on the court. If it’s specific shots we don’t see them executed on the floor. Ariza, in his 17th season, ought to know where he can make a shot from. Donut. Dwight played 11 minutes…donut. Also couldn’t defend the paint against a stream of Miami players. Reaves is a rookie and has had an uneven distribution of minutes but also brought a donut to work.
4. LeBron continued his 25+ point streak!!! Congrats on your Spirit award, Mr. James. We need more on defense at this point. Especially when you play center which isn’t really working anymore.
5. A late push? Cute. Seen it this season and it’s Fool’s Gold. We’re mediocre, at best, and simply not good enough to rely on a few minutes of “Wow…we’re getting our asses kicked tonight…again. Time to play hard guys!!!” every few games. Had they played like that all game literally everything would have been different. They didn’t. Show up consistently. Play hard consistently. Don’t worry about streaks, stats, or the record books. Be better.

Getting AD back will help a little but we have a lot of issues. Westbrook’s fit, a lack of players with anything resembling defensive acumen or pedigree, and a general lack of competitive spirit from the tip. Late rallies should be needed every so often not once a week. We can’t even reliably beat bad teams, which has been the biggest issue, in all honesty. Had we shown an ability to beat inferior teams and come up short against top teams that would be one thing. We play down to everyone, get up for no one and spend a lot of time preaching patience. Well, we’re coming up on 2/3’s of the way through the season. Patience and time are ever-dwindling luxuries.

It was certainly more of a contest than one might have expected. But, given the Lakers’ struggles against young teams this season, the win was more than enough. Solid contributions from across the board, LeBron’s 25+ ppg streak continued, and for one night more things went right than went wrong.

1. Westbrook bounces back from benching. You don’t play at the level Russ has without being able to turn the page on a bad game. Or two. Or…well, you catch my drift. The fit might not be the best. A mid-season trade seems all but impossible (to me, anyway) and so there remains but one thing to do: figure out how to make it work the best that it can. We’ve seen it in glimpses but it hasn’t found a “sustain” feature, yet. Maybe the long road trip can be the lab where that happens, away from the home crowd pressure, away LA, and among the team we would all like to see play better.
2. Ariza better on defense, still looking for his shot. I thought this was Trevor’s best game of the season. He was able to better execute our game plan on D which is essential for making this team work. He also took the open shots that came his way, most of them just didn’t go in. That’s OK, for now, after not playing for almost the entire season his legs aren’t where they need to be. Seeing him execute the defensive game plan better is a step in the right direction and something we need more of. Playing with LeBron a lot helps his +/-.
3. LeBron keeps playing at a high level. For my part I’d prefer if LeBron keep it to 5 3 PT FGA/game. Unless he’s hot we really shouldn’t see too many 30+ foot shots or early shot clock threes. The corner three he hit off a pass was a great example of the kind of three point shots I think we want LeBron and our specialists shooting more of. LeBron has a 16 game streak of 25+ points going currently and he kept that up against the Magic last night as they couldn’t contain him. Especially in the second half when we went back to him at the 5. There are definitely some teams/match ups that I think Dwight is the better option for. Back-to-backs, as well, I think would be a situation where I would like to see LBJ at the 5 in half closing scenarios. Against teams that are either unsure about their low post identity or don’t have a strong presence in the paint it’s OK. The biggest issue with LeBron at the five is a lack of a rim deterrent and rebounding. Figure out how to balance that out, or when to play Dwight, and this should work better.
4. Carmelo’s road game shows up. It’s been a season long issue. Not only just with Melo, although his home/road splits are fairly dramatic, but with the whole Laker bench. They show up at Crypto, not so much on the road. Carmelo showed us some vintage basketball and then got hot from three, as well, to the tune of 23 points. While the rest of the bench didn’t have quite the same impact (only Monk and Johnson managed to score 10+ points) they all did their part to help bring him the win. I’ll add that it looks to me like Reaves is hitting a bit of a rookie wall as both his defense and outside shot have leveled off a lot lately. THT had his traditional low-impact game after a big one and Johnson continues to play at a steady level off the bench which is great to see since that is where his role would be should he stick past the 10-day.
5. Better defense is a must. We still have to be a lot better on that end of the floor. We simply lack the firepower, especially without AD, to just outscore teams. Sending the young Magic to the line 29 times and letting them score in the paint like they did just can’t continue to happen. Against one of the worst teams in the Association we eked out a win. We won’t be so fortunate against even mediocre teams, like we saw in Indy. Against top teams we’ll get blown out. So something has to happen. If we can outscore teams with LeBron at the five every single games than that could be the answer but the problem is we don’t. We sieve paint points and rebounds while not creating quality shots of our own. So, if we’re going forward with James at the five he, too, has to adjust his game to operate closer to the rim and not further from it. We need to see us not miss the backdoor cut…repeatedly…like we did last night. Above all we need to find it within ourselves to play a higher quality of defense. If not this is done and it’s done now. There will be no late season surge or player we get back that alters that identity. If the guys playing now can’t figure it out it’s likely we’ll see an entirely new team in training camp. Again. For the third season. After winning a title…using defense.

Next up is a very early game against the Miami. Never a good combo. But the Lakers won’t have to leave the state of Florida so maybe they can get they can get acclimated to the EST vibe and come out with some intensity. Miami has powered it’s way to 3rd in the EC among a slew of injuries to key players. Sound familiar? However, that team takes the defensive end a lot more seriously and there is no question that Spo has the team’s attention. So, we’ll see. I don’t have high hopes we can win, to be honest, but if we can get some good play off the bench and James and Westbrook can be as efficient as they were against the Magic we have a shot. I suppose that’s the best this version of the Lakers can muster right now.