The fallacy is it’s more likely that the good game by Drummond against the Suns a week ago was an outlier because he has traditionally not played well against teams with a high powered center or strong team defense. The issue is many of his stats seem to be empty stats that don’t move the game.
The coach’s job is to create schemes on offense and defense that optimize his players and make it easier to win games. It’s not just rolling the ball out and expecting LeBron and AD to play like superstars and win. It’s about creating a scheme that optimizes their skillsets on offense and defense.
Both the stats and the eye test are telling us that playing Drummond at the five with LeBron and AD is not that scheme. Obviously, Pelinka and Vogel must believe differently and that the problem is we have not had enough time and games to get the James, Davis, and Drummond Big Three working.
If you agree with that thinking, you’re going to change your mind once it costs us a rare shot at our 18th NBA championship. The Drummond experiment could easily result in a first or second round loss for the Lakers.
On the plus side, the Lakers took 45 threes tonight, something I wish they would do more often. On the negative side, they only made 13 of them and went 1 for 13 in the fourth quarter.
On the plus side, they held the Heat to 35 points in the second half and just 15 in the 4th quarter. On the negative side, they allowed 61 points in the first half and played most of the game from behind.
On the plus side, Kuz played excellent defense and rebounded well, Wes defended Jimmy well. On the negative side, Kuz didn’t shoot that well and Wes missed a wide open game winner/
On the plus side, they stole the inbounc pass and had a change to tie or win the game. On the negative side, Alex Caruso continued his poor play and missed the shot to tie the game giving him another ‘zero’ game.
On the plus side, we almost pulled off the win and only lost by 2 points with two starters and our second superstar out. On the negative side, close only counts in horseshoes.
Spoelstra outcoached Vogel and was literally laughing at our offense when LeBron is off the court.
Our offense is a toilet bowl without a true PG. When LeBron and Schroder are not on the floor, there’s no one to create a shot for themselves or others. Fact.